Review: "Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls," David Sedaris

By Paul Carrier

With only one other David Sedaris book under my belt (the hilarious Holidays on Ice), I may not be in the best position to judge Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls, a collection of monologues and essays, many of which have previously appeared in The New Yorker and other publications.

That being said, I didn’t enjoy this compilation as much, not because it lacks Sedaris’ delightfully offbeat sense of humor (there's some laugh-out-loud stuff here) but because this is an uneven assemblage. The hits here share space with a few near misses.

Sedaris is known for writing ostensibly autobiographical essays about his life, including his childhood in North Carolina; his time abroad in England, France, and elsewhere; his relationship with partner Hugh Hamrick; and his dyspeptic take on the antics of the boorish and baffling people he encounters in his travels.

In fact, Sedaris is at his best when he turns a jaundiced eye and a sardonic pen on folks who strike him as ill-mannered cretins. He is a peevish — some might say petty —  fellow, but that’s part of his appeal. Many readers are sure to share his take on the irritants that bedevil modern life, such as the slovenly dress code that has become the norm for traveling Americans.

“I should be used to the way Americans dress when traveling,” Sedaris writes, “yet it still manages to amaze me. It’s as if the person next to you had been washing shoe polish off a pig, then suddenly threw down his sponge saying, ‘Fuck this. I’m going to Los Angeles!’”

Sedaris doesn’t confine his biting assessments to his fellow Americans. He describes rural Britons as slobs who dump an obscene amount of litter along scenic roadways and in adjacent forests. He finds China to be a land plagued by truly horrendous, and avoidable, sanitation problems. As for Italy, Sedaris laments that the language barrier there had unfortunate consequences when he bought a train ticket to Brindisi.

“The man behind the counter offered me three options, and I guess I said yes to the one that meant “No seat for me, thank you. I would like to be packed as tightly as possible alongside people with no access to soap or running water.’”

Part of Sedaris’ appeal is his knack for finding links among disparate events and ruminations, which he packages so tidily that readers may find themselves wondering, in the end, how they got from A to Z in the course of a single essay. He also conjures up poignant images from time to time, most notably as a son who, even in adulthood, continues to crave the love of a less-than-supportive father.

Still, 13 pages devoted to Sedaris’ one-man anti-litter campaign in West Sussex, a county in the south of England, is at least a few pages too many. Another essay, on Sedaris’ growing frustration while stuck in line behind a boringly chatty customer at a coffee bar in a New Hampshire hotel, is shorter, but only mildly entertaining.

Yet Sedaris packs so much variety into Let’s Explore Diabetes with Owls that reading it is something like catching a talented stand-up comedian at work. Some jokes may fall flat, but the audience doesn’t obsess over them because the guy on stage is sharp enough to quickly recover his footing with a better gag or a funnier anecdote.
 
Sedaris tosses in several entertaining and thought-provoking monologues that make no claim to being factual. In one such fictional tale, a homophonic man becomes so unglued when same-sex marriage is legalized in New York that he decides the world has completely gone to hell, so the rules governing acceptable behavior no longer apply to him or anyone else.

The narrator then murders his wife, his daughter and his mother-in-law, none of whom he liked all that much anyway. For good measure, he zips past a stopped school bus while it's unloading students, accidentally killing a kid — “most likely a gay one” —  who was crossing the street. Figuring he’ll be released from prison if the powers that be believe he's gay, he kisses his cell mate and concludes that "it's really not that bad," if you keep your eyes closed.

Over-the-top? Certainly. But how better to skewer senseless hatred and all-consuming phobias?