What Am I Still Doing Here?: My Years as Me: Amazon.co.uk: Roger Lewis: Books

Review

'Unremittingly glorious. I and the world demand more and we shall thump our tin mugs on the table demanding it until we are satisfied.'

(Stephen Fry )

There is only one writer alive today who is as mordantly funny as Kingsley Amis, as acute about human misery as Philip Larkin, and as brilliant in skewering pretension and vanity as both. His name is Roger Lewis... Nothing funnier or wise has been published all year. If you love someone buy them this book. If they don't appreciate the gift then purge them from your life.

(Michael Gove, Mail on Sunday )

'Uproariously funny, tremendously clever and irresistibly lovable'

(Rupert Christiansen, Mail on Sunday )

'Roger Lewis's new memoir takes us on an anarchic rollercoaster ride through what is probably the nearest thing to an autobiography he will ever write. Numerous hilarious routines jostle in the pages for attention. Lewis's strength is that behind all his acrobatics there is a richly stocked intellect at the controls. Stylistically he is ultramodern, a deracinated 'everyman; for the 21st century.

(Duncan Fallowell, Telegraph )

'The funniest book of the year. What Am I Still Doing Here? by Roger Lewis is a wonderfully splenetic journal - part-diary, part-diatribe - by a man who rages with an indignant eloquence against the modern world. But Lewis' furious rants are never far from hilarity, and his anger is redeemed by flashes of pur poetry. Like all the best comics, Lewis is a disappointed optimist rather than an outright cynic, and it's this thwarted idealism which makes this such a liberating, life-affirming read.'

(Independent )

'The jokes come thick and fast, the humour runs deep and dark. Among the belly laughs, Roger Lewis gifts us plenty of thought-provoking diamonds.'

(Graham Ball, Sunday Express )

He can be lethally catty and he also has an unfailingly sharp eye for absurdity. He is wonderfully funny, with a uniquely skewed take on the world.'

(John Preston, Spectator )

'There's nobody else in the history of the world who is simultaneously as crude and dangerous or so gentle and poetic... Lewis, with his original and eloquent voice is nothing less than heroic.'

(Esquire )

'Lewis is a marvellously wayward spirit, as well-versed in lavatory humour as in the classics, capable of taking in the gutter and the stars at a single glance.' 5*

(The Lady )

'Enormously entertaining... It is generous, sincere and intelligent, and shows that Lewis is more than just the angry buffoon he paints himself as.'

(Evening Standard )

Praise for Seasonal Suicide Notes:

(by Roger Lewis )

This is comedy of a rare quality. Lewis is a seriously funny man.

(Sunday Express )

Seasonal Suicide Notes is the most brilliantly funny and genuinely thought-provoking book of the year. (Sunday Times )

Roger Lewis is a genius writer, and he knows it.

(Lynn Barber )

He makes me cry with laughter - I really cried, blubbering and sniffling and gasping. Roger Lewis is a magnificently bilious comic genius.

(Francis Wheen )

This is one of the funniest books you will ever read. And the most reckless. If you like black comedy you'll find yourself in Narnia.

(Spectator )

If they ever award gold medals for comic genius Roger Lewis will be a shoo-in for gold.

(Mail on Sunday )

The perfect Christmas present is already on the shelves. It is the funniest, truest, most engaging thing I've read all year.

(Times )

These sulphurous round-robins are not just cry-makingly funny; there are also arresting insights into literature and life, with flashes of beautiful seriousness.

(Daily Telegraph )

Review

'Unremittingly glorious. I and the world demand more and we shall thump our tin mugs on the table demanding it until we are satisfied.' -- Stephen Fry There is only one writer alive today who is as mordantly funny as Kingsley Amis, as acute about human misery as Philip Larkin, and as brilliant in skewering pretension and vanity as both. His name is Roger Lewis... Nothing funnier or wise has been published all year. If you love someone buy them this book. If they don't appreciate the gift then purge them from your life. -- Michael Gove, Mail on Sunday 'Uproariously funny, tremendously clever and irresistibly lovable' -- Rupert Christiansen, Mail on Sunday 'Roger Lewis's new memoir takes us on an anarchic rollercoaster ride through what is probably the nearest thing to an autobiography he will ever write. Numerous hilarious routines jostle in the pages for attention. Lewis's strength is that behind all his acrobatics there is a richly stocked intellect at the controls. Stylistically he is ultramodern, a deracinated 'everyman; for the 21st century. -- Duncan Fallowell, Telegraph 'The funniest book of the year. What Am I Still Doing Here? by Roger Lewis is a wonderfully splenetic journal - part-diary, part-diatribe - by a man who rages with an indignant eloquence against the modern world. But Lewis' furious rants are never far from hilarity, and his anger is redeemed by flashes of pur poetry. Like all the best comics, Lewis is a disappointed optimist rather than an outright cynic, and it's this thwarted idealism which makes this such a liberating, life-affirming read.' -- Independent 'The jokes come thick and fast, the humour runs deep and dark. Among the belly laughs, Roger Lewis gifts us plenty of thought-provoking diamonds.' -- Graham Ball, Sunday Express He can be lethally catty and he also has an unfailingly sharp eye for absurdity. He is wonderfully funny, with a uniquely skewed take on the world.' -- John Preston, Spectator 'There's nobody else in the history of the world who is simultaneously as crude and dangerous or so gentle and poetic... Lewis, with his original and eloquent voice is nothing less than heroic.' -- Esquire 'Lewis is a marvellously wayward spirit, as well-versed in lavatory humour as in the classics, capable of taking in the gutter and the stars at a single glance.' 5* -- The Lady 'Enormously entertaining... It is generous, sincere and intelligent, and shows that Lewis is more than just the angry buffoon he paints himself as.' -- Evening Standard Praise for Seasonal Suicide Notes: -- by Roger Lewis This is comedy of a rare quality. Lewis is a seriously funny man. -- Sunday Express Seasonal Suicide Notes is the most brilliantly funny and genuinely thought-provoking book of the year. -- Sunday Times Roger Lewis is a genius writer, and he knows it. -- Lynn Barber He makes me cry with laughter - I really cried, blubbering and sniffling and gasping. Roger Lewis is a magnificently bilious comic genius. -- Francis Wheen This is one of the funniest books you will ever read. And the most reckless. If you like black comedy you'll find yourself in Narnia. -- Spectator If they ever award gold medals for comic genius Roger Lewis will be a shoo-in for gold. -- Mail on Sunday The perfect Christmas present is already on the shelves. It is the funniest, truest, most engaging thing I've read all year. -- Times These sulphurous round-robins are not just cry-makingly funny; there are also arresting insights into literature and life, with flashes of beautiful seriousness. -- Daily Telegraph

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

Notes from the Herefordshire Balkans 20 May 2012

By John Leabody

Format:Hardcover

Very much aligned to the Dorothy Parker, 'if you don't have anything nice to say, come sit next to me' school of human interaction, Lewis is always entertaining, full of spite for the pointless celebs and metropolitan hacks who seem to prosper with ease while he - former Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford - struggles to stay afloat in the purlieus of Grub Street. But then again, as we are constantly reminded in this rich book, he remains his own worst enemy, unbound by the accepted rules and conventions as laid down by mainstream sub-editors 'with 2:2 degrees from provincial universities'. Asked by a newspaper to review the Julie Roberts vehicle 'Eat Pray Love', he declines, thinking the job beneath him, because the film is aimed at 'full-of-themselves rich bints of a certain age moving to Bali or Mali in their high heels'. Indeed, Lewis is a great hater and his targets are admirably widespread: Geoffrey Hill, Julie Myerson, Britain's Got **** All Talent, Wales, fish pedicures.

As well as being funny, it's also refreshing to read an author who is shamelessly un-PC. 'I'm not a political person', he asserts. 'On the day of the 'Don't Attack Iraq' demonstration in London, I went to see Chitty Chitty Bang Bang...a suicide-inducing horrible afternoon...I came out of the theatre so cross I wanted to attack not only Iraq, but Iran, Afghanistan, even Belgium'. He has an 'ace' idea for a TV panel game show called 'Fatal Celebrity Mishaps' ('Rod Hull and Emu fell off the roof, Roland Barthes was run over by a garbage truck''). His efforts to become a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature are constantly being rebuffed. Instead, he has to judge a dog show at somewhere called Ocle Pychard, where he awards the rosette for 'The Dog that Most Resembles its Owner' to a Mr Swainshill and his lovely Airedale. 'How was I to know that in fact there was no such class and that Mrs Swainshill has had her ovaries and uterus removed, hence the unfeasible hairiness?'

Thank heavens he never went on to 'make it', as a novelist for instance. His loss is our gain.

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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful

Only for clever people who enjoy laughing 22 Dec 2011

By Wooster

Are you bright, informed and quite angry at the State Of Things? Do you enjoy laughing until you weep? Then Lewis' latest is right up your street. He is absolutely my favourite social commenter, but in this book, there are plenty of glimses of his work as a critic and serious writer as well. But being me, it's the bits where Professor Lewis is getting aerated over something (the incident at the craft fair still has me laughing out loud) or observing how it would be to live in a housing development called Hernia Forum. Terrific.

16 of 24 people found the following review helpful

Yes, It's Christmas!! 12 Nov 2011

By Graham Chapman TOP 500 REVIEWER

And on the back of that dubious season, Roger and his publisher are going to try to persuade you to buy this awful book for your loved one. Now it may be that your relative is male, white, aging, cantankerous, conservative and that this book might appear to offer an easy solution to the Christmas present problem. However, if you have any vestiges of love left for him browse on through Amazon and find another one.

Let me select a fairly random line:'The radiographer said my liver was 'fatty' to which I was tempted to reply "and you're an ugly tw@t..up the b@m and no babies to you." Characteristic Lewis misogynism, but is it even funny?

Here's another excerpt: 'If I said I was Oscar's pre-op lesbian, transgender, one-legged, black, vegan, Mohammedan asylum-seeker, no doubt all doors would immediately be opened' (you don't really need to know the context). Even to those of the political bent to nod their head in agreement to this sort of tedious claptrap, is it actually humorous?

Well, I don't know. Some like Clarkson too. I will say no more. If you really think your elderly male relative needs a hardback full of whining self-pity, fatuousness and bigotry, then go ahead and make his Christmas. But you'll find the contents of a Christmas cracker cheaper, shorter and, above all, funnier.

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