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| View Larger Image | The Dead Guy Interviews: Conversations with 45 of the Most Accomplished, Notorious, and Deceased Personalities in History
by Michael A. Stusser
| | List Price: | $14.00 | | Price: | $11.20 | | You Save: | $2.80 (20%) |  | | Available: | Usually ships in 24 hours | | | | | Sales Rank: | 59398 | | Studio: | Penguin (Non-Classics) | | | Binding: | Paperback | | Number Of Pages: | 304 | | Publication Date: | September 25, 2007 | | Publisher: | Penguin (Non-Classics) |
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EDITORIAL REVIEWS |
Product Description
The interviewees in this irreverent book may not have a pulse, but, boy, can they talk!
Ever wanted to ask Nostradamus for the winning lotto numbers or van Gogh about the whole ear episode? How about Napoleon about his complex, or if Frida might consider a brow wax? In The Dead Guy Interviews, journalist Michael Stusser has created forty-five interviews with some of the most famous personalities of all time, asking them probing questions about their lives, accomplishments, and what’s on their iPods. Based on his column in the acclaimed magazine mental_floss, this collection of conversations is incredibly funny, but each interview is also based on serious research, so in addition to laughing, readers actually learn real history.
The Dead Guy Interviews includes discussions with:
Alexander the Great
Beethoven
Napoléon Bonaparte
Buddha
Julius Caesar
Caligula
George Washington
Carver
Catherine the Great
Winston Churchill
Cleopatra
Confucius
Crazy Horse
Salvador Dalí
Charles Darwin
Emily Dickinson
Albert Einstein
Benjamin Franklin
Sigmund Freud
Genghis Khan
Vincent van Gogh
Henry VIII
J. Edgar Hoover
Harry Houdini
Thomas Jefferson
Joan of Arc
Robert Johnson
Frida Kahlo
Leonardo da Vinci
Abraham Lincoln
Mao Tse-tung
Karl Marx
Michelangelo
Montezuma
Mozart
Nostradamus
Edgar Allan Poe
William Shakespeare
Sun Tzu
Mae West
Oscar Wilde
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CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 5.0 based on 12 reviews)
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Come for the history, stay for the funny 
I'd been following Michael Stusser's column in Mental Floss Magazine for some time when I heard that the book was being released, so naturally I was one of the first in line to pick up a copy. I haven't been disappointed. Stusser's book delivers on all of the important levels.
For the history buff, "Interviews" packs the punch of obscure anecdotal insight into our favorite dead celebs.
For the casually knowledge hungry, the book keeps the reader laughing while it teaches (something our school systems might learn from).
All in all: an fun read and a Jeopardy field guide packed into one paperback with a clever cover.
August 21, 2008 | |
One Trick Pony 
The Dead Guy Interviews is based on the intriguing premise that forty-five of history's greatest, and most interesting, people can be summoned back to life long enough to sit for an interview with the author. The theory goes that Michael Stusser will ask the hard questions, questions that would have in some cases probably gotten him killed if he had dared to ask them during the actual lifetimes of his subjects. Stusser will combine insightful questions and humor in his interviews in a way that will provide the reader with forty-five painless little history lessons. So much for the theory, because in reality, this hit-and-miss book is more miss than hit.
Stusser interviews Beethoven, Napoleon, Churchill, Einstein, Darwin, Freud, Hoover, Poe, Mae West, Wilde, Crazy Horse, Washington, Lincoln, Julius Caesar, Buddha and thirty others. Each interview runs five or six pages and is introduced by a one-page biography of the person being interviewed. The interviews seldom fail to offer at least one or two lesser known, but intriguing, historical facts about their subjects but so many of the questions are phrased in such a sophomoric style of humor that the facts are soon overwhelmed by the silliness. And because Stusser sometimes has his historical figures respond in the same tone in which the questions are asked, many of them seem to have the same personality regardless of what they accomplished in life or in what era they lived. After a while it starts to seem that everyone who comes back to life does so with the personality of Don Rickles.
Although many, if not most, of the interviews stress the sex lives of those answering the questions, with Stusser seeming to take particular delight in pointing out how many great figures of history were either homosexual or bisexual, some of the conversations do serve as good capsule histories. Unfortunately, because of the numerous sex jokes and the constant trading of insults between interviewer and interviewee, those conversations do not happen as often as they could have.
More typical is the way that the interviewer begins his session with Mexican painter Frida Kahlo.
Michael Stusser: Gotta ask about the facial hair. Why not trim up the old mono-brow and wax the `stache, you know?
Frida Kahlo: Yes, I now see this is going to be like sitting with a pig for an hour. Why don't you shave your back?
But along the way we are reminded of Beethoven's deafness, that Mozart may have suffered from Tourette's syndrome, that only seven of Emily Dickinson's poems were published in her lifetime, and we learn how Harry Houdini (and Siegfried and Roy) made an elephant disappear on stage. Stusser provides the kind of historical trivia that puts a human face on history's legends but the book is ultimately less a history lesson than it is a book filled with jokes written at the expense of those legends.
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July 06, 2008 | |
Hilarious!
I have read all of the Mental Floss books, and this may be the best yet. The "Dead Guy Interviews" are short (2-6 page) conversations between author Michael Stusser and famous figures from history. His imagination is so colorful and the statements from the "interviewees" so realistic that I had to keep reminding myself that these were not real interviews.
Stusser really brings these characters to life. He captures their mannerisms, speech patterns, and idiosyncracies. And his humor is wonderful. Some of the funniest moments are when he tells J. Edgar Hoover that his bra strap is showing and asks artist Frida Kahlo if she ever considered getting her mustache waxed. I was left entertained and wanting to know more about some of these famous characters.
For anyone who thinks history is boring, if they read this book, they're sure to change their mind.
April 29, 2008 | |
fun reading
The book gives you a general idea about each famous guy. It is very fun to read. My daught who is 12 likes this book too.
February 16, 2008 | |
Terrific
I don't rave about many books, but this is quite simply one of the most ingenious and enjoyable books of recent years. Stusser is a regular contributor to mental_floss magazine, as well as other venues, and that comes through loud and clear here. The book reminded me of Steve Allen's show, "Meeting of Minds," back in the 70s, I think, which was based on the same premise. Different actors would play the various historical figures, and Allen would interview them, and it was very well done, quite entertaining, and even informative. I remember veteran actor Alexander Scourby played a very convincing St. Thomas Aquinas, and even Poncho Villa made an appearance, although I don't recall who played him. :-)
Anyway, this book reminded me of Allen's old show, and I was delighted to find it. Many of the names are the same, obviously, but there are differences, too. Among those who appeared on Allen's award-winning show were (in chronological order): Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, Cleopatra, Marie Antoinette, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Paine, Francis Bacon, Thomas Jefferson, Voltaire, Charles Darwin, and Poncho Villa. You're bound to find some of your favorites here in Stusser's book (mine were Einstein, Ben Franklin, and Winston Churchill), but the other interviews are fun, too. And by the way, the interview with Sigmund Freud is hilarious what with all the off-color, risque comments and bantering back and forth between Stusser and Freud.
The different characters respond in persona to the questions, and even when the interviewer throws in a tough question, they still respond in persona. The whole concept is terrific, and very cleverly and ingeniously executed. It's a great book for your nightstand; that is, if you can manage to fall asleep after chuckling so much at how convincingly the various personas have been recreated in interview format.
November 07, 2007 | |
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