Westward Ha!
S.J. Perelman (1948)

THE A5 BOOK REVIEW

One of the classic funny travel books was written by Sidney Joseph (S.J. ) Perelman, an American writer best known for his witty short pieces for The New Yorker.  Westward Ha!: Around the World in 80 Cliches is a recap of his madcap travels around the world with the cartoonist Al Hirschfield, who provides some accompanying drawings for the book.  Perelman’s expressions are brilliant, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, and his vocabulary is so rich that many modern readers might require an accompanying dictionary.  The book does provide an interesting point-of-view on what life was like in the 1940s, when travel was much more challenging and writers were not expected to be politically correct.  Perelman was very popular in his day and while some of the references will be dated, still worth reading.
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ABOUT S.J. PERELMAN

Sidney Joseph “S.J” Perelman (1904-1979) was an American humorist and writer, with numerous short pieces written for The New Yorker as well as a number of books, Broadway plays, and screenplays.  Perelman received an Academy Award for screenwriting for the 1956 film, Around the World in Eighty Days, based of course on the novel of the same name by Jules Verne.  He is considered one of the first surrealist humor writers in the United States, and an influence to Woody Allen, Garrison Keillor, and T.S Eliot.

GREAT QUOTES:

"The former (Ayet Itam temple in Penang) is possibly the largest, and unquestionably the dullest, Buddhist temple in Malaya, and no wastebasket is complete without a snapshot of this historic shrine.  The botanical gardens boast many varieties of cactus not found anywhere, not even in the botanical gardens."
- S.J. Perelman, Westward Ha!

INTERESTING LINKS: