Sitcom

by David McGimpsey

Implicating extremes from Coriolanus to Karen Carpenter, David McGimpsey’s Sitcom is both serious poetry and a work of comedy.

Where Timon of Athens meets Shania Twain, that's where you'll find Sitcom. Mischievous, generous and side-splittingly funny, this collection of wry soliloquies and sonnets begins with a milestone birthday and finds itself in demi-mondes as varied as the offices of university regents and the basic plot arc of Hawaii Five-O – offering, along the way, a sincere contemplation of mortality and the fashion sense of Mary Tyler Moore. In between, you'll find Auden, Arthur Carlson, oper, Girls Gone Wild and the lead from Suddenly Susan's turn as a creative writing student.

Unembarrassed by its literary allusions or its hi-lo hybridity, Sitcom’s strategic and encompassing voice is prepared for each comedic disaster and is, somehow, always ready for next week’s episode.

Genres: Poetry

88 pages, Paperback

First published October 14, 2004

About the author

David has a PhD in English Literature. Writes a regular humour column called "The Self-Esteem Workout" for Matrix. and the "Sandwich of the Month" column for EnRoute magazine. David is a songwriter and musician, and member of the rock band Puggy Hammer. He is the Montreal fiction editor of the e-magazine Joyland and is the fiction editor for the Punchy Writers Series at DC Books. David was named by the CBC as one of the "Top Ten English-Language Poets in Canada". David currently teaches creative writing and literature at Concordia University. excerpts from Li'l Bastard 2011

Reviews

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was lent to my roommate the cover seemed intriguing so I picked it up. Genuine sentiment saved me from perceiving McGimpsey's pop culture laden poems as too "hipstery", which was baseless fear. I'm a fan and eager to read more of his work.

[Arjun · Rating 5 out of 5]

David is one of the funniest, brightest poets going. This collection rocks.

[Mar · Rating 2 out of 5]

This collection of poetry references many sitcoms which have aired since the 1950's into the time the book was written. I feel the pop culture references clearly date the poems and while some may deem the author clever, I didn't appreciate the poems or the self-deprecating humour.

[Hal · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF... just genuinely awful annoying poetry you can tell was written by a white man who once had dreadlocks

[Shawna Lemay · Rating 5 out of 5]

sheer genius.