Book review: Planet Simpsons by Chris Turner

Planet Simpson
Originally uploaded by Dimitris Mazarakis.

I bought this book in a very cool science fiction bookstore in Stockholm an couple of months back, and I just managed to finish it. For those of you who don't know, I am a big fan of the simpsons. The book is being commented upon also on http://www.snpp.com/news.html#planet (simpsons archive online).

It was a great read, as the book not only describes the characters and makes numerous references to funny and serious aspects of episodes, but also links them with the way the simpsons view our world, and the way they make satire out of it.


An excerpt of the book worth putting down here, that really struck me as I have had similar thoughts:

The following was written as a foreword by Neil Postman to his 1985 book "Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business"

What Orwell feared were those who ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much information that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy and the centrifugal bumblepuppy.

The only disadvantage of the book I find is that it refers to the Simpsons as the biggest pop cultural phenomenon of the 90's, which I kinda disagree on (on the other hand, can you name a bigger pop culture phenomenon in the same decade?). It's definitely worth a read though, if you see the Simpsons as more than just a cartoon.