I don\u2019t read the winners of the National Book Award, the Booker or the Giller Prize or any other major literary prize.<\/p>\n
But I do read the winning titles of the Diagram Prize, which is bestowed on the book with the silliest title. I\u2019m almost certain that the titles are better than the books themselves. Furthermore, the pleasure or gratification is instantaneous. Why waste time reading the book?<\/p>\n
The 2013 winner is Goblinproofing One\u2019s Chicken Coop<\/i>, by Reginald Bakeley. \u00a0To my disappointment and surprise, it beat God\u2019s Doodle: the Life and Times of the Penis, <\/i>by Tom Hickman.<\/i> \u00a0It lost by this much.<\/p>\n
In 1978, to fend off boredom at the Frankfurt Book Fair, some book distributors (Diagram Group) thought it might be a \u201cpasse-temps\u201d to offer a prize for the most bizarre book title. That year the prize went to Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice.<\/i> I was blissfully unaware that some mice actually sported vestments.<\/p>\n
Some of my favorite winners are Greek Rural Postmen and Their Cancellation Numbers<\/i> (1996), Cooking with Poo (2011), <\/i>and what might be considered a companion volume, How to Shit in the Woods: An Environmentally Sound Approach to a Lost Art<\/i> (1989). Worldcat shows, that somehow, 173 libraries acquired the 1989 edition, while 253 opted for the 1994 reprint. \u00a0Cracks in the approval plans?<\/p>\n
Only 3 libraries dared purchase Cooking with Poo<\/i> -all of them Australian. If scatological titles don\u2019t sit well with you, perhaps The Stray Shopping Carts of Eastern North America: A Guide to Field Identification<\/i> (2006) or Butterworths Corporate Manslaughter Service<\/i> (2001) might pique your interest. The last named should be a futuristic detective novel, but it isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
Fresh out of Iibrary school, I considered purchasing The Madam as Entrepreneur: Career Management in House Prostitution<\/i> (1979) if only to prominently display the book cover as I rode the subway, but I was finishing Sophie\u2019s Choice<\/i> (Styron) and promised myself Shibumi <\/i>(Trevanian) next.<\/p>\n
I eagerly anticipate the list of contenders for the 2014 Prize; be still my beating heart.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I don\u2019t read the winners of the National Book Award, the Booker or the Giller Prize or any other major literary prize. But I do read the winning titles of the Diagram Prize, which is bestowed on the book with … Continue reading