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"Mike and Jon, Jon and Mike—I've known them both for years, and, clearly, one of them is very funny. As for the other: truly one of the great hangers-on of our time."—Steve Bodow, head writer, The Daily Show
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"Who can really judge what's funny? If humor is a subjective medium, then can there be something that is really and truly hilarious? Me. This book."—Daniel Handler, author, Adverbs, and personal representative of Lemony Snicket
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"The good news: I thought Our Kampf was consistently hilarious. The bad news: I’m the guy who wrote Monkeybone."—Sam Hamm, screenwriter, Batman, Batman Returns, and Homecoming
December 19, 2006
OUR KAMPF FAQ
How can I buy Our Kampf?
Our Kampf is available via Amazon and Powell's, just like a normal book that doesn't kill you seven days after you read it. A limited number of copies are also available directly from me for $19.95 via Paypal, using the button below. The price includes shipping and an inscription of your choice.
What IS Our Kampf?
I appreciate that you asked how to buy it before asking what it is. This site needs more readers like you.
Anyway, it's a humor collection by Michael Gerber and me. Much of it first appeared in the New Yorker, Atlantic, New York Times, etc. and on Saturday Night Live and NPR's The Next Big Thing. You can find some excerpts here, here, here and here.
To some degree it's in the tradition of Woody Allen's Without Feathers or Ian Frazier's Dating Your Mom. But unlike them, it's a big hodgepodge of different forms: along with New Yorker-style pieces, it has sketches, Weekend Update jokes, charts, forms, radio schedules, and the world's most difficult crossword puzzle. It may be closest to the Harvard Lampoon Big Book of College Life, if you've ever seen that.
Why is it called Our Kampf?
Well, certainly not because both Mike and I were cloned from one of Hitler's eyelashes, smuggled out of his bunker in the final days of the Third Reich. And even if that were true, there's no way you could make it stand up in court!
Also, it just made us laugh to compare the struggles we experienced trying to get our 750-word humor pieces published to the "struggle" of the 20th century's greatest psychopath.
What is Our Kampf printed on?
It may be printed on vellum, since I'm not sure what vellum is.
Why should I buy Our Kampf?
(1) Eternal life. I know other humor books promise this, but only Our Kampf delivers. Just please don't scream when you find out exactly how it works. (See the "seven days" part, above.)
seven days
(2) It's genuinely funny. And, by purchasing it you'll be supporting this site.
Posted at December 19, 2006 05:39 AM | TrackBackIf you must dedicate this vile knock-off to me, please spell my name correctly:
RUDOLF HESS
Stellvertreter des Fuehrers
Reichsminister a.D.
somewhere in Argentina
Rudolf,
My apologies; now corrected.
Good luck with your secret mission to England!
Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 19, 2006 09:10 AMI thought Mein Kampf was pretty funny, so I'll try Our Kampf.
If you can, please have it signed by Ahmadinejad! Vielen Dank.
I thought Rudolf was the reindeer.
Posted by: Jesus B. Ochoa at December 19, 2006 11:38 AMOnly by PayPal?
Posted by: Jesus B. Ochoa at December 19, 2006 11:40 AMOnly by PayPal?
From now through Christmas, yes (though remember you don't need a Paypal account to use it -- just a major credit card).
Soon after Christmas it will be available via Amazon.
Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 19, 2006 12:26 PMOf course, your book will be competing with
MEIN KRAMPF
by former speaker Hastert, the heartwarming story of one man's battle against and victory over acid reflux and bloating. The bloating has not been fully conquered. It's a professional affliction, dontcha know.
Surely that's dedicated to Rudolf Hess, not 'dictated' to him?
Posted by: Nell at December 19, 2006 02:20 PMNo, Mein Kampf was actually dictated to Hess. (And some other guy.) I guess Hitler just talked and talked and talked and then they tried to turn it into something reasonably coherent.
Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 19, 2006 02:35 PMHitler dictated the first half of "Mein Kampf" to fellow prisoners Rudolf Hess and Emile Maurice in Landesberg prison in 1924. He wrote the second half, after his release, in 1925.
Now, the original title was supposed to be : "Viereinhalb Jahre (des Kampfes) gegen Luege, Dummheit und Feigheit."
("Four-and-a-half years (of struggle) against lies, stupidity and cowardice.")
Woulda been read by as many people as read a dissertation on the early unpublished poetry of Emily Dickinson.
What a difference a title makes.
What a difference a title makes.
Or a name, as others have previously observed.
Heil Schickelgruber!
Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 19, 2006 04:15 PMYeah, coulda been:
-Hiedler--what his father (Alois Hitler) thought he was changing his name to in 1876/77--some clerk along the way spelled it Hitler.
-Coulda been Nepomuk, my favorite, but a long and convoluted story. But a funny (by German standards) name.
Do our leaders have funny names? Well, Tricky Dick is funny, but that was just a nic.
Funnier names might make some Americans laugh more at their leaders. I wish.
Do our leaders have funny names?...
Funnier names might make some Americans laugh more at their leaders.
Surely you jest. John Boehner (R-Dumbass). Best name ever. Oh, wait. You said "leaders". Actually, there aren't too many of those around anymore. I got some "feeders", and over there's some "greeters"... Nope, no more "leaders".
Posted by: Yasonyacky at December 19, 2006 08:14 PMJon -
Do you do personalized greetings -- like love letters, long-overdue apologies, etc? Sort of like personalized singing telegrams, but funny.
Yes, Vasonyacky (by the way, what kind of name is that?) we have no leaders today. Despite all those books on "leadership," from Drucker to Dreck.
Then again, the great leaders of the 20th century were Hitler, Stalin and Mao. Maybe we need humble managers with salary caps. But it's five days to Weihnachten and I'm dreaming already.
Cheers.
When I first heard your book's name is Our Kampf at Dennis Perrin's Site I thought you have poked fun at that lunatic who is obsessed with Noam Chomsky, Oliver Kampf. Anyway the book must be very funny. Best of luck for the book.
Posted by: Ajit Hegde at December 20, 2006 12:22 AMSehr Geheertes Herr Tiny!
Often I am seeing that the books with the humor which are being made, but always with the taste.
And now comes this which is some of a parodie of the book from the old days. However you are making the title wrong you know. But good luck.
Mit Freundlichen Greussen u. The Other Thing also,
A. Bewartung
(Retired)
Funny names, you say? Do de name Barak Obama ring a bell?
Which means his run for the presidency is probably hopeless. The last president we've had with a funy name was Dwight Eisenhower. Before that you have to go back to Calvin Coolidge, though Roosevelt would probably count as a funny name if we weren't so used to it.
Jana C.H.
Seattle
Saith Floss Forbes: If you don't know the tune, sing tenor.
The name of the town wher Hitler did time is Landsberg am Lech. Whereas the 'Landsberg' is a 'fortress' and lies at the river Lech. It was a strategic spot to collect customs and taxes.
Posted by: ItsJustKarma at December 22, 2006 04:13 PMI usually don't buy nagware, but in this case...maybe.
And why doesn't your paypal button prefill the amounts?
Posted by: Ted Pan at December 23, 2006 06:39 PMI usually don't buy nagware
Thank you for introducing me to that term, which for some reason I'd never encountered before.
And why doesn't your paypal button prefill the amounts?
Well...I didn't set it to do so. The cold hard truth is I was worried someone might want to donate more than $19.95 because they love the site so much, and would then be dissuaded from doing so because the form was pre-set at $19.95. In other words, it's just brazen greed.
Posted by: Jonathan Schwarz at December 24, 2006 09:31 AMIn the spirit of pervasive paranoia that your readers enjoy, I thought you were just phishing me with the empty PayPal boxes...
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Can you set up an open post where we (the Tiny people), can compete for your affections by kissing up your unabashed desire to recycle old crap into new green? Certainly, you can use some trite and unsolicited quotes from obsequious internet nobodies, praising your greed as virtuous.
Sample: This is a monumentally epic and important collection...I'd gladly sacrifice massive areas of the Amazon to deforestation, if only to keep copies in perpetual print. Accelerated global warming is a small price to pay to keep this book in a 2nd and 3rd printing...if only to keep the necessary paper stock out of Thomas Friedman's hands.
I don't actually need to read it to have a fawning opinion. Just have a inner need to counterbalance Gandhi's infuriating smugness on the left sidebar there.
There's something off about that guy.
Posted by: Ted Pan at December 24, 2006 12:34 PM