Review: Rancid Pansies: James Hamilton-Paterson

Humour is very difficult to get right, and it is almost impossible to define what makes something "funny", particularly in books.  Some writers seem to achieve an effortless humour, almost as though it would be impossible for them to be serious.  Jerome K Jerome and George and Weedon Grossmith from an earlier age, or Tom Sharpe, and Tom Wolfe from more recent times, all seem to achieve this effortless humour, largely based on the ridiculousness of their characters and the inventive situations they place them in. 

In Rancid Pansies, James Hamilton-Paterson gives another outing to his character Gerald Samper who has already appeared in Cooking with Fernet Branca, and Amazing Disgrace and I have to say, the concept is now wearing a bit thin.  As I flick through the book now, I think I can see why. The book consists of pages and pages of blocks of text, describing the inner thoughts of Samper, with surprisingly little dialogue. The pages look dense and hard work, as in fact they are. While it was amusing to get inside the head of Samper for the first book and maybe the second, most readers will now feel that they know quite enough about him and his supercilious outlook on life and perhaps don't really need a further instalment of his self-regarding eccentricity.  I think by the end of this book I had actually come to form an intense dislike for Gerald Samper and was glad to reach the last page.