Age and Guile Beat Youth, Innocence, and a Bad Haircut (O'Rourke, P. J.) (Paperback)

by P. J. O'Rourke (Author) "I began to write for pay in the spring of 1970, albeit that pay was mostly peanut butter sandwiches and mattress space..." (more)
Key Phrases: United States, New York, San Cristobal (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Readers can be excused for a little motion sickness when reading this collection of pieces from P.J. O'Rourke. To go from preaching "Armed Love" (whatever that is) to being anointed as the ultra-libertarian Cato Institute's favorite humorist in only 25 years is an astounding transformation.

Still, whether it's New Left juvenilia or high-octane auto journalism scrawled in the Age of Cocaine, one thing holds true: O'Rourke writes one hell of a sentence. Here's P.J.'s impression of Nixon explaining Vietnam to a bunch of hippies: "To be really out front, I get off on ego trips, power games. But, like that's where I'm at ... I mean you can put me down for kicking your ass but don't put me down for being an ass-kicker 'cause that's my movie." Then fast-forward 17 years: "Sure, everyone says the Sixties were fun. Down at the American Legion hall, everybody says World War II was fun, if you talk to them after 10:00 p.m." Age and Guile is fun, whatever time it is.

Product Description
A provocative, conservative satirist shares his strange and twisted days as editor in chief of National Lampoon, his numerous essays on the pleasures and perils of driving, and a look at appropriate sports for middle-aged Republicans. Reprint. 100,000 first printing. $100,000 ad/promo.

Product Details

• Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press; 1st Pbk. Ed edition (August 9, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0871136538
• ISBN-13: 978-0871136534
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #190,289 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Politics, stories, and concrete poetry -- best of everything, November 16, 2001

By	Jeffrey Ellis "bored recluse" (Richardson, Texas United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

PJ O'Rourke has always been one of my favorite cultural and political commentators. An unrepentant Libertarian Republican who used to be an unrepentant Marxist radical, O'Rourke is a conservative who writes with all the wit and verve that, supposedly, only liberals are capable of. P.J. O'Rourke is the Al Franken of the American Right, if Al Franken were actually funny. Age and Guile Beat Youth, Innocence, and a Bad Haircut is made up of O'Rourke's previously uncollected writings over the past three decades. As such, the book begins with a few choice pieces from his angry days as a Marxist journalist in the early '70s (where, it must be said, O'Rourke still writes with a wit that proves that funny is funny not matter what the ideology) moves on to cover his brief period as an adherent to Concrete Poetry (an art form that he admits still having no idea what to make of) and finally closes with a few of his recent essays as Rolling Stone's Foreign Affairs Editor. Best of all, O'Rourke includes a few short stories that he wrote and published while editor of National Lampoon. The stories, all dealing with his past as a '60s radical, are a perfect mixture of radical nostalgia and modern day clear headedness and, along with an unexpected pathos for his lost characters wandering through the political wilderness of protest, they also rank amongst the most hilarious of O'Rourke's writings, perfectly displaying his trademark style of detached irony and self-depreciating wit (one can always sense O'Rourke saying, "Can you believe they actually pay me to write this stuff?"). Perhaps most nicely, the pieces in this collection are arranged by chronological order so that the reader literally goes through O'Rourke's political and literary evolution with him over the course of the book. As such, we're provided with a nice view of the political odyssey of both O'Rourke and America over the past 30-odd years. If one thing remains the same it is that O'Rourke, whether conservative or liberal, consistently refuses to accept anything at face value. He remains, always, the eternal skeptic. And we, as readers, are all the better off for it.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The evolution of a writer, June 7, 2003

By	Trevor Seigler (South Carolina) - See all my reviews

I first got into PJ O'Rourke when I started reading his book "Republican Party Reptile" and realized that I could laugh heartily at his wit, as opposed to the often divisive rhetoric of Rush Limbaugh and Fox News Channel. O'Rourke is equally scathing in his approach to "born-again" nutjobs as he is to "pinko" enviromentalists, and his is a style of writing I wouldn't mind trying to emulate in my own belated (and as yet unpublished) career as a writer.

"Age and Guile" caught my fancy because I had heard it was a collection of his pieces from over the years, and I tried to find it at the local library and various bookstores, but was unlucky in my pursuit. I ended up checking out a Books-on-Tape version of the book, read by Norman Deitz, and I was quite pleased.

The early material is amatuerish, to be fair, but there are nuggets of wit to be found amongst the "juvinelia". The Truth About The Sixties was actually one of my favorite parts of the book, I found it very involving and fascinating to hear. The rest of the book tickled my funny bone. I just don't have enough good things to say about this book.

So, I ordered it on Amazon, and I've recieved it, and it's joined my collection of P.J. O'Rourke books. A liberal at heart myself, I agree with a previous reviewer that O'Rourke celebrates individual freedom and doesn't care for those who try and take it away. I only hope I can be as good at conveying that in my own writing, he's certainly one hell of a teacher.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Stellar! (After the first 41 pages), March 9, 1999

By	[e-mail] (Charleston, SC) - See all my reviews

Having read all of P.J. O'Rourke's books, I can safely say that this was one of my favorites. Save for the first 41 pages, I was thoroughly entertained and stayed up 'til the wee hours giggling like a mad squirrel. Rip the first chapter out and it's a five-star read.