Books about Slapstick from Amazon.com

Slapstick presents an apocalyptic vision seen through the eyes of the current King of Manhattan (and last President of the United States), a wickedly irreverent look at the all-too-possible results of today’s follies. But even the end of life-as-we-know-it is transformed by Vonnegut’s pen into hilarious farce (a final slapstick that may be the Almighty’s joke on us all.)

“Vonnegut’s ongoing puppet show…that fabulous is reborn.”—John Updike

“Both funny and sad…just about perfect!”—Los Angeles Times

“Imaginative and hilarious…a brilliant vision of our wrecked, wacked-out future.”—Hartford Courant

*The New York Times.
Price: $7.50 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Keaton's autobiography, My Wonderful World of Slapstick, is our only record of the quirky mind behind the stoic face. Filled with stories about his childhood in vaudeville where, billed as 'The Human Mop, ' he was slammed on the floor, hurled into wings, banged on the bass drum-by his father!.
Price: $11.30 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Meet Me...Don't Delete Me! is a very unique book on Internet dating. It not only gives great advice about dating online, but also includes funny, zany stories and hilarious photos. The author uses her own personal experiences to let you know you're not out there alone! Internet dating is a fun, exciting way of meeting tons of people. This book reminds us that even the worst date can be the funniest story at any get together. Find out:

How to post the right photo

How long to correspond before meeting

When and where to meet

What to say and what NOT to say

How to screen for the best and safest results

How to laugh at the author's mistakes, all made

so YOU don't have to

AND lots more!
So put down the TV remote and the Twinkie and find out how to jump start your love life..
Price: $12.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Melds philosophical analysis with early cinematic history to develop a fresh theory of the notion of comedy..
Price: $21.94 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Film

An enthusiast's look at American comedies and the physical comedians who made them great.

Legendary screen comedian Jerry Lewis once said, "The premise of all comedy is a man in trouble " The films that endeared Lewis and others to us hinged on the physical assault of their hero, the pie in the face or slip on the banana peel that reduced the movie star to the level of the audience. Comedy Is a Man in Trouble presents the legacy of physical humor from the performances of vaudeville actors and circus clowns-who coined the term "slapstick" by playfully and noisily beating each other with wooden paddles-to its ongoing popularity today in the films of Jim Carrey and the Farrelly brothers.

Alan Dale's personal and passionate tour of movie slapstick begins with an original assessment of the work of famed silent clowns Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd, and Buster Keaton. Dale rejects the long-held notion that the talent of these comedians lies in their ability to combine comedy and tragedy and suggests that their riotous imaginations and their physical grace revealed greatness in comedy for its own sake. A decade later the Marx Brothers exploited the new technology of sound film in their fast-paced verbal exchanges-and, in doing so, invented a verbal form of slapstick later exploited by directors such as Preston Sturges and Howard Hawks. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Jerry Lewis energetically revised and combined the physical and verbal humor of his predecessors for a new generation of viewers.

Comedy Is a Man in Trouble presents a lively, accessible, and lavishly illustrated look at a form of comedy that has its origins in ancient Greece and in American vaudeville and has been expanded and refashioned in film by everyone from W. C. Fields and Marion Davies to Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. Here is not only an amusing look at film comedy history, but an insight into the human condition and what causes us to laugh.

Alan Dale worked at a Los Angeles talent agency before earning a Ph.D. in comparative literature from Princeton University. He lives in Hoboken, New Jersey.

Translation Inquiries: University of Minnesota Press.
Price: $28.99 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Bernardo Walterhaus is a detective on a mission: find a missing heiress that no one else can seem to locate. But this is no ordinary detective. Bernardo Walterhaus is the self-proclaimed "world's greatest detective," on the run from forced imprisonment in the Lombardo Institute For The Mentally Sub-Standard and yearning to save the day. The Mayor of Oberwalz is trying to put him back in the Institute (and wants him dead), his ex-partner hates his guts (and wants him dead), there are mercenaries following him (who want him dead), and he's hours behind everyone
else on the case. But that won't stop Bernardo Walterhaus.

Armed with cunning wit, tremendous luck, and an unerring ability to find trouble, Bernardo will solve the case with the help of his driver and bodyguard, Ching Dic-Tofon, his favorte cab driver, "Sugah" Brown, and a pack of "Oberwalz's finest," the most vulgar and violent cops you could have on your side.

Bernardo will find an unlikely solution, without a clue or a good idea, as long as the mercenaries, gnomes, orderlies, exploding castles, fake Germans, angry competitors, plane crashes, burning office buildings, board meetings, boiling chocolate, fratboys, and criminal masterminds don't get him first.

A Bernardo Walterhaus novel, hand-crafted from aged mahogany by Ryan Speck..
Price: $3.19 [Notify me when price goes down.]