| ||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Visit the Amazon.co.uk Trade-In Store for more details. |
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Synopsis
The only guy to wear shades on the Sgt. Pepper album cover, Terry Southern was an audacious, outrageous American original. This book is a collection of his writings spanning the gamut of his stellar career. From his reminiscences of early days as a pornographer to his account of life neck-high in girls and cocaine aboard the Rolling Stone's tour jet, this is a journey from the buttoned-down 1950s through the sexual revolution, rock'n'roll and independent cinema, which saw the birth of "Easy Rider", co-written and produced by Southern himself. The book features Terry's "Esquire" piece covering the 1968 Chicago Democratic Convention with Jean Genet and William S. Burroughs, and his remembrances of 20th-century legends like Abbie Hoffman, Kurt Vonnegut Jr and director Stanley Kubrick, with whom he wrote "Dr Strangelove".
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Superb collection shows off a great satirist's comic range,
By laughterandstars@aol.com (London, England) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Now Dig This: The Unspeakable Writings of Terry Southern, 1950-1995 (Hardcover)
Terry Southern is possibly the most underrated comic writer of the post-war years, and his reputation continues to decline. It's the demographics. His fans from the 1950s and 1960s are dropping like flies and the younger generation never discovered him. This is a great pity. So much good stuff has been neglected. How may under-40s could tell you who wrote the screenplay of Dr. Strangelove? Where can you find a copy of "Candy"? Whatever happened to "Blue Movie"?But wait! Now there is hope for a regeneration of this great satirist's name. For his son Niles and collaborator John Alan Friedman have brought together a wonderful collection of Terry Southern at his most outrageous, in "Now Dig This", a collection of fragments, fantasies, interviews, spoof letters and other bits that defy categorization. Forgive the naff title. Open the book. Nearly every page will leave you laughing. I have been getting second-hand laughs myself in London pubs for the past two weeks quoting lines from this treasure, much of it in the most awful taste. I was reminded of Terry Southern's talent a month ago when I saw Dr. Strangelove again on late-night television and found it fresh as ever. This man had the discipline to write for Stanley Kubrick and the creative force to help push back the boundaries of American journalism. He also had the weirdness to write deadpan to MS. Magazine to complain that women in bed must learn to calm down and cut out this "panting, gasping, moaning, sobbing, writing, scratching, biting, screaming, and the seemingly inveriable "Oh my god... oh, my god ... oh, my god" if ever they were to be taken seriously by men. My personal favorite in this collection is his 1100-word account of his imaginary visit to the New Yorker, whose editors had turned up their noses at his writings for many years. He describes himself ordering NYer staffers about in the corridor while "leaning lightly forward on a Malacca cane, pointing at things with my chin." He ends up bickering with E.B. White. The book is not all humor. His interviews deal with such subjects as the making of Dr. Strangelove, the nature of screenwriting and a chat with the great William Burroughs. One fleeting gem was the background on Slim Pickens and a priceless vignette of Southern and Pickens sharing a few fingers of Wild Turkey well before the sun hit the yardarm. Even his serious reflections are imbued with a turn of phrase that seems to make sport of almost everything, including himself.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Terry Southern RIP - We need YOU now!,
By Chris "Reactiv8" (Herefordshire, England) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Now Dig This: The Unspeakable Writings of Terry Southern, 1950-1995 (Paperback)
As I love TS I'm a bit biased ... I enjoyed this book and bought it because the man will always be my No.1 Hero. I just wish this collection was longer, but it was surely meant as a 'taster', so now I have to research more ... and I will ;)
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.3 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews) 6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
the long awaited sequel to Red Dirt Marijuana,
By Lee Hill - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Now Dig This: The Unspeakable Writings of Terry Southern, 1950-1995 (Hardcover)
In these heartless consumerist times, irony has become debased. Thus the arrival of this anthology of previously uncollected and unpublished work by Terry Southern is not only a delightful surprise, but profoundly neccesary. Just as his 1967 anthology, Red Dirt Marijuana, proved that Southern was not just the great black humorist of the post-WWII era, but a great short story writer and essayist, so does Now Dig This affirm that status. No one has ever managed to quite duplicate Southern's mastery of so many forms: the letter as put-on, gonzo journalism, literary criticism, screenwriting and short fiction. Southern fans will be delighted at the inclusion of "Heavy Put-Away", a superb essay on Kurt Weill, and reminscences of Stanley Kubrick and Frank O'Hara. For first time readers, I have only envy. Now Dig This will be your all expenses paid ticket to a world of darkness and laughter. To paraphrase Ringo Starr, who acted in adaptations of two Southern novels, Candy and The Magic Christian, Buy a Terry Southern book today. Now Dig This is a very, very good place to start your spending spree.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Vile,
By Thomas Quale - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Now Dig This: The Unspeakable Writings of Terry Southern, 1950-1995 (Paperback)
A grave disappointment. I cast myself into the Great Pit of Squaredom, surely, by this judgement, but aside from some isolated good bits, including Southern's notes on working with Kubrick on Strangelove and his interview with Henry Green, this is a poor (unspeakable, indeed!) excuse for a collection--repetitive, full of tiresome hipster tics, willfully and wearyingly perverse, seeking shock for shock's sake, like a child misbehaving to get attention. Do not waste your time or your money on this unfortunate production. Buy a copy of The Magic Christian instead.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
He's Too Hip, Baby!,
By Jim Yoakum - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Now Dig This: The Unspeakable Writings of Terry Southern, 1950-1995 (Hardcover)
It's hard to imagine today, but there once was a time when the simple written word could send shudders of fear and loathing down the spines of mainstream America. And no one gave Mr and Mrs Front Porch USA the shakes more than Terry Southern. His novel "Candy" was banned and branded as pornography before it even reached our shores; his take on the military in "Doc Strangelove" earned him the label "pinko." But, like all great satirists (which he certainly was) know, "telling it like it is" often times means "taking your lumps like a man." And Terry took plenty of lumps, and humps, but never let his trials and tribs get in the way of "making it hot" for people. Although the mighty lions of 60's pop culture are now - alas! - all nearly gone, this volume of previously unseen TS works serves as an excellent reminder of a time when humor meant more than just being funny, and words alone had the power to give people the coniptions. And as "Now Dig This!" reminds us, while Southern took on all comers and suffered no fool gladly, he was a gentle giant who did so whilst nudging us playfully in the ribs - not poking us in the eye. "Now Dig This!" is a great addition to any modern humor library, and a worthy addition to the Southern canon. Bravo.
|
|
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
