The Satirist - America's Most Critical Journal

A Modest Proposal - To Convert Shopping Malls Into Prisons. Converting shopping malls into prisons could be a boon for the U.S. economy.

Are You a Conspiracy Theorist? Take the Test!

Psychedelic Re-education: A Policy Proposal for the Incarcerated Just give prisoners drugs to calm them down.

King Willie The Slick, Then Junior Bushleague. Once upon a time in the United States of Amnesia lived a king called King Willie The Slick. Now King Willie was a popular king, known throughout the land for his big smile and feathery head of hair. But one day King Willie the Slick was caught smoking a cigar that had been dipped in the sweet nectar of a harmonica flower... More

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Cult Leaders gives valuable advice to those seeking to start their own lucrative religious cults. Conceptualize your cult!

The Breyers-Devere Probe of Human Worth is an online personality test (Myers-Briggs Satire). Are you an AEIOÜ? The Breyers Probe measures five personality categories, as opposed to merely four used by Myers-Briggs. If you want to know who you are, then Take the Test!

Letter from Saint Nicholas to the Tax Inspector: A Poem

The New Dictionary of American Cultural Literacy. Key American cultural terms such as "Cool" and "Like" are defined. Browse The Cultural Dictionary

Genesis Satire: The Story of Adam and Steve

Guidoism: A Historical, Gendered Study — The roots of Guidoism go back much further than you think.

Disney's "Genesis" describes Disney's latest venture into the Bible.

Disney's King David. Disney bravely depicts Old Testament sex and violence.

Disney's "The Book of Revelations" is a beautiful animated rendition of the Biblical apocalypse.

Disney's "Animal Farm" and "1984" reviews Disney's attempt at two George Orwell masterpieces.

Quentin Tarantino's Harder repackages Tarantino's familiar cinematic tactics.

Jake Steiger: The Great Director reviews the career of the critically acclaimed movie director.

Thomas Pynchon's Dys - imaginary review of a modern Pynchon conspiracy work.

John Irving's The Third Leg sees Irving recycle his familiar themes.

William Faulkner's Sons of the South shows his unique command of deranged first-person narration.

America's media-saturated popular culture has neglected the contributions of serious artists and thinkers.

Imaginary Biographies chronicles the life and works of the most important overlooked creative geniuses of our time.

Sazonov: Russia's Greatest Poet? traces the hapless life of Maxim Sazonov, who may have been either a total idiot, or the greatest poet in Russian history.

Felix Spielenhammer: The Heavy Mahler reviews the life and works of an avant-garde German composer and musicologist.

Claude Roget: Philosopher Or Fraud? retells the life and works of Roget, a French philosopher whose possible plagiarisms eventually led to his downfall from the heights of academe.

The Anti-Artist reviews a Washington, DC exhibition of the great artist, Karl Kinski.

Hans Donkerzijde and His Amsterdam Portal tells the story of the most ludicrous failure of golden age Dutch architecture.

New Faulkner Novel Found heralds the discovery of a lost William Faulkner manuscript, Sons of the South.

Dr. Claire Hoyt: "Shrink to the Stars" laments the loss of Dr. Hoyt, who treated famous Hollywood stars, but failed to keep their secrets.

Alexandra: True Psychic tells the life story of an honest psychic

Novels

An Accidental Family (The Adolescent) — Fyodor Dostoevsky. Powerful, underrated portrait of adolescence in crisis.

The Air-Conditioned Nightmare — Henry Miller. Henry Miller's On The Road.

Alice's Adventures In Wonderland — Lewis Carroll.

The Celestine Prophecy — James Redfield. A fantasy validation of New Age beliefs.

A Clockwork Orange — Anthony Burgess. Interesting little book might have been forgotten but for Kubrick’s movie.

Cracking India — Bapsi Sidhwa. An engaging and extremely well-written story of a young girl growing up in Pakistan, at the time of the partition of India.

The Corrections. — Jonathan Franzen. A funny, convincing portrait of an American family at the end of the 20th century.

Even Cowgirls Get the Blues — Tom Robbins. Clever language shrouding a weak story with philosophical trappings.

The Crying Of Lot 49 — Thomas Pynchon. Pynchon's short masterpiece on the distortion of communication leads to innumerable interpretations.

The Fourth Hand — John Irving. John Irving must have quickly dashed off and polished this funny, feather-light book.

Freedom — Jonathan Franzen. Franzen solidifies his reputation with a worthy follow-up to The Corrections

Gravity's Rainbow —Thomas Pynchon. "Gravity's Rainbow: The V-2 Rocket Cartel as Multinational Corporate Conspiracy".  At its center, Pynchon's great novel shows us the nature of corporate power during World War II.

The Handmaid's Tale — Margaret Atwood.

Hapworth 16, 1924 — J.D. Salinger. Salinger's anticlimatic last published work on the Glass family.

J.D. Salinger – In Memoriam. Future generations may never understand the unique affection Salinger's readers felt for Salinger and his characters.

Inherent Vice — Thomas Pynchon. Pynchon for the Masses! A funny, nostalgic surprise for Pynchon fans everywhere.

Life After God — Douglas Coupland. Gen-X Fast Food

Look Homeward, Angel — Thomas Wolfe. Beautiful passages, pasted together by Scribners editor Max Perkins.

Outer Dark — Cormac McCarthy. McCarthy's vision is unrelentingly dark.

The Picture of Dorian Gray — Oscar Wilde. An interesting idea, but kind of icky.

A Prayer for Owen Meany — John Irving. The Sorrow of American Sports. Another funny John Irving production.

A Son of the Circus — John Irving. As hilarious as anything he's written.

Swann's Way — Marcel Proust. I agree with the publisher who said: "I fail to see why it takes thirty pages to describe a man turning over in bed." Yet the Swann-Odette courtship is a profound meditation on desire.

Tyrannicide: The Story of the Second American Revolution (a novel) — Evan Keliher. Hilarious skewering of DC corruption.

Vineland — Thomas Pynchon. America as a "Scabland Garrison State"

A Widow For One Year — John Irving. Hilarious opening is not sustained.

Winesburg, Ohio — Sherwood Anderson. Novel or stories?

Plays

The Cocktail Party — T.S. Eliot. A play with rhythmic dialogue, and ponderous themes.

Philosophy

The Genealogy Of Morals — Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche's greatest work, featuring sustained arguments rather than incisive fragments.

Man's Search for Meaning — Viktor Frankl. Frankl's Logotherapy School (discovering our purpose heals us) was inspired by Frankl's own experience as a concentration camp survivor.

Parables of Kierkegaard — Soren Kierkegaard. More readable than most philosophy. Kierkegaard's fascinating, little stories illustrate his theories.

Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature — Richard Rorty. For Rorty, philosophy is one part of a changing cultural dialogue that will always address the questions of one era, without having answered any previously asked philosophical questions.

The Psychoanalytic Movement — Ernest Gellner. Probing and hilarious critique of the West's embrace of psychoanalysis to describe behavior and emotion.

Religion

The Book of J — Harold Bloom. Genesis is great literature, not the intended foundation of world religions.

The Four Noble Truths — The Dalai Lama. Excellent summary of Buddhist tenets

The Gnostic Gospels — Elaine Pagels. Controversial history of early Christianity

The Gospel According To Jesus — Stephen Mitchell. A noted translator's attempt to identify the authentic sayings of Jesus, and uncover their spiritual meaning.

The Kabbalah of Money — Rabbi Nilton Bonder. Money is an ineffable mystery. But it’s ok to make lots of it.

Omens of Millenium — Harold Bloom. Strange, fascinating work on Gnosticism, religious history

Zen At Work — Les Kaye. IBM was nice and let the author be a zen monk. So he wrote about it.

Criticism

The Anxiety Of Influence — Harold Bloom.

The Conquest of Cool — Thomas Frank. 60s Counterculture as unwitting shill for Madison Avenue

The Erotic Silence of the American Wife — Dalma Heyn. It's OK for women to cheat too.

New Close Readings of The Crying of Lot 49 — Robert E. Kohn

The Western Canon — Harold Bloom. After some anti-PC rants, 26 rich essays on some of the West's greatest books.

History

The First Salute: A View of the American Revolution — Barbara Tuchman. Barbara Tuchman's compelling view on the American Revolution highlights the key role played by The Netherlands in the struggle, first as arms merchant via Saint Eustatius (Dutch Antilles), and later as creditor and ally.

The Island at the Centre of the World: The Untold Story of the Founding of New York — Russell Shorto. The Dutch impact on New York (New Amsterdam) was much greater than you think.

Nixonland — Rick Perlstein. Colorful, electric chronicle of the political history of 1964-72, and the Nixonian comeback (and repression).

The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy — Jacob Burckhardt. Often hilarious account of political struggles in Renaissance Italy.

From Dawn To Decadence — Jacques Barzun. Masterful survey of western civilization since Renaissance finds 20th century to be without much decent art since Cubism.

Modern Times — Paul Johnson. An engaging portrait of the giant political figures during the 20th century, the age of moral relativism.

Technology

Engines of Creation — K. Eric Drexler. Nanotechnology. How will it all turn out?

The Holographic Universe — Michael Talbot. Is the universe one big hologram?

How Buildings Learn — Stewart Brand. Buildings should be designed for reuse, not for magazine covers.

Essays

Learning Dutch describes one man's fledgling efforts to master the Dutch tongue.

Cycling in Amsterdam - There may not be hills, but battling the elements is no picnic.

Weather In Holland - Does it rain every single day? The eternal question.

Smoking As Religion describes the similarities between smoking and religion.

Letter To Republicans: Why You Should Not Vote for George W. Bush.

The 2000 Presidential Debates laments the scripted and unenlightening debates between Al Gore and George W. Bush for the year 2000 Presidential Elections.

The Big Lebowski (1998). Lebowski remains the Coen brothers' funniest movie.

Bob Roberts (1992). Tim Robbins' ruthless satire of American politics.

Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969) This funny, sexy comedy shows the limits of sexual freedom.

Canadian Bacon (1995). Michael Moore's 1995 comedy about a wag-the-dog war against Canada rings true today.

Citizen Kane (1941). Orson Welles' classic satire about Hearst and media sensationalism.

Dr. Strangelove (1964). Landmark satire took on the military establishment.

Fargo (1996). Yes, it is brilliant, but why do people love this movie so much?

I'm Not There (2007). I'm Not There will be fun for Dylanologists, but others may find its riffs on Dylan lore slow going.

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003). Quentin Tarantino pushes the envelope of violence still further.

Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004). Tarantino's comic book action/adventure is rivetting, but probably a waste of Tarantino's talent.

Pulp Fiction (1994). Pulp Fiction gives us violence in broad daylight, hip dialogue and circular structure.

The Royal Tenenbaums (2001). Love it or hate it, this is a movie where you see more the second time around.

Rushmore (1998). Wes Anderson's breakthrough movie paved the way for The Royal Tenenbaums.

The Social Network (2010). Fast-moving, entertaining movie about the origins of Facebook.

I watch Boston Public and I'm Ashamed reviews the sensationalist high school TV drama.

Fast Food Satori - a short sketch of a character standing in McDonald’s thinking he lost his mind, but that might be a good thing.

My First Cubicle - relates a young man's nightmare job at Golden Publishing in Florida. But it’s supposed to be funny.

Fridays at The Blind Pig’s Pub - relates a young man’s humorously inept attempts at meaningful human contact with an eclectic set of people in a Florida bar. But it’s supposed to be funny.

The Satirist — September 2009 News

• Americans Protest Public Healthcare, Retirement Benefits, Student Loans, and Public Water

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