The publisher’s motto is “Humor Heals Us.” Noble words, but count me as one who is sceptical about either the risibility or the medical efficacy of its publications. Consider Fritz the Farting Reindeer, subtitled “A Story About a Reindeer Who Farts” – one must imagine the side-splitting antics that ensue when Santa has to choose his team for his Christmas run and Comet comes down with a broken leg. Imagine more unbridled mirth in the same author’s Santa’s Tooting Tooshie: A Story About Santa’s Toots. Conceive, if you possibly can, of the jocundity to be found in Ellie the Tooting Elf: A Story About an Elf Who Toots. Stand back Voltaire, P.G. Wodehouse, and Ogden Nash, you are no match for the literary mind that can turn a phrase like this:
Farting without you is like….
Elmer without glue
Detective without a clue
Crying without “Boo-hoo!”
The author is modestly anonymous but he (or she) has emitted a whole series of books aimed at the children’s market, involving unicorns, penguins, turkeys, puffer fish and other fauna plagued by uncontrollable gaseous emissions. Not since the fabled Le Pétomane, consummate farter of the French musical hall scene in the 19th century, has flatulence been monetized so nakedly. I can only recommend that the author purchase a barrel of industrial-strength Gas-X and stay away from beans, prunes, and cabbage.
It read that.
It’s a gas.
And there is the Catalonian obsession with poop at Christmas.