2008-09-19 Those spoof reviews...

I'm not particularly fond of Littlejohn's writing style, but at least this book of his surpasses the sarcastic, witless, banal, condescending drivel that smears most pages of these mock 5-star reviews. And at least, though he likes to repeat himself, he has the excuse of being the sole author of his repetitions. These spoof reviews are drenched with the worst kind of elitism, but each author seems unable to unable to match his (or hers, pardon) terrifying smugness with even the slightest hint of original thought. Why don't you keep your aloof, clueless chitter-chatterings amongst yourselves? Committing them to the written word over here only reveals how herdlike you really are.

Did you think you were being clever in your attempts at humorous criticism? Perhaps, next time, all of you could try and do something a little bit different from one another; you know, perhaps one of you, instead of throwing down a famous quote, or name dropping a few obvious philosophers (because of course, nobody who disagrees with you has ever read any of them) - maybe one of you could actually provide a sensible account of what you do actually believe? Perhaps you could even relate it to a sensible account of why Littlejohn is wrong, if you could manage stooping so low...

I could be accused of being just as hypocritical as these dear reviewers, because I haven't revealed much of substance in the way of where I stand on this book. However, these priggish reviews do all the work for me, and any sensible, thinking, sane English person, really. Even if Littlejohn's book is full of inconsistencies and flaws, at least he spares us the cringe-inducing heights of self-flattery that these reviews seem to be basking in. Some of his complaints about this wondrous country and its "fascist left" also happen to be damn true, however badly he words them, and he actually has things to say that go beyond worshipping his own superiority, which is more than can be said of the reviews over here.