When You Are Engulfed in Flames
by David Sedaris
Little, Brown HK$208
When You Are Engulfed in Flames, the latest of David Sedaris' six internationally best-selling anthologies of essays, has been received with significantly less enthusiasm than its predecessors.
Sedaris has been accused of complacency; romantic equilibrium has been held responsible for leeching his humorous prose, but the truth is more complicated. He has been at the top for so long now - and with a notable absence of scandal - that a backlash was inevitable. In addition to which, the bar Sedaris has set is now so high that if he writes a story that is less than riotous he is considered to have failed.
When You Are Engulfed in Flames is, in parts, as moving and outrageously hilarious as anything Sedaris has ever written. His meditation on Stadium Pal, 'the ultimate portable urinal', must be one of the funniest pieces ever written. 'Was it masculine?' he asks. 'Yes, and proudly so. Knowing no sensible female would ever voluntarily choose to pee in her pants, the manufacturers went ahead and designed the product exclusively for men ... The bag can be reused up to twelve times, making it both disgusting and cost effective. What could be manlier?'