The disjointed isolation of lists, statistics, acronyms, epigrams, short verses and so on means the humour has to work harder to Punch through, yet it frequently does, thanks to Martin’s precision of language. It’s undeniably impressive comedy thinking, but sometimes eliciting a wry smile of appreciation rather that a more instinctual chuckle. Martin revels in his rarefied intelligence, and his comedy very much seems like a smart kid showing off the homework that earned him straight As. Your opinion of that ‘achievement’ will probably much determine your opinion of this book, too. Martin probably single-handedly introduced Venn diagrams to stand-up – so it’s all his fault that there is now such huge overlap between educated comedians and comedians who use Venn diagrams. This eclectic collection comprises everything from hand-drawn sketches to pithy one-liners, from a ridiculous crossword to a single palindrome about finding love in a strip club that spans three pages – not to mention several pages of charts and graphs. He tinkers with words and ideas like a teenage Poindexter might take apart an electrical gizmo to see how it ticks – then put it back together slightly differently.

Like the stand-up that won this razor-smart New Yorker, the Perrier award back in 2003 (and formed the basis for his subsequent Important Things TV show back in his homeland), the humour here is unapologetically nerdy, offbeat and fragmented.įor most comedians, the nerdy tag probably means gags about Star Wars or Schrodinger’s Cat but Martin is a practitioner of geek, not just an observer. If you’re already aware of Demetri Martin’s work as the hipsters’ favourite comedian, this is exactly the book you would expect him to write.

This is a Book by Demetri Martin