Exclusive Review - The Book of Animal Ignorance

The Book of Animal Ignorance by John Lloyd and John Mitchinson is available to pre-order from Amazon.co.uk.

The Book of Animal Ignorance is quite different from its predecessor, the Book of General Ignorance. The few people that disliked the first QI book complained that its question and answer style made them feel stupid (although the fact that so many people bought it seems to suggest that people quite enjoyed this). You won’t get that feeling when reading the latest edition from the QI team.

The book has lost the question and answer style of the book of general ignorance. Instead it has been organised into two-page sections, each concerning one of 100 animals, organised alphabetically. Hence the focus has drifted away from the ignorance and over to the animal. However, that does not mean that the book is any less interesting.

For someone who religiously watches the TV show which the book accompanies, this book is far more rewarding. The first book lifted much of its material from the general ignorance round in the show. That which hadn’t been seen by viewers of the show, probably hadn’t made the cut. For this book it is clear that a considerable amount of extra research has been done.

Since much of the research has been done exclusively for the book, you can begin to perceive some of the themes that preoccupied the authors and their elves. The etymology of animal names is a clear example. Understanding how an animal was named gives a fascinating insight into what we believed we knew about the animal in the past and how our relationship with it has changed. The mouse is an excellent example:

“The very name ‘mouse’ ultimately derives from the Sanskrit root mush, which means mouse and also to steal. Hence wherever we went thereafter – on foot, in carts, or by ship – the little thief kept us company.”

There’s also a very strong focus on evolution and how natural selection produced some of the stranger animals in the book. This makes for some interesting discussion, especially for those animals that have existed in isolation for so long.

If the book makes a reference to barbs, spines, nails or unfolding like a Swiss army knife then something about male genitalia is probably about to follow. The topic of animal reproduction and their reproductive organs is something this book doesn’t shy away from. It certainly makes for intriguing discussion. Both men and women will find that this book will create feelings of varying degrees of supremacy and inadequacy. However, one must disagree with the claim that “if the Nine-banded armadillo were human its penis would be 4 feet long”. If it were human then it would have a human sized penis.

Accompanying the section on each animal is at least one picture drawn by Ted Dewan. Reading a book as interesting as this, it would be easy to rush onto read about the next animal without glancing at these excellent illustrations. Don’t! These pictures don’t just illustrate what is described in the text but also include some of the most interesting pieces of information in the book. They range from mechanical drawings (Ted Dewan trained as an engineer) to illustrate an owl’s ability to move its head around 360 degrees, to the life-like drawing of a catfish. Some will set you laughing out loud like the sketch of a brown bear wandering around a supermarket. Also, don’t miss the extra facts and quotes in the grey boxes. The best one accompanies the section about humans.

“Human beings, who are unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so” Douglas Adams.

The book includes at its start a foreword by Stephen Fry, a ‘forepaw’ by Alan Davies (which is far bigger than his contribution to the first book) and an introduction by the authors John Lloyd and John Mitchinson. All three are well worth reading and avoid skipping straight into the main text. As they explain, QI is as much a philosophy as a TV show and animals are the bread and butter of interestingness. A quote from Henry Beston in the book:

“In a world older and more complex than ours, they move finished and complete, gifted with the extension of the sense we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings: they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time.”

The amazing illustrations, the tireless research by the elves and the philosophy of QI have combined to create an excellent book. You can dip into it and be confident that you will always be rewarded with something you didn’t know. I sincerely suggest that you take up the author’s invitation to “come down to the waterhole of ignorance and wallow with us for a while”.

Daily Telegraph QI Column - week 34

This week's column follows on with more animal related facts. Click here to read the column.

Biography 11: Jo Brand

In our penultimate focus on QI panellists, we bring you the fabulous “ladygirl” that is Jo Brand.

Josephine Grace Brand was born on 3rd May 1957 in Hastings, East Sussex. At school, she took piano lessons and had a bad experience with playing the violin. By the age of 16, she was going out with a heroin addict and, after being told by her family to get her act together, she soon left home. She had been slim up until this point, but not long after, the weight crept on; she made up with her parents, ditched her boyfriend and moved to London.

Brand's mother was a social worker, and Brand herself worked as a psychiatric nurse in her late 20s at the South London Bethlem and Maudsley Hospital. Three things spurred her to begin a career in stand-up comedy: her weight, the lack of female comics on the circuit at the time, and her agent Malcolm Hardee, whom she was romantically linked with for a while. Acquiring the stage name "The Sea Monster", she soon became central to the British alternative comedy movement, working London alternative comedy clubs, and appearing initially on the Saturday Live television show in the early 1980s.

In 1993, she began her transition into mainstream comedy when she hosted her own series on Channel 4, Jo Brand Through the Cakehole, co-written with comedy writer and partner Jim Miller, who by then was already her main stand-up writer. Around this time, she was living in the Elephant and Castle area of London. Though it was a rough estate, many comedians, when the London Comedy Circuit has closed down for the night, would often venture there for after hours drink and drug-fuelled sessions of board games. Such comedians included Mark Lamarr, Jeff Green, and Alan Davies.
More recently her humour has softened and she has been a guest on such television shows as Have I Got News For You and Never Mind The Buzzcocks. She has had several solo television series, and presented shows such as Jo Brand's Commercial Breakdown. In 2003, she was listed in The Observer as one of the 50 funniest acts in British comedy.

In 2004, Jo appeared in a special episode of What Not to Wear, where fashion gurus Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine gave her a makeover. As a fan of Countdown, she achieved an ambition when she was asked to appear in the show's Dictionary Corner as the celebrity guest. She later became a friend of host Richard Whiteley. Following his death in 2005, she attended his memorial service at York Minster. She appeared again on Countdown in "Dictionary Corner" in February 2007.

Jo has a close association with Comic Relief. Perhaps against her better judgement, she took part in the first celebrity version of Comic Relief does Fame Academy and then in 2007 in Comic Relief Does The Apprentice.

On 25 March 2007, Brand appeared on reality television show Play It Again where she was required to learn how to play the organ in just four months. This was in preparation to perform at the Royal Albert Hall on the largest pipe organ in the British Isles.

Despite rumors to the contrary she turned out not to be a lesbian but after reading it in the newspapers for so long, she started to believe it. She has described men as "fantastic – as a concept". Brand is a big fan of Crystal Palace Football Club, and has sponsored the match ball for games in the past. She also once delivered a guest lecture on the subject of Psychiatric Nursing for the University of Derby Psychology Society. The lecture was reportedly highly ironic.

As the only regular female panellist on QI, Jo has had to compete with the men for laughs, but has still flourished with her self-deprecating humour. She has thoroughly deserved her place as the most frequent guest on the show. Jo will return on several occasions for series E.

"QI in America" Petition Milestone

Warm greetings to you from the States!

I'm happy to report that, following the start of the new series, and thanks in part, I'm sure, to our new place of honor at the top of the QI Talk forums, the "QI in America" petition reached 1000 signatures this morning.

And the numbers are still quickly rising! If you're new to the game, click through to go to the text of the petition, and to its homepage. We've no limit to the number of signatories for household, so if you know your family and friends would be interested, do pass along the word. Bonus elf points for leaving a quite interesting comment along with your signature. x

QI E01 Review - Engineering

Read the recording review here.

This was the fourth episode to be recorded in May and one that I have particularly fond memories of because I was a production guest and following the episode I went to the green room.

One of the funnier features of this episode was the train that was used to send sweets to the panellists when they got a correct answer. Of course the use of toffees wasn't very wise. In rehearsals Roses' chocolates were used and these could be consumed far quicker than the mastication intense toffee. As a consequence, Rob Brydon really did struggle to get his words out whilst the toffee was stored in his cheeks like a hamster. The other guests kept their sweets until the end so that after the show they could throw them into the audience.

There was a rather interesting introduction for the Elephant in the Room card. Perhaps what wasn't mentioned is that playing the card comes with a points penalty if an elephant isn't the answer. This was the downfall for Bill Bailey who achieved one of his worst ever scores.

There was one very significant section missing from the show and it wasn't included in the vodcast either. Now this was the funniest moment in the entire series for me but discussing it with Piers Fletcher after the show, he described the fact that such jokes are funny because they just keep going. Hence fitting it into the show was unlikely because it would take up so much time.

However, one mustn't forget that the thirteenth episode will be a clip show formed entirely from unbroadcast material. Piers' hints that the last one on the show is hilarious makes me wonder if this is it. Hence I shall reveal nothing more about what happened that was so funny. You'll have to wait until after Christmas to see it though.

The QI vodcast which accompanied this show included some extra unbroadcast material so I sincerely suggest that you go check it out here. It's 7 minutes long. Extra features include the London Eye, Darwin Awards, Vaseline and Alan's comments about fans wanting photos. The decision to make a vodcast only came about during the series so you'll note that the early recordings' intros and outros were filmed after the recording. That's the case for Bill Bailey's intro here, although later shows will have a selection that involves the audience and Stephen.

This episode was an unusual second place for Alan. He has won three episodes before but 2nd places are rare. Only in episode A07 has Alan been second until now. I know how Alan does in the rest of the series, but I won't be spoiling that for you. I didn't even write notes of the scores!

Edit: News just in (20:30 24/09/07) QI E01 was the highest rated programme on BBC2, Channel 4 and 5 over the entire weekend (Fri-Sat).

Next week's review for E02 will be presented by MinervaMoon, our USA correspondent who made the trip to the UK to watch the recording.

(Don't forget this Friday, the exclusive review of the Book of Animal Ignorance)