Review of "A Comic History of the United States," by Livingston Hopkins

Review of

A Comic History of the United States, by Livingston Hopkins


Three out of five stars

 While there are many cartoons in this book, a more apt title would be “A Comedic History of the United States.” It contains a series of jokes that often only somewhat follow history. Most are not that funny and seem designed to be more nonsensical than require an understanding of the historical allusions. For example, it is not necessary to understand the fundamentals of the Monroe Doctrine in order to follow the section about President James Monroe.

 This book was first published in 1880, so by reading it, you are looking back at how humor was written in that era. It certainly was different from modern satire and farce and has not traveled well.