Buy New

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
or
Amazon Prime Free Trial required. Sign up when you check out. Learn More
Buy Used
Used - Good See details
$3.97 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
More Buying Choices
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
Getting Even
 
See larger image
 
Tell the Publisher!
I'd like to read this book on Kindle

Don't have a Kindle? Get your Kindle here, or download a FREE Kindle Reading App.

Getting Even [Mass Market Paperback]

Woody Allen (Author)
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)

List Price: $12.00
Price: $9.60 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details
You Save: $2.40 (20%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.
Only 18 left in stock--order soon (more on the way).
Want it delivered Monday, January 30? Choose One-Day Shipping at checkout. Details

Formats

Amazon Price New from Used from
Library Binding --  
Paperback --  
Mass Market Paperback $9.60  
Unknown Binding --  
Audible Audio Edition, Unabridged $11.95 or Free with Audible 30-day free trial

Book Description

August 12, 1978
The classic, with 316,000 copies sold to date.

Frequently Bought Together

Getting Even + Without Feathers + Side Effects
Price For All Three: $24.58

Show availability and shipping details

Buy the selected items together
  • In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

  • Without Feathers $7.99

    In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

  • Side Effects $6.99

    In Stock.
    Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
    Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details


Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought


Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

After three decades of prodigious film work (and some unfortunate tabloid adventures as well), it's easy to forget that Woody Allen began his career as one heck of a great comedy writer. Getting Even, a collection of his late '60s magazine pieces, offers a look into Allen's bag of shtick, back when it was new. From the supposed memoirs of Hitler's barber: "Then, in January of 1945, a plot by several generals to shave Hitler's moustache in his sleep failed when von Stauffenberg, in the darkness of Hitler's bedroom, shaved off one of the Führer's eyebrows instead..."

Even though the idea of writing jokes about old Adolf--or addled rabbis, or Maatjes herring--isn't nearly as fresh as it used to be, Getting Even still delivers plenty of laughs. At his best, Woody can achieve a level of transcendent craziness that no other writer can match. If you're looking for a book to dip into at random, or a gift for someone who's seen Sleeper 13 times, Getting Even is a dead lock.

From the Inside Flap

The classic, with 316,000 copies sold to date.

Product Details

  • Mass Market Paperback: 128 pages
  • Publisher: Vintage; Vintage Books ed edition (August 12, 1978)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0394726405
  • ISBN-13: 978-0394726403
  • Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 0.4 x 6.9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #93,780 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

 

Customer Reviews

22 Reviews
5 star:
 (13)
4 star:
 (7)
3 star:
 (2)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.5 out of 5 stars (22 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Nothing Compares, July 1, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Getting Even (Mass Market Paperback)
Nothing can compare to this book and also Side Effects and Without Feathers, by Allen. Dave Barry is funny (although not as funny in recent years). Douglas Adams is hilarious, but he writes novels. These "nonfiction" pieces and short stories by Woody Allen are the funniest things ever written. And if you're concerned because you don't like Woody's whining style in his stand-up and movies, be assured you can't do that in prose. They are two distinct styles and you probably wouldn't even know it was Woody if not for his name on the cover. Read at least one of Woody's three books -- or at least one story from one of these books. Make that one page. If you don't love it, you can put it back on the shelf and at least know you didn't let something fantastic slip by unread.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars As funny as as dated as the early Woody Allen comedies, October 18, 2005
This review is from: Getting Even (Mass Market Paperback)
Getting Even is one of three early collections of Woody Allen's short humorous articles. The others are Without Feathers and Side Effects. Many of the pieces in Getting Even appeared in magazines, mostly The New Yorker, but also Playboy, and Evergreen Review. While others first appeared in this anthology. In total, there are 17 articles in the collection. Considering that they were written over 35 years ago, there are some references that do not come across well today. Yet as a group they are still quite funny.

<u>The Metterling Lists</u> is a piece of satirical literary criticism of <u>The Collected Laundry Lists of Hans Metterling Vol. 1</u>, a supposedly scholarly work of 437 pages that analyzes the first six laundry lists. Fortunately Mr. Allen only takes seven pages to mock this fictional piece of scholarship.

<u>A Look At Organized Crime</u> provides a very brief history of organized crime in America including the murder of Kid Lipsky by Albert (The Logical Positivist) Corillo who locked Lipsky in a closet and "sucked all the air out through a straw." It also provides a description of a Mafia initiation ceremony and ends with some tips on fighting mobsters.

<u>The Schmeed Memoirs</u> are represented as the recollections of Hitler's barber. Yet they can't be taken too seriously because he claims he didn't know Hitler was a Nazi and thought he worked for the phone company. There is a funny where Hitler fears that Chruchill will grow sideburns before he can. It is humorous to view World War II from the perspective of Hitler's hair.

<u>My Philosophy</u> consists of the Critique of Pure Dread, the Eschatological Dialectics As a Means of Coping with Shingles, and The Cosmos on Five Dollars a Day. It ends with two Parables and a short list of Aphorisms.

<u>Yes, But Can The Steam Engine Do This?</u> provides a humorous take on the scientific research saga with a history of the Earl of Sandwich's research into developing the sandwich. Starting with his birth in 1718, the tale is filled with bread experiments, research into cold cuts and cheeses, and years of failures followed by his final success and lasting fame.

<u>Death Knocks</u> is a short play in which an inexperienced angel of death, who comes to claim Nat Ackerman's soul, is lured into a losing game of gin rummy and returns empty-handed.

<u>Spring Bulletin</u> is Woody Allen's satirical take on college course descriptions. It includes a course called Introduction to God which is described as "Confrontation with the Creator of the universe through informal lectures and field trips."

The next piece, a guide to the interpretation of Hassidic tales, includes tales like the following and Mr. Allen's interpretations of them.
A man journeyed to Chelm to seek the advice of Rabbi Ben Kaddish.
"Rabbi " the man asked, "where can I find peace?"
The Hassid surveyed him and said, "Quick, look behind you!"
The man turned around, and Rabbi Ben Kaddish smashed him in the back of the head with a candlestick. "Is that peaceful enough for you?" he chuckled.
There are six other tales and their interpretations in this piece.

<u>The Gossage-Varbedian Papers</u> tells the sad story of a chess game played at a distance via letters. The correspondence starts out with a missive from Gossage stating that one of his letters must have gotten lost in the mail since his chess board is set up differently than Verbedian's. The insults and the confusion worsen as the letters go back and forth. A must for any chess fan.

<u>Notes From The Overfed</u>, Mr. Allen claims, was inspired by reading Dostoyevski and a Weight Watchers magazine on an airplane trip. In it an Atheist is converted when he decides that, if God is everywhere, He must be in food. Then consuming everything in sight, he achieves sanctity and obesity through compulsive eating.

<u>A Twenties Memory</u> mocks the name-dropping memoirs of the post-war lost generation. Filled with references to Gertrude Stein, Picasso, Earnest Hemingway, Alice B. Toklas, and many others, a non-entity tries to gain fame by the shared light of his famous contemporaries.

In <u>Count Dracula</u> the famous vampire wakes up early due to confusion caused by a solar eclipse, and visits the baker and his wife for what he thinks is an evening snack with disastrous consequences.

In <u>A Little Louder, Please</u> a true afficionato of the arts confesses his one failing - an inability to understand the gestures of mimes.

<u>Conversations With Helmholtz</u> consists of notes taken by the student of a famous elderly psychoanalyst of their conversations together. Senility has certainly gotten the better of the older man, but his reputation and fame keep the younger man from realizing this with humorous results.

<u>Viva Vargas</u> is subtitled Excepts From The Diary of A Revolutionary, and reveals much of the same humor that the author later used in the movie Bananas.

<u>The Discovery And Use of The Fake Ink Blot</u> provides a humorous social history of a device used in practical jokes.

The last story in the volume, <u>Mr. Big</u>, is my favorite. It is narrated by a Philip Marlowesque detective who is hired by a lovely woman claiming to be a Vassar student. She wants him to find a missing person, God. The mixture of Raymond Chandler's format with the existential search for the meaning of life is extremely funny even after the passage of many years.

All in all, if you like the early Woody Allen movies, you will love this book - even though some of the material is no longer as fresh.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No


6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Allen's Raw material, January 22, 2003
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Getting Even (Mass Market Paperback)
Reading this is like participating in Allen's creative process since many of the short sketches here are reminiscent of scenes from Allen's earlier films. Very funny stuff that had me laughing out loud. However it's best to read this and imagine Woody Allen's voice is telling the stories, it makes them even funnier. Not all of the sketches work as well as others but when he's on the sketches are hysterical. A very short collection of Woody Allen shorts.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews 
Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews











Only search this product's reviews



What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?


Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
 

Your tags: Add your first tag
 

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

Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
Search all Amazon discussions
   
Related forums



So You'd Like to...



Look for Similar Items by Category


Look for Similar Items by Subject