Are You One of the Dumb?

With a ruthless literary assault on almost anything you may expect Dawn Of The Dumb to be a rather pointless series of rants by the Guardian writer Charlie Brooker from his columns in the paper. Yet you would have assumed wrong as this fantastically hilarious collection of articles written by Brooker seethes away with critical bitterness that would put even the sharpest tongued of people to shame. Published as a collection of articles in 2007 the actual articles date back from November 2004 to July 2007 broken in to 12 individual chapters based around TV shows and other writing on a vast array of subjects (split pretty evenly into TV for 50% and other subjects for 50% of the book).

In recent years Brooker has started appearing on TV with shows like Screenwipe, Gameswipe and Newswipe on BBC4 all following in the same sort of vein as the viciousness of the book. Despite the almost rant-like tone Brooker portrays (in both the TV shows and his writing) it never becomes a swear-a-thon as many rants seem to, infact they are often incredibly clever rants full of graphically interesting descriptions and an agreeable tone laced with copious amounts of humour to soften the anger of the articles.

Due to the fact many of the columns were written quite a while back so many of the TV ones feel rather dated, especially the ones one reality TV shows that now are difficult to remember such as Big Brother from 2004 for example was a theme in the book that lead to several columns in the book, the views of Brooker changing with each successive one. The same applies to the ones on things like X factor as at the time of the columns he was writing the TV segment of the Guardian newspaper and often got to advise what was worth watching. It's fun to read these writings to see how things were on TV just a few years ago (it would seem they were just as poor are they are now, yes, almost 5 years later on TV is still diabolically poor on the whole).

The none TV based articles are just as fun though usually completely pointless rants about anything ranging from how having a cold "proves" that God cannot possible exist, to the usefulness of a suicide button that we should all be born with, even political policy's are mentioned (a way to cut out Smoking nationally). Even a rant about a study on Penis sizes finds it's way into the book as Brooker lets loose with an hilariously put together rant on the Sun newspaper's reporting style.
A compellingly addictive read from start to end that's wonderfully written with a dark humour underlining everything about it. The fact the book can be written in small chunks of an article a time (usually around 1 ½ A5 pages) as well as the much more lengthier chapters, it will almost certainly keep you captivated throughout the whole thing. Possibly even having you re-read it again after you've been through the entire anger once feeling that once just isn't enough to fill you with enough of Brooker's vile temper.

Although some may find the pointlessness of it all rather off putting whilst others will find the wide ranging targets of defenceless victims rather unfair and offensive it's not aimed at those easily offended. If you have a sense of humour, can accept a well worded insult and won't take things to heart too much you will really enjoy the vile tongued anger of Brooker. Of course if you'd rather avoid anger in your life and live like some sort of a hippy who just wants peace and live in the middle of nowhere then you should avoid this, as of course, it may raise your blood pressure to that of Brooker himself. Yes if you are easily offended stay away, despite the cleverly worded insults, a few naughty words do slip into the book throughout as well so it perhaps should be avoided for you lot.

Of course a lot of it is just the writers opinion, but that's one of the appealing factors, he almost seems like he's been given free reign to write what he wants, often seeming like it's uncensored and he's been allowed to really let lose, something most writers aren't allowed in the national press where agendas are to be followed. This is a prime example of how to write rants like they were supposed to be written with out them becoming diatribes that veer off into anarchy of written anger with no point at all to them. Brooker whilst his themes often seem uncorrelated does tend to keep to the same target for a full rant, and is exquisite at thinking of the right insult every time.

Overall a brilliant book show casing the best in sharp tongued rants and the most wondrous TV reviews available. Ian Hyland (the Suns TV writer) could only dream of having half the originality of Brooker, and sadly none of the other TV writers seem to even make a note worthy effort to match the bar Brooker was setting years ago.