It takes only three hours to read "The Alphabet of Manliness," but plowing straight through the collection of comedic diatribes by Internet celebrity Maddox sort of defeats the purpose.
The 204-page book, heavy on illustrations and charts, with wide spacing and margins, is designed to be read by guys through eight to 10 toilet sittings.
Though not for the easily offended, "The Alphabet of Manliness" is good for steady chuckles throughout, an eye-rolling, head-shaking shock of vulgarity every other line, and a genuine belly laugh every 20 pages.
The true significance of the book, which was released in June and has been a regular on the New York Times hardcover advice best-seller list since, is twofold. Not only does "The Alphabet of Manliness" prove that young men's literary interests aren't confined to sports biographies,it represents a resounding advancement in new media's gradual takeover of old.
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Maddox is the alter ego of George Ouzounian, a Utah resident who runs maddox.xmission.com, an insanely popular humor site. Maddox's followers aren't so much fans as they are worshipful subjects, sticking to his demagoguery like moss to a stone. The site draws between 4 million and 5 million readers a month, even though Maddox often goes months between updates.
Such is his influence, as well as the blind devotion of his underlings, that Maddox spurred his book to the top of the Amazon best-seller list by sending an e-mail out to fans that the book was available for presale weeks before its release. Now that Maddox's book allows him to penetrate off-line society, he should rise to the level of bona fide franchise.
Much of his material, which cleverly parodies modern notions of machismo by buying full bore into them, would work well as a stand-up routine. He sings the praises of pirates, lumberjacks and beef jerky while disparaging vegetarians, women and those who end phone conversations with "ciao."
Maddox, who writes with the rickety enthusiasm of a 15-year-old passing notes under the teacher's sightline in homeroom, pays tribute to all things manly in his book, which is divided into 26 single-subject chapters by letter. "C" is for copping a feel, "F" is for female wrestling, "G" is for gas, etc. Chapters are written as mock how-to manuals, highlighted by essays that often stray off-topic and slop into stream-of-consciousness proselytizing.
Though the A-to-Z approach is lazy and clichéd, it serves as a springboard for Maddox to rip into social ills both real and imagined with the panache of George Carlin. Maddox's shamelessness and affinity for exaggeration and self-aggrandizement bring to mind Howard Stern and Ann Coulter, with a healthy twist of Stephen Colbert's inverse satire. Maddox is misogynistic in the way Colbert is a Republican.
The writing is wildly uneven, but even the dry spots move along. Just as the old-time sportswriters say that it was more interesting to watch Babe Ruth strike out than to see some other player get a single, Maddox's voraciousness for straight-for-the-jugular provocation is a spectacle to behold.
Some of the jokes are weak — Maddox is a little too obsessed with flatulence humor for his own good, and he's at least a year late in pulling up a seat to the "Chuck Norris rules" table — but Maddox also is capable of jagged sarcasm that approaches brilliance. His reasoning for why Socrates chose to sire children, for instance, is sublime.
Don't expect much flowery language or turns of phrase. Maddox's style is meat and potatoes — hold the potatoes, and make that meat beef jerky.
Review
THE ALPHABET OF MANLINESS
By George Ouzounian
(Citadel, $15.95)
