Customer Reviews

The Compleat Practical Joker

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

You'll pass out from lack of oxygen for laughing so much! There is an original edition, and a 1992 reissue with an update in back from the late author. This HAS to be one of the funniest books ever written. A monograph on the practical joke. Deals with practical jokes in the past, with emphasis on Hollywood and the 1920s through 1940s. Don't get caught! There are even jokes in the index! I personally have purchased 4 copies of this over the years for friends, and of course for myself. I would not hesitate to give it to anybody over 12 (I would rate it PG, not for anything of a sexual, etc. nature, but you wouldn't want the little urchin getting some ideas on how to torture you!) Warning! If you don't find practical jokes (such as releasing a dozen moths in a movie theater after you've had a fight with the manager) funny, you may NOT think this is humorous.....

A brilliant collection of gags, wheezes and wind-ups, written in a fluid classic style. Must have been a large effort to collect all the stories included, many of which will have you laughing out loud. Every person alive should own this book, it's that good. Superb.

A brilliant collection of stunning practical jokes, as dreamed up and executed by some of the most imaginatively funny people who have ever lived. Should be subtitled: Don't try this at home. For that matter, should be in print.

An interesting period piece and an inspiration in coming up with jokes, however, most of the events included in the book wouldn't work now. No one is going to put their telephone inside a pillowcase to keep their homes clean while the engineers blow the lines out - but a clever person could probably adapt it to the wireless culture.

Originally published in 1953, this book covers a wide variety of antics played by a wide variety of people. Many of the pranks are just plain cruel however there are some gems sprinkled throughout. I consider the true value of this book as a type of time capsule of an earlier era. Recorded are lesser known incidences of famous and common people from the mid 1800s onwards. You probably couldn't (and hopefully wouldn't want to) convince anyone who just swallowed a raw oyster that it was going to eat its way out through the diners stomach trying to escape... and then go on to suggest that the only way it could be stopped was by killing the oyster by guzzling copious amounts of hot sauce - but it worked in pre-civil war times.

This book is the definitive treatise on the subject;at least as far as I am concerned.I had a paperback copy of it over 50 years ago when still in High School.What a nice surprise,when I recently came across in again at a University Used Book Sale. It is a First Edition ,hardcover ,in great shape,including the dust jacket with a drawing by that cartoonist,we all love,Charles Addams.Somone has thought well enough of it to have given it shelf space since 1953. That may have been a Harry J Boyle,whose name is inscribed when you open the book.Now,how,s that name sound for someone who would enjoy or maybe even partake in a Practial Joke.
As you read all the great and imaginative jokes Smith details in the book;you're going to get a kick out of all the terms he uses to describe them.I never could understand why "Practical"is used,but it has become the most understood term.Here are some others;Pranks,Practical Jocosity,Chicanery,Guile,Horseplay,Funny
Business,Plots,Snares,Delusions,Imaginative Assaults on Peace and Dignity,Puerile Pranking,Jinks,Boisterous Buffonerie,Sells,Whipping the Cat,Stunts,Administration of Hot Foots,Practical Jocularity,Rigging Thimbles Against Pomposity,Sport of Creeps,Hoaxes and Larking;just to name some I found.
I often wondered why this much enjoyed art has slipped away over the years.Could it have been the advent of the computer and people so busy with playing with them? Or maybe TV giving so much entertainment that people just sit back and watch it and can't be bothered with using their imagination and creating some fun.I was in High School in the early 50's and Engineering School and the Army in the late 50's and someone was forever pulling off Practical Jokes.
The papers were always telling us of some well executed prank.Especially things during Freshman Week or other Initiations.Things like the Mayor's chair disappearing and later to be found in some ridiculous place,a box of soap filling the fountain with suds,a statue painted,a car placed in a very awkward place,a cow led to the top floor of a dormitory (it's simple to lead a cow up several flight of stairs,but just try to get it to come back down).
Allan Funt made a career of this stuff on his show "Candid Camera";but we don't have anything like it any more,Reality TV seems to have taken over.
This Art did not belong to college kids and such,it was well practiced by many of the best known actors,writers,politicians,clergymen,why;even Presidents and Generals have participated;as you'll see in this book.
I remember one from college days,unlike anything in the book. An Itercollegiate Hockey Game was coming ou. Our team was completely outclassed by the opposition.Not to be completely outdone,we gained access to the arena the night before,placed aout 20 buckets of flour on the rafters above where the opposition would be sitting.A rope was strung between the buckets of flour and terminated in a far off corner.When the opposition scored the first goal,the rope was pulled and the stands were doused with flour..boy they looked like a bunch of snowmen.After that,it really didn't matter who won the game,we had already stolen the success of the event.
If you've ever enjoyed Practical Jokes,and maybe even taken part in a few,you'll love this book and it'll even bring back some fine memories when a great Practical Joke was a work of art and great entertainment as well.

This is, without any doubt, the Funniest, most hilarious book I have ever read. There were many times when I had to put it down... I was laughing so hard I was crying. Yes, it IS that funny. I've reread the book several times over the years, and it still cracks me up. The practical jokes written up here are real, did happen, and described by a celebrated author who was a master humorist, H. Allan Smith. They go from the small & subtle to the exceedingly elaborate (believe me, you WON'T believe how elaborate). Some of these are astonishingly inventive and will have you shaking your head in wonder; others are wildly outrageous and raise the level of the practical joke to an artform. There are very few humorists that can write with such verve and wit as H. Allan Smith. Don't miss this one!