By Rupert Besley
Publisher: Souvenir Press
ISBN: 978-0-28564-092-4
Cartoonists’ Club member Rupert is no stranger to observing the idiosyncrasies of our nation’s populace through his regular Isle of Wight County Press cartoons and his vast array of postcards. In fact, the Tourist Board recently calculated that so prolific are the latter items that Rupert has now exposed himself to every man, woman and child in the UK and has startled several on the continent to boot.
Terribly English brings all that insight, knowledge, scrutiny and utter damn cheek into one jam-packed and rather bulging book of fascinating facts and satirical shenanigans.
And this isn’t just a book of cartoons, but of page after page of sharp effortless prose too, and it’s not some silly throw-away-after-reading triviality but rather rich in research with its tempting trivia.
Topics cover our penchant for eccentricity and gardening to culinary suggestions based on class and offbeat festivities. A large section towards the back breaks the country down into counties and explores everything from peculiar place names to the local lingo, so we can all reflect on how utterly the same we are whilst being so utterly different.
Rupert is a gifted comedian, so there’s no faffing about and certainly no padding in his writing, and, believe me, you will chortle. I also found that you could read some pages with an air of innocence and then again with one of malice and dripping sarcasm and they both worked equally well. So something for everyone.
All of this is decorated throughout with Rupert’s superb cartoons, gloriously coloured and deliciously detailed. Not a centimetre is wasted from cover to cover.
And if you liked that: Try and track down some of Rupert’s Wight Smiles. Lovely stuff.
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