Truth in Advertising

Though we try to pass over blog-bait, we can’t resist directing your attention to the print ad campaign for the paperback version of Jonathan Franzen’s The Discomfort Zone. “From the acclaimed memoir by the author of The Corrections” runs the copy, above several blurbs:

• “Funny, masterfully composed” – Gregory Kirschling, Entertainment Weekly
• “[A] total lack of humor…perverse” – Daniel Mendelsohn, The New York Times Book Review
• “Luminous, essential reading” – Tim Adams, The Observer (London)
• “Odious…incredibly annoying” – Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

This is postmodern advertising at its best: honest, funny, provocative… and almost enough to reconsider our decision not to read the book.

[Editor’s note: We wish we could find a version of this ad online, but Harper’s readers can find it on page 51 of the November issue]