Emotional Reaction

David Sedaris’ book makes me literally laugh out loud.  The way he phrases and puts together chapters his really incredible.  Even the way David creates and details situations and objects is fantastic. For example, in one of the later chapters he talks about how he and Hugh were a very strange couple: “Hugh and I have been together for so long that in order to arouse extraordinary passion, we need to engage in physical combat. Once, he hit me on the back of the head with a broken wineglass, and I fell to the floor pretending to be unconscious. That was romantic, or would have been had he rushed to my side rather than stepping over my body to fetch the dustpan.”(139).  I find it hilarious that the fact that they have to fight each other, to inspire passion.  Also, the fact that after he got hit in the back of the head with a wineglass he pretended to be knocked out in order to be romantic is ridiculous, I mean I started laughing out loud.  In, addition when Hugh instead of helping out David he went to get a dust pan for the glass is insane because he is making fun of Hugh’s priorities.  These are the kind of quotes that make me smile, and be happy.  This quote was written with such irony that I could almost hear David’s voice filled with sarcasm.  This is one of the many quotes within this book that made me fall over laughing.

Word Count: 252

Passage analysis

“Real love amounts to withholding the truth, even when you're offered the perfect opportunity to hurt someone's feelings.”(Sedaris, pg.140).  

He uses the term real love as in true, full, or literal.  Also, when he says withholding the truth he may mean the truthfulness of the love, or withholding the truth would be telling a lie so as not to hurt their feelings, which is very hard for David because it’s in his nature as he implies with “...offered the perfect opportunity…”.

In addition, the whole statement can be inference to a flashback or a foreshadow.  The statement is clearly a setup for a story he is or already has told about how he had to hold back from telling the truth because it was more important to not hurt someone.  For instance, that fact that he wrote this in the novel means that soon this statement will show his morals or that this statement had already done so.  Furthermore he uses the satire for entertainment and to exaggerate the point he is making.  For example the phrase is used to portray that there is something else that he could do to benefit himself but you shouldn't do it.

Initial impressions

I selected the book Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim because the author David Sedaris is a well-known and well-praised stand up comedian who lives in France and travels to many places like the United States of America and parts of Europe.  He also is often a commentator on National Public Radio.  Given what I already know about him I assume his memoir will be a funny read and I would learn the back-story on his early life. 

I am hesitant to read this book because his comedy is intended for a very mature adult audience, and also on the cover of the book there is a picture of a naked Barbie.  I also know that David has written many other successful books including Me Talk Pretty One Day so that leads me to believe that this novel will be well done and will help me become a better reader.  In addition I think that that format of this book will go back in forth between the earlier and later events in his life seeing that many memoirs are written that way. 

Furthermore, I anticipate that the book will deal with David Sedaris’ early life events and how they changed the way his family acts because the title of the book is Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim so because it’s dress your family I think that throughout the novel he will shape his family.  On the back of the book the review from the New Yorker has made my hopes high for this book.  So all in all I believe that this book will teach more about David Sedaris while making me laugh.

Word count: 276