National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook [Hardcover]

P. J. O'Rourke (Editor), Douglas C. Kenney (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 26, 2003

Welcome back, graduates of the 1964 class of C. Estes Kefauver High School in Dacron, Ohio!

They're all back in glorious black and white with color Magic Marker-Chuck U. Farley, Maria Teresa Spermatozoa, Purdy "Psycho" Lee Spackle, Faun Laurel Rosenberg, and, of course, Dacron's most famous son, Larry Kroger. Learn everything there is to know about Kroger's past before he became the pop-culture legend Pinto (Tom Hulce), the virgin fraternity pledge in National Lampoon's Animal House.

With a hilarious "Where are they now?" addendum and a brilliantly funny new introduction by P. J. O'Rourke, the 39th Reunion Edition is sure to be the talk of the baby boomers who grew up with National Lampoon and of the new generation of comedy fans spawned by the success of The Onion.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A masterpiece of parody" -- ,Detroit Free Press,

"A masterpiece of parody"
- Detroit Free Press

"The finest example of group writing since King James Bible."
- Harper's Magazine

"Classic" - Frank Rich, New York Times
-- Review

"Classic" -- Frank Rich,New York Times,

"The finest example of group writing since King James Bible." -- ,Harper's Magazine,

About the Author

About the Editors:

P. J. O'Rourke is the bestselling author of ten books, including The CEO of the Sofa, Eat the Rich, Parliament of Whores, and All the Trouble in the World. The former editor in chief of National Lampoon magazine, O'Rourke now writes for Rolling Stone and The Atlantic Monthly and lives in New Hampshire and Washington, D.C.

Doug Kenney (1946 - 1980) founded National Lampoon with Henry Beard and Rob Hoffman. The inspirational heart and soul of the magazine, Kenney went on to cowrite the screenplays for Animal House (with Chris Miller and Harold Ramis) and Caddyshack (with Brian Doyle-Murray and Harold Ramis).

Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Rugged Land; 39 edition (August 26, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590710126
• ISBN-13: 978-1590710128
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #983,394 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars They Missed A Golden Opportunity, September 30, 2003

By 

J. A. Goodman (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook (Hardcover)

I really wanted to love this book...I still have my original copy of the 1964 Yearbook, and as far as I'm concerned, it's still the definitive edition. With the announcement of this HARDCOVER edition, I was hoping the publisher would take the opportunity to make this parody look like a REAL yearbook. One of the things the NL was great at doing was an Exact Parody of the thing they were satirizing. In the original edition the paper utilized different stocks for different functions. Also, the book could be placed upside down and backwards on a surface and aside from the paperback binding, it looked like a vintage yearbook. This version is loud, garish, the buttcheecks have been covered up, and the logo is wrong...Perhaps I'm a purist, but the design of this book is just all wrong. It should have been released in a dust jacket that could be removed, with a real looking binding of a yearbook underneath. Also, the printing inside the book looks like it was printed from an old copy of the yearbook magazine, instead of the original stats or negatives...Yes, the comedy is still great, but the design is greatly flawed...I'd only recommend getting it if you have to have it...Otherwise, hold out for an original copy, it just feels better!

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Comic Masterpiece, September 29, 2003

By 

The JuRK (Our Vast, Cultural Desert) - See all my reviews

This review is from: National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook (Hardcover)

I don't know how many copies I've had of the NATIONAL LAMPOON 1964 YEARBOOK PARODY over the years but they all disappeared. Shared them with friends and--POOF--they were gone. I just could not keep them to myself.

Thank God they've reprinted it! It's still one of the funniest books I've ever read.
I'd read an Esquire article about the life and death of Doug Kenney in the early 1980's and it described how Kenney threw himself into the project (reading yearbook after yearbook and even wearing his high school letterman's jacket to the Lampoon offices every day). He went on to co-write ANIMAL HOUSE (he played "The Stork") and then co-wrote/produced CADDYSHACK before he died in a hiking accident in Hawaii.
One weird detail: the picture of the kid who died (and no one seems to remember) is an actual school photo of Doug Kenney.

P.J. O'Rourke and the others also deserve the highest praise for creating what will be an enduring classic of American humor. I'll treasure this along with my own yearbooks!

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant and detailed satire, August 19, 2003

By 

Stefan Jones (Suburbs of Portland, OR) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook (Hardcover)

Oh WOW, it's back! I purchased the original edition of this classic ages ago.

This hilarious, elaborate, and merciless satire creates a complete little world: Dacron (motor home capitol of the world), Ohio's High School, circa 1964. It captures the slightly clunky look-and-feel of school yearbooks, and includes lots of great B&W photos of the classes, clubs, sport teams, and events. Like Matt Groening's _School is Hell_, it is humor with a healthy measure of grim insight and honesty.

Fans of "National Lampoon's Animal House" may find some of the student's names familiar.

As a bonus, the last few pages contain ephemera: little forms from the owner's "permanent record," pages from a mediocre history book, Dacron High's poetry journal, the school newspaper, and so on.

There are some new additions in this special edition, but they're kind of perfunctory: A mock-cutesy "What Happened To?" newsletter, and an introduction that breaks the versimilitude of the piece.

Perhaps there's hope that National Lampoon's equally brilliant, even more elaborate Sunday Newspaper spoof (The Dacron Republican/Democrat) -- which has references to the yearbook -- will be released.