Whenever Oprah Winfrey comes out with a new book club selection, we at the public library know it within twenty seconds. This is no exaggeration. The Oprah books are, of course, favored almost exclusively by women. Middle-aged white women comprise the largest group of fiction readers. I expect them to be reading the kind of stuff she recommends, even without her recommendation. What happens when Oprah selects is that the huge number of them who are currently reading Danielle Steel or Sue Grafton or Nora Roberts are alerted to another woman-type fiction book and all crowd over to the lee rail of that particular literary ship to get sight of something they might otherwise have passed over, since the Oprah books are typically not mere entertainment, but entertainment salted with cracker-barrel philosophy that helps them feel, well, whatever it is that Oprahites need to feel.
Her audience (as I can see it from where I sit) is interesting in that she seems to range considerably outside this group of typical fiction readers to younger women, non-whites, and the less-educated. If mere literacy is a societal value, then Oprah certainly encourages it, and deserves every bit of lionessization that American Library Association types can lavish on her.
Mere literacy has no value in itself. It is worthy only as the servant of virtue. The virtues of Oprahism, however, appear to be subordinate to, and ordered by, the prime virtue of self-realization and self-actualization rather than that of finding the self by losing it in sacrificial service to others, subject to the will of God. Its heroes tend to be Prometheans injured by, and in defiance of, the Traditional Moral Order (let us all weep for them a bit), lap-christs for the entertainment of silly women. Oprahism, to be sure, is chock-full of "virtues," but the order in which they are placed relative to one another in the scheme of the whole makes the phenomenon a veil of evil.
She did go through a period where her selections included Tolstoy and Faulkner and Steinbeck, but it seems to have been short-lived (and I doubt if her analysis was anything to write home about even during that period).
Posted by: James Kabala | February 15, 2008 at 10:32 AM
The difficulty with critical analysis of phenomena like what I am here calling Oprahism is their ambiguity. They are "soft," polymorphous things for which one could, if one were so convinced, build a fairly convincing case for benignity. Their spiritual root can only be ascertained in an attempt to assess the thing as a whole, which involves the risk of being "proved" wrong by those who come forward with an incontestable catalog contrary facts. I am not in saying this opposing Mr. Kabala, but his comment brought this to mind.
What I have said here will in all likelihood make sense only to those who have reached the same conclusion, or something like it, independently, often on the basis of the autonomic working of empirical intelligence that is usually called intuition, but for that no less based on the comprehension of fact than actual ratiocination.
Posted by: smh | February 15, 2008 at 11:27 AM
This is interesting to me because one of our friends just recently made the Oprah Magazine with her first book (and the NYT Bestsellers list). It is a book that is typically read by women (I haven't read it yet, but will to support and learn more about our friend).
As such, I've wondered about the self-actualization, self-realization nature of Oprahism, which spreads way beyond Oprahdom and is not gender exclusive. I've heard my fair-share of self-actualization mantras in the past (I do like in SF afterall!) and can understand their allure; they promise to give one the feeling of progress (I'm doing something about __________) and bring one in contact with what seems to be profundity from those who seem to know more than oneself about "those things." Self-validation from self-perceived authorities on one's condition is very intoxicating and addictive, particularly when it looks like such tough, meaningful work - "I suffered and am suffering!". I thought in the past that this sort of "movement," while perhaps going in the wrong direction, is all in all not a bad/evil thing as at least someone is actually thinking about something. The rub, though, seems to be that there is no guarantee that one's "inner exploration" won't end; that if it feels good enough and is supported with enough "success signs," i.e., "I look, live, eat, sex better, make more money and I feel stronger and better about myself," - something that can be reasonably expected via "correct usage" of modern upper-middle class abundance, then one could conceivably go on forever with this "religion." I've always harbored the hope, though, that the inner searching would naturally lead oneself out of oneself, if for no other reason than one would/should eventually get bored with oneself and/or with one's guru. It did for me during my "soulful" (read self-absorbed - Mom was right again!) period. But, feeling like a Star IS all the rage these daze.
I guess I'm trying to say that maybe Oprahism is not so bad IF it is just a transfer-station on the path towards True Authority. Problem is, "the mirrors in this station make me look so good, why should I get on that dusty old train? It's hard to leave such mirrors for an unknown one "they" (you know, the ones who claim reality involves patriarchal authority - "Are you kidding?," say the Oprahites) say is better and actually real, especially if 'It' isn't particularly impressed with my self-expression." Guess that makes for a pretty big IF, doesn't it. No wonder prophets are needed (and killed). Yikes.
Posted by: Tim | February 15, 2008 at 12:50 PM
Your comment, Tim, is a model of the kind I would like to encourage on this site. Thoughtful, interactive with the original posting, and an interesting lead toward more of the same. Well done.
Posted by: smh | February 15, 2008 at 02:05 PM
In my post, among other typos I'll ignore for now, it should read (I do live in SF afterall). Not "like."
Posted by: Tim | February 15, 2008 at 02:09 PM
Thank you SMH. It's nice to know someone can make sense of my writing/thoughts!
And thank you for your many thoughtful, interesting and provocative contributions and comments. I feel blessed to have found Touchstone and Mere Comments; within their domain I learn about things truly profound (those "things" outside myself!) from multiple, earnest and honest authorities who are, themselves, questers on this path, desiring to know more fully and reflect more lovingly the Author of our true selves.
Posted by: Tim | February 15, 2008 at 02:39 PM
But mere literacy does have virtue in and of itself: it is necessary to be able to read to be a full citizen: to vote (and vote wisely), to hold down a job that can support oneself and a family, etc., etc., etc.
And of course, like any skill, literacy improves dramatically with practice. If the practice can be made reasonably pleasant enough, it is more likely to be done, until one is "over the hump" and good enough at the thing that it becomes self-sustaining. Books that help struggling readers over that hump, if they have no truly serious flaws, are therefore praiseworthy.
But, as far as I have been able to tell, Oprah does not inspire those who cannot read, or who have been struggling, with reading skills to master them, so perhaps the word "literacy" is not the word you (or the A.L.A.) wants to describe the phenomenon of liking to spend time reading.
Because that, like any hobby, as you say, may be virtuous; but just as easily may not.
But as I dislike the Oprah books myself (I prefer children's books or history or science fiction) I am somewhat unwilling to judge the reason that those who do like them, like them. Pehaps they may have innocent reasons, as well as ungodly ones?
Posted by: Carbonel | February 15, 2008 at 04:07 PM
I've had only one direct contact with Oprah's choices and that was "The Road". It was recommended by a fellow SciFi fan and I nearly skipped it because of the Oprah sticker. I should have trusted my gut. "The Road" is an emotional hit piece with every virtue stripped out of it. The setting is inconsistent and the hero is anything but. What amazes, or at least perplexes, me is that women love it. They are wrapped up in the the feelings produced from the work rather than the message or technical merit.
Posted by: Nick | February 15, 2008 at 04:25 PM
>>>But mere literacy does have virtue in and of itself: it is necessary to be able to read to be a full citizen: to vote (and vote wisely), to hold down a job that can support oneself and a family, etc., etc., etc.<<<
Mere literacy doesn't mean that one reads what is necessary to be a full citizen, etc., and many people don't. My hairdresser, a woman in her 40s and fully literate, asked me the other day if Ron Paul is a real person or a made-up character. A literate person may read only pornography, or instructions for conducting violent jihad, or any number of immoral things.
The idea of literacy being a virtue in itself puts me in mind of Cuba, where they boast of a 100 percent literacy rate and this boast is repeated ad nauseum by western leftists. Literacy to read what? Librarians who attempt to loan out books unapproved by the state are thrown into prison.
Posted by: Judy K. Warner | February 15, 2008 at 04:33 PM
I've never paid attention to Oprah, but I just went to her website and found two different listings of books. One is the books that are "seen" on her show -- I guess that means the authors appear. The ones for January are uniformly nonfiction and most are self-help books.
The other list is her book club. Going from the current book back through 2006, these are:
There were three Faulkners in 2005, Anna Karenina and The Good Earth in 2004, a few things that might be called literature before that but mostly popular fiction. It looks like she had a short literary period and is now offering a self-help book as a book club selection for the first time. Maybe the literature hurt her ratings.
Do women ask for books from both of these lists, SMH? And do libraries make sure to carry the books Oprah recommends? The libraries I use seem to be getting rid of all their good fiction and filling up the shelves with Nora Roberts, so if they are really bent on giving their customers exactly what they ask for and little else, I suppose their self-help section is huge.
Tim, I can't see any way that this sort of thing could lead to seeking the truth. The message of self-actualization is that you are the truth.
Posted by: Judy K. Warner | February 15, 2008 at 05:08 PM
I think Tim hit the nail right on the head: If Opraliteracy is a stop on the road toward Jerusalem (that being truth, beauty, and virtue), then it's probably not a bad thing. If on the other hand, if it's a stop on the way out of Jerusalem, then one'd be better off illiterate.
Posted by: Steve Nicoloso | February 15, 2008 at 05:11 PM
>>>The message of self-actualization is that you are the truth.<<<
Indeed, Judy, but I like to think (and have experienced to some extent myself) that, via the self-explorations that one undertakes in a "self-actualization" process, eventually one must come to realize that one actually is not the truth. Once that happens, one can travel back to paths more profitable knowing now not only about one's own serious limitations but also about the limitations and dangers of following all too-human, "entrepreneurial" saviors. Methinks God stands waiting, at this point, back on the true path for his long, lost child to finally join Him again. Maybe we had to get that self-guided side-tracking out of our system? Of course, I'm assuming here that people are truly doing self-exploration, a not so easy and pleasant undertaking if done seriously (the struggles of which gives it its' martyr-like pseudo-sanctity in the eyes of a selfish disciple). I fear, though, that most don't really undertake "inner-work" with much seriousness; they only go so far with it as to wrap the popular righteousness of its' claims round their shoulders in communion with fellow "sufferers" til, of course, the next book and its' "revelations" come down the media pipeline into their TVs, their "self" magazines, and themselves. I suspect, as long as this process of consumption continues without interruption, the soul ceases to grow and therefore begins to decay. Contrary to the advertisements, decadence seems the end product of the self-actualization process. Or is it contrary?
Posted by: Tim | February 15, 2008 at 06:59 PM
I'm not really sure what "self-actualization" means. I say that having worked in counseling for a number of years when I was younger, received a master's degree that involved a lot of that kind of talk, and had therapy. I understand having life problems and solving them, learning to look at oneself honestly, being dissatisfied with oneself and trying to change, figuring out one's real interests and following them, figuring out one's beliefs; these are things people have always done. There is some mystical element to self-actualization that I can't grasp. (It is from Maslow, isn't it?) I think the extra element is the idea that you have to make a break from whatever you have been, including your family and your beliefs, and become an autonomous being, re-inventing yourself from scratch. Perhaps, Tim, you are the first person to come out of this NOT thinking you are your own God.
We all need a structure to our lives, and until fairly recently religion provided that structure; even those who were not religious lived within the culture that religion had created. With so much of our culture destroyed in the last 45 years, many people are floundering around looking for some kind of structure to help them make sense of the world. The only authority that is acceptable is one that tells them there is no authority. Oprah is such an authority, and the structure she provides is one of self-actualization. I see nothing good in this; I think that rather than leading people to the truth, or allowing people to come to truth, it probably inoculates people against seeing truth as it induces suspicion and hostility toward anything that requires obedience to something greater than oneself.
Posted by: Judy K. Warner | February 15, 2008 at 07:36 PM
To answer Judy Warner's question:
Yes, women, almost exclusively women in my library--which has multiple copies of all the Oprah books--ask for titles from both these lists. The self-help sections (including exercise books and videorecordings) are indeed huge, and visited mostly by women. The religion section is full of what amounts to being self-help material. (Men, being men, usually don't look for help until they're beyond it. They seem to be more reluctant than women to approach the Reference Desk and ask for assistance, so I walk around sometimes and fish for them. When they see that I'm happy to help them and don't treat them like they're stupid, they are very pleased and grateful. One of my frequent lines: "That's what they pay me for; don't hesitate to ask." Once I have a session like this with them, they will ask for help if they need it.)
The exceptions from nearly exclusive female readership I recall offhand from those you enumerate are the Guinness Book of Records, which is a great favorite of pre-teen boys, and Wiesel's Night, a frequent school assignment, so must be read by the youth of both sexes. Teenage boys don't read much; they play with the computers. Their female counterparts read more, but seem to concentrate on teen girl rivalry-romances. Friendly dragons and the like seem to have replaced horses as objects of their fantasies about big, strong, lovable animals.
There are a few popular authors who seem to be read by men and women, although perhaps not equally--James Patterson, John Grisham, Carl Hiaasen, and (somewhat surprisingly to me) Stephen King, for example--but most adult fiction seems to sort itself out along male and female lines, the men preferring books by authors like W.E.B. Griffin, Robert Ludlum, John Sandford, Dean Koontz, Clive Cussler, and James Lee Burke. Men are the chief consumers of westerns and science fiction, but the more the edges blur toward fantasy or romance the larger the female involvement becomes. Mysteries proper, I would guess, have a slightly larger female readership than male, but only slightly, and this tends to vary with the writer. I have never had a man ask for Lillian Jackson Braun, or a woman ask for Ralph McInerny or Arthur Conan Doyle, but I have had men and women ask for Agatha Christie and G. K. Chesterton's Father Brown.
Every last time a man has asked me for a Danielle Steel novel he has felt it necessary to explain that he's there to get it for his wife or mother. Even the covers on those things bother the guys.
Bear in mind that all this is only anecdotal; I don't have any figures to back me up, only thirteen years of experience behind a reference desk observing what library patrons read in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
Posted by: smh | February 15, 2008 at 08:19 PM
"The Green Book"
Whoa, shades of C. S. Lewis!
I think perhaps that women who read McInerny and Doyle don't need to ask how to find them. Although, one would think that about people looking for Fr. Brown also.
AMDG,
Janet
Posted by: Janet | February 15, 2008 at 08:41 PM
>I think perhaps that women who read McInerny and Doyle don't need to ask how to find them.<
Point taken. I find myself recommending McInerny to people who are casting about for a "new" mystery writer. When I mention that he's the author of the Father Dowling series, I always say that the priest-detective of the novels is completely different than the clueless dolt who needed help from a "with it" young nun in showing him what the world was really like, as in that ridiculous television series. The Father Dowling of the novels suffered acutely from awareness of what the world was really like.
Posted by: smh | February 15, 2008 at 10:44 PM
I didn't know about McInerny. Thanks. Any more mystery recommendations?
Posted by: Judy K. Warner | February 16, 2008 at 07:17 AM
>>>My hairdresser, a woman in her 40s and fully literate, asked me the other day if Ron Paul is a real person or a made-up character.<<<
And you answered her how? :)
Posted by: Bobby Winters | February 16, 2008 at 01:06 PM
Judy K. Warner:
A couple of years ago I came across C J Sansom, a Brit who writes about the time of the English Reformation. His protagonist, besides solving mysteries, reflects intelligently about the competing religious claims of the time. The first in the series is Dissolution.
Perhaps the editors could open another thread some time for the exchange of information about mysteries, or other fiction. This isn't the reason for Mere Comments, but, seriously, given the state of literature (lots of bad books getting lots of adulation), literary criticism, and the mostly pathetic book review sections in many newspapers, journals, etc. (Touchstone's contributions notwithstanding), it is not easy to find good fiction. I would welcome some informal fiction reviews/direction from Touchstone editors and readers.
Posted by: pilgrim kate | February 16, 2008 at 01:15 PM
"Any more mystery recommendations?"
I'm not a huge reader of mysteries, but I have three favorite series I've followed over the years: P.D. James's 'Inspector Dalgliesh,' Colin Dexter's 'Inspector Morse,' and Ian Rankin's 'Rebus' series.
James's books are long, character-driven and fairly psychological. She is an Anglican Christian and her books reflect a strong moral sense. Her detective, Adam Dalgliesh, the son of an Anglican minister, has lost his faith due to a personal tragedy, but still wrestles with it from time to time.
Rankin's books are more aptly called police procedurals, and his detective, John Rebus, is a lapsed Catholic with a fair share of personal demons. This series can be quite gritty at times, but not horribly so, IMO. Not for those who like "cozies" however.
Dexter's 'Morse' is a poetry-reading, classical music fan who does crosswords, but he puts himself forward across as a tough and aloof loner to hide his softer self. He sometimes drinks a little too much, and is very much the nice guy who never quite gets the girl.
Posted by: Rob G | February 16, 2008 at 02:23 PM
P.D. James is my favorite. I've read Dissolution but forgot about that author, so thanks for the reminder, P. Kate. I'll check out your others, Rob.
Posted by: Judy K. Warner | February 16, 2008 at 07:33 PM
maybe it's just me, but I really, really love Stephen King. I'm not even ashamed to admit it. I've read about 21 of his novels; he sits comfortably on my shelf between Dostoyevsky and Chesterton.
Posted by: Anna | February 16, 2008 at 11:23 PM
Here is her whole list:
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Back Roads by Tawni O'Dell
The Best Way To Play by Bill Cosby
Black and Blue by Anna Quindlen
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
The Book of Ruth by Jane Hamilton
Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat
Cane River by Lalita Tademy
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
The Deep End of the Ocean by Jacquelyn Mitchard
Drowning Ruth by Christina Schwarz
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons
Fall on Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald
A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
Gap Creek by Robert Morgan
The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
The Heart of a Woman by Maya Angelou
Here on Earth by Alice Hoffman
House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III
I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb
Icy Sparks by Gwyn Hyman Rubio
Jewel by Bret Lott
A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines
Light in August by William Faulkner
Love in the Time of Cholera By Gabriel García Márquez
A Map of the World by Jane Hamilton
The Meanest Thing To Say by Bill Cosby
The Measure of a Man by Sidney Poitier
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
Midwives by Chris Bohjalian
A Million Little Pieces by James Frey
Mother of Pearl by Melinda Haynes
A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle
Night by Elie Wiesel
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
Open House by Elizabeth Berg
Paradise by Toni Morrison
The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
The Pilot's Wife by Anita Shreve
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
The Rapture of Canaan by Sheri Reynolds
The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
River, Cross My Heart by Breena Clarke
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb
Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
Songs In Ordinary Time by Mary McGarry Morris
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail by Malika Oufkir
Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi
Sula by Toni Morrison
Tara Road by Maeve Binchy
The Treasure Hunt by Bill Cosby
Vinegar Hill by A. Manette Ansay
A Virtuous Woman by Kaye Gibbons
We Were The Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates
What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day by Pearl Cleage
Where the Heart Is by Billie Letts
While I Was Gone by Sue Miller
White Oleander by Janet Fitch
A great many authors I do not recognize. A number of the one's I do (Jonathan Franzen, Alan Paton, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, William Faulkner) have produced engaging and worthwhile literature. At least one other (Toni Morrison) has been praised as a stylist by critics (e.g. Stanley Crouch) who do not have much use for other aspects of her work. The Oufkir book I recall being reviewed and I believe it is the memoir of a political prisoner, something outside the realm of experience in this country. I have read old interviews with Maeve Binchey and somehow doubt she trafficks in therapeutic ideology, though there's been a lot of water under the bridge for Ireland in the last 25 years and perhaps for her too. Anna Quindlen is the only person on the list who I would classify a dreckmeister from having read what she has written, though the term 'cracker-barrell philosophy' seems rather inapt to describe her general outlook.
Their spiritual root can only be ascertained in an attempt to assess the thing as a whole, which involves the risk of being "proved" wrong by those who come forward with an incontestable catalog contrary facts....What I have said here will in all likelihood make sense only to those who have reached the same conclusion, or something like it, independently, often on the basis of the autonomic working of empirical intelligence that is usually called intuition,
I think you are saying you cannot be argued out of your position by actually examining the books in question.
I do not recall that Tom Bosley played Fr. Dowling as a 'clueless dolt'. (The show was on for one season twenty years ago. Who besides you and me remembers?)
Men, being men, usually don't look for help until they're beyond it. They seem to be more reluctant than women to approach the Reference Desk and ask for assistance, so I walk around sometimes and fish for them. When they see that I'm happy to help them and don't treat them like they're stupid,
No, but you've just let a large portion of your distaff constituency know you think they're squish-heads based on their diversionary reading.
Posted by: Art Deco | February 17, 2008 at 08:54 AM
In _Ideas Have Consequences_, Richard Weaver notes that mass literacy could be a very good thing, but is not necessarily so when the culture has lost any grounds for authority to say *what* should be read. By authority here, he is not meaning the authority to censor the ideas in books ("you cannot publish or read this book because it glorifies communism"), but rather that in the schools and in reviews we need to be able to say "this is a good book, based on its ideas and moral values as well as its aesthetic excellence" and "this is not so good, based on the same criteria." When this is not done by family, schools, and reviewers, when we say "who can say" whether a book is good or bad for any reason whatsoever, then mass literacy is not so great because it's human nature to move toward that which tickles our ears.
Posted by: Beth | February 17, 2008 at 11:43 AM
>I think you are saying you cannot be argued out of your position by actually examining the books in question.<
No, that's not what I said; apparently the thought was lost on you, but I must say you dispatched your straw man with aplomb.
>I do not recall that Tom Bosley played Fr. Dowling as a 'clueless dolt'. (The show was on for one season twenty years ago. Who besides you and me remembers?)<
Perhaps the people who loved the Father Dowling novels and were anxious to see them portrayed on television. Where in the novels was the junior nun who served as the priest's companion and mystagogue? Bosley was everybody's Nice Cleric, with a special talent. McInerny's Dowling has depth and gravity that Bosley and his writers completely failed to show.
>>No, but you've just let a large portion of your distaff constituency know you think they're squish-heads based on their diversionary reading.<<
Yeah. All the Oprahites among Mere Comments readers. And you think I'm the one who's insulting our female readers.
Posted by: smh | February 17, 2008 at 01:36 PM
No, that's not what I said; apparently the thought was lost on you, but I must say you dispatched your straw man with aplomb.
I did no such thing and your thoughts were not lost on me.
Bosley was everybody's Nice Cleric, with a special talent.
Nice Clerics with special talents and female seconds are 'clueless dolts'?
Yeah. All the Oprahites among Mere Comments readers. And you think I'm the one who's insulting our female readers.
You made a public statement that can be located by anyone who makes a Google search, whether they be a squish-heads or not. (I must say that the one person in my circle of acquaintances who reads Oprah's magazine does not fit your description well).
And it is a repulsive statement. It is not that difficult for people employed in library administration to suspend judgment on the folks coming in the door. You have only brief (and commonly civil) interactions with them and deal only with certain aspects of them.
Posted by: Art Deco | February 17, 2008 at 02:34 PM
Oprah their a excellent new book out there name The Essence of a Man by Sir Darcy Darrell Demby a 31yrs.ld man fom Dallas, Tx. This book is relaxing,profoundly poetic,enjoyable and smoothing for your mental state. I would suggest this book for Oprah book club for all sexes No.1
Posted by: ms. weley | June 30, 2008 at 09:18 PM
Just out of curiosity, has anyone seen the incredibly vulgar but hilarious sendup of Oprah and her book club by South Park, called "A Million Little Fibers", in which Towlie (a walking, talking towel who likes to smoke pot--don't ask) writes his memoirs (while stoned) and submits them to a publisher. But since no publisher is interested in the autobiography of a towel, he changes his identity to a person (by growing a mustache and wearing a hat), calling himself "Steven McTowelie". At which, Oprah picks up his book and plugs it on her shoe, only to ditch Towlie when it is discovered that he is, well, a towel.
This is, of course, a brilliant parody of the scandal surrounding James Frey's fictitious autobiography "A Million Little Pieces", it's shameless plugging through Oprah's Book Club, and Oprah's subsequent repudiation of Frey and on-air humiliation of the disgraced author.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | June 30, 2008 at 09:28 PM
Stuart, it's good to know there are others who appreciate a good South Park treatment. Re the Oprah episode, poor Midgie and Gary didn't stand a chance. And maybe I missed an episode, but where did Towlie come from?
Posted by: Tim | July 01, 2008 at 12:37 AM
>>And maybe I missed an episode, but where did Towlie come from?<<
Towelie first appeared as a nod to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in the episode bearing his name in season 5. He told Stan to "Remember a towel!" as a random cameo-style walk on and then asked the boys if they wanted to get high. He was later a candidate as a "replacement friend" for the deceased ("permanently") Kenny in the episode "Professor Chaos" from season 6.
Posted by: Michael | July 01, 2008 at 02:09 AM
Thanks Michael. It's been a long time since I read the Hitchhiker's Guide.
Posted by: Tim | July 01, 2008 at 11:41 AM
And this, Michael, from Wikipedia ...
Towelie
* On the episode commentary, Trey and Matt explain that the origin for Towelie began on a boat trip they took with several writers and friends, where people were constantly telling each other "don’t forget to bring a towel" and the phrase eventually morphed into "Towelie says to bring a towel.", after Matt Stone and Trey Parker were hotboxing their office in the studio, and needed a towel to block under the door so no smoke would spread, which also explains why Towelie is always high.
* Matt and Trey have asserted (in the VH1 special and elsewhere) that they were becoming increasingly aware as to how heavily merchandised and exploited their creations were becoming. Towelie was their way of poking fun at themselves. They designed Towelie as a shallow, two-dimensional (both literally and figuratively) character who has no real purpose except to "spout catch phrases and merchandise the hell out of". This is why they threw in the fake commercial during the show, and also why Cartman calls him the "worst character ever".
Posted by: Tim | July 01, 2008 at 11:44 AM
I believe Midgie and Gary were a subtle paean to a host of British heist movies, most of which starred Bob Hoskins. But Gary sounded suspiciously like Pinkie from Pinkie and the Brain.
Posted by: Stuart Koehl | July 01, 2008 at 01:52 PM