One Hand Jerking

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY 31 OCT. 2005

After realizing early in life that "one person's logic is another person's humor," Krassner (Murder at the Conspiracy Convention, Confessions of a Raving, Unconfined Nut) has consistently produced clever satire of mainstream media, personalities and ideologies throughout his long, strange career, and, with this collection of essays and reportage, he maintains his status as a counterculture legend and an "unrefined nut" (according to the FBI and the author bio). As editor of satirical magazine The Realist, he pushed the limits of the day by referring women to a doctor who performed abortions before they were legal and publishing an illustration of Disney characters in the midst of "an unspeakable Roman binge." (Influenced, Krassner notes, by Time magazine's "God is Dead" issue.) Krassner's integral role in American counterculture is evident in the anecdotes featuring Lenny Bruce, Abbie Hoffman, Norman Mailer and Hunter Thompson. These writers and humorists are clearly influenced by and an influence on Krassner, whose writing exposes censorship and excessively prudish regulations as the absurd, unreasonable results of giving humorless, hysterical people authority-for instance, he recalls a song was once banned from radio play because it contained humming, an interlude that could be construed as symbolic of coitus. Krassner can make readers howl with laughter, but a few pieces fail to measure up, mainly because Krassner jettisons his commentary and plays the role of reporter/observer. Intelligently irreverent, Krassner's writing crisply and crassly skewers the teeming absurdity in contemporary America.