It takes a particular kind of man to want an embroidered polo player astride his left nipple. Occasionally when I am tired & emotional or consumed with self-dislike I try to imagine myself as someone else a wearer of Yarmouth shirts & fleecy sweats of windbreakers & rugged Tyler shorts of baseball caps with polo players where the section of the brain that concerns itself with aesthetics is supposed to be. But the hour passes. Good men return from fighting Satan in the wilderness the stronger for their struggle & so do I. The winner of the 2010 Man Booker Prize Howard Jacobson brims with life in this collection of his most acclaimed journalism. From the unusual disposal of his father-in-laws ashes & the cultural wasteland of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to the melancholy sensuality of Leonard Cohen & desolation of Wagners tragedies Jacobson writes with all the thunder & joy of a man possessed. Absurdity piles upon absurdity & glorious sentences weave together to create a hilarious heartbreaking & uniquely human collection. This book is not just a series of parts but an irresistible unputdownable sum which triumphantly out-Thurbers Thurber.