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Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks: The Essential Alan Coren (Hardcover)

by Alan Coren (Author), Giles Coren (Editor), Victoria Coren (Editor)

4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

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Product details

Hardcover: 464 pages
Publisher: Canongate Books Ltd (2 Oct 2008)
Language English
ISBN-10: 1847673201
ISBN-13: 978-1847673206
Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.6 x 4.2 cm

Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 44,281 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)
Popular in this category:
#55 in Books > Humour > Collections & Anthologies

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Product Description

Review

'A comic genius.' - The Times 'The field is led by Alan Coren.' - Observer 'Coren is our heavyweight champion humorist, over-powering as well as graceful, able to do everything, sometimes in the same short article. - GuardianThe funniest writer in Britain today.' - Sunday Times 'Coruscating! A master humorist!' - Daily Telegraph 'He has a comic imagination which can actually render your jaded scribe flabbergasted.' - Observer 'His power of observation knows no bounds.' - Daily Mail

Product Description

Edited by his children, Giles and Victoria, "Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks" is an anthology of writing from the former editor of "Punch" and Radio 4 national treasure Alan Coren, who died in October 2007. In a prolific forty-year career Alan Coren wrote for "The Times", "Observer", "Tatler", "Daily Mail", "Mail on Sunday", "Listener", "Punch" and the "New Yorker", and published over 20 books including "The Sanity Inspector", "Golfing for Cats" and "The Collected Bulletins of Idi Amin" (he turned down an invitation from Amin to visit Uganda saying, 'I'll probably end up as a sandwich').Even twenty years ago he estimated that he had published six million words, or ten copies of War and Peace. This anthology draws together the best of Coren's previously published material as well as new unpublished autobiographical material. Coren was one of Britain's most prolific and now much-missed humourists, finding the comedy of life all around him and rendering it, hilariously and compellingly, in polished and witty prose which will be eagerly devoured by his loyal fanbase.

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Customer Reviews

8 Reviews

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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Average Customer Review

4.9 out of 5 stars (8 customer reviews)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very funny prose, a great read, 10 Oct 2008

By	Mr W (Manchester, England) - See all my reviews

Very funny and surprisingly informative. Coren is a wonderful writer and a lot of what he has to say is intelligent and genuinely interesting as well as funny. Well recommended.

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11 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't read this in bed unless you sleep alone, 23 Nov 2008

By	Sarkasti "Sarkasti" (Disley, Cheshire, United Kingdom) - See all my reviews

If herself is sitting there with her thumb up her Jane Austen ("Sense & Prejudice" or somesuch), she'll elbow you in the ribs for laughing until both sides ache, but one much more than the other. It is not just one of the funniest books you'll read, it is also fascinating to see his style develop. The examples are in chronological order covering semi-defined periods of his life and you can see how he develops ideas and structures. The piece about Leonardo da Vinci is sheer genius and, as with others, would have made a wonderful TV sketch. What a loss to us, but God must be wetting himself.

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great writing, great fun..., 24 Aug 2009

By	Emanon "Mr Holmes (they were the footprints o... (Derbyshire) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks: The Essential Alan Coren (Paperback)

It's difficult to express how much of a joy this collection of works from the long career of Alan Coren's is because any kind of superlative prose can only seem inadequate when compared to writing of this artfulness and quality. Suffice it to say that some of these pieces are laugh-out-loud funny, many of them you just feel the need to read out loud to whoever is within earshot just so you can share their brilliance and sheer exuberant eloquence, and pretty much all of them will leave you in a pleasantly thoughtful frame of mind.

I did find that I preferred the later shorter pieces, probably as they overlapped more with events in my own lifetime, and it seemed that age did not wither that amazing wit. When Mr Coren got older he got sharper, pithier and funnier. It's all just so amazingly well written that sometimes you can't believe quite how good it is. The targets - both big and small - are dealt with an inimitable stylishness that seems effortless but comes from someone who was truly an expert at what he did. Some of my personal favourites are about the absurdities of suburban living - like over-ambitious dinner party menus, over-competitive bridge partners, or the sheer over-optimistic hopefulness involved in just trying to make it to the theatre on time - but there's so much more to this collection than that and so many more topics that are touched upon that you're bound to find something to enjoy here.

85 pieces from across over four decades of writing cannot but scratch the surface of the imaginings of this master wordsmith, but this selection does make for a very enjoyable read. Introductions to the various decades from Melvyn Bragg, Victoria Wood, Clive James, A. A. Gill and Stephen Fry show the quality of his fans and influence. His (rather fabulous) offspring, Giles and Victoria, also pitch in with a fondly observed introduction perhaps proving, at the very least, that genius might just have something of the genetic about it.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Poetry, royalty and estate agents
A wonderful collection of writing. Funny but also good for the mind. Coren's ability to immitate and translate makes such a good read: royalty on days off, what estate agents... Read more

Published 6 months ago by Mr. Alan Massey

5.0 out of 5 stars A very satisfying retrospective on a comic genius
Not only is this an excellent selection of some of the best of Alan Coren's writing and of his prodigious style and humour, there is a preface by his children that reveals quite a... Read more

Published 7 months ago by Mr. A. J. Downs

5.0 out of 5 stars Alan the King Coren
Excellent collection, gives a real feeling for the man and his humour. Highly recommended, both husband and I really enjoyed it, lots of laughs. Read more

Published 9 months ago by Mrs E

5.0 out of 5 stars brilliant, brilliant comedy writer/performer
I'd rather read this than Woody Allen anyday. Alan has an intelligence unequaled, and it's running riot thru these pages!

Published 11 months ago by Ben J. Ohmart

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant!
With Alan Corens books you always smile throughout the story and in the end you burst into laughter. Read more

Published 13 months ago by Ljiljana Cosic

› See all 8 customer reviews...

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