Momus (1) (1960–)

This is filthy. Incest acts or jokes every few pages, a dad with a cock that drags on the ground, a prominent character named Molester, etc. In tone BOOK OF JOKES recalls the bawdy, early Barth stuff, or that David Sedaris essay about the sub-literate porno novel, and in tone and style this reminds me very much of Daniel Handler's ADVERBS. The premise here is a family, the Skeletons, live in a glass house and are for some reason totally beholden to tasteless jokes. Laws of jokes dictate their lives. That's it. Really. I would guess this book was written for me, specifically, or possibly other people who are both pretty serious Comedy nerds (Scharpling and Wurster bits affect my speech patterns) and hardcore Lit geeks (Hi, everyone reading this!). So, hella spoilers ahead:

The novel alternates chapters between the big-dicked dad (currently in prison with his [eventual:] friends, the Murderer and the aforementioned Molester), and the big-dicked dad's son, who happens to be the grandson of the old man in the "how would you rather die? Peacefully in your sleep like your grandpa did, or screaming like the passengers on the bus he was driving?" joke. The really bad, tasteless jokes, which frame most of the chapters, aren't actually told, usually. They're examined and dissected, redirected, and honestly, made really really funny. The Aristocrats, famously disgusting and unfunny joke of the documentary 'The Aristocrats', makes a brief appearance with an even less satisfying, thus more satisfying, ending. Elaborate set pieces are created only to serve the often absurd punchline, and then reused from another angle to hold another punchline, or to multiply the first, or show up surprisingly framed within another punchline. Am I making this seem like just a string of naughty zings and clever shit? I hope not. It's more. Dalkey Archive Press, after all. Serious Literature. It happens to contain a string of naughty punchlines, though.

There isn't a plot, really. A few pointless arcs, mainly there to serve the jokes. I guess the plot may be more of a personal thing, as this book's plot is mostly open spaces, with room for your relationship to a bunch of jokes you may or may not have heard, and for your reaction to a rethinking and retelling of these cultural touchstones, which are gathered into something like a narrative and end with a weirdly touching resolution of punchlines, a finale which up until this point you hadn't realized possible, feasible or needed (Wow!). The author's father is a linguist, by the way. Brother is a type of deconstructionist somethingorother. Words matter to this Momus dude, despite his dumb nom de plume.
This is a great example of a really neat idea carried to its logical ends for no other reason than the ride, the show; but in the showing, the molesting and dick-dragging, something else happens: joy. I mean, a book full of jokes that work, told in pretty language? Joyous. The humor opens your guts, in way. Speeds you along. Humor is undeniable. Jokes are stories. Try to dislike something you're laughing at (or with). Jokes are storytelling at risk: either the audience laughs or they don't. You're good or you're bad. BOOK OF JOKES is good.

I love this book. I was going with 4 stars, but in writing this review I've grown to love it even more. 5 stars, assholes. Read it.
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