Bossypants: A Conversational Review

We'd like to thank the wonder that is gchat for the following conversation about Bossypants by Tina Fey:





zoe: hullo!

emily: yo yo yo

zoe: so, you finished Bossypants, eh?

emily: indeed! i sat in barnes and noble for 2.5 hours on Saturday and finished it. so i didn't buy the book, but i was a sitting advertisement for them that whole time. i made sure the cover was visible and everything.

zoe: i did buy the book - a special splurge for myself. worth every penny.

emily: i almost wish i'd purchased it because i think it would be fun to read aloud to jeff.

zoe: so . . . do you not feel like her "voice" is similar to your personality/writing style? I just couldn't stop thinking of you the whole way through

emily: i feel horribly arrogant agreeing, but yes. not through the whole thing (i have not yet reached levels of comedic brilliance equal to something like her prayer for her daughter, for example), but occasionally yes.

i think what i loved about it was that i felt like i could be friends with her. she intertwines her thoughts on producing a major network television show with her struggle to plan a good birthday party with her daughter.

zoe: That writing device was so fun and also so profound. She effectively dignified motherhood as being similarly important as running a TV show and worth glorifying.

emily: exactly. i also plan to repeat one of her thoughts to myself whenever people say dumb things about my mothering skills (which i've heard happens to all mothers at some point). she said something like "no one ever says you HAVE to give birth when you're pregnant. if it's something you actually have to do, it doesn't need to be said."

zoe: that was so great - and unfortunately an important tool to have in your arsenal. i'm amazed at how everyone has an opinion about how to mother your child.

emily: blech, i'm not looking forward to that. i don't take criticism of any kind well.

zoe: i recently got a whole slew of that. everything from judgy-looks to full out comments. but the strangest thing was - they would be amazed at how good of a baby she was, then turn right around and tell me I was mothering her wrong. If I’m getting such great results, why are my methods so wrong?

emily: man. i would have punched them in the face.

zoe: another great comeback i can't get over is when someone uses a curse word to refer to her. She says, "No. You don't get to call me that. My parents love me; I'm not some[one] that's going to take that *%^&." No one ever calls her that word again - to her face at least. I love it. I really hope I can raise Sofia in such a way that if ever anyone dares say something so awful to her, she would have the same response. Someone should work that into anti-bullying programs!

emily: hahaha yes, that is brilliant.

other reasons i loved bossypants:

1.    i was either laughing or had a stupid grin on my face the whole time i was reading.

2. she is honest about what's rough about being famous (idiotic comments on the internet) and what's awesome about being famous (photoshoots)

3. she and her husband are still married and get to be fun and creative together.

4. her daughter's name is alice, and not carrot or beast or october or anything. (i realize that’s a reason i love tina, and not specifically the book, but still…)

and 5. i already had an affinity for the tina. i admit she could have written something less awesome than this and i would have still enjoyed it to some degree.

zoe: true. i think it did end up exceeding my expectations though.

just like Date Night - I thought "Steve Carrell and Tina Fey in a movie together? That's too brilliant to have any real possibility of being all that good/funny" but it really really was. so funny that i could not watch it after my C-section cause it hurt my abs so bad to laugh that much

emily: haha awesome

zoe: other female comedians believe this myth that only men can be funny - so in order to get a laugh - they try to tell jokes that men would tell. but the thing is, funny men are ones that name surprising, unspoken truths about their own personal experience. But the woman comic isn't personally experiencing being a man. Tina, on the other hand, is funny because she names surprising, unspoken truths about being a woman. so she cracks the male-comedian code and dispels the myth about female-comedians by being so effective herself.

  

emily: i totally agree. basically, she’s brilliant.

Zoe gives bossypants two claws up. So does Emily. That’s four claws up, Lobsters. Go buy (or read in the bookstore) Bossypants today. We command you!