Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim

by David Sedaris

Paperback, 2005

Status

Available

Call number

814.54

Genres

Biography & Memoir

Biography

Collection

Biography/Memoir

Publication

Time Warner Books Uk (2005), Edition: First Edition, 5th printing, 272 pages

Description

Essays. Nonfiction. Humor (Nonfiction.) HTML: David Sedaris plays in the snow with his sisters. He goes on vacation with his family. He gets a job selling drinks. He attends his brother's wedding. He mops his sister's floor. He gives directions to a lost traveler. He eats a hamburger. He has his blood sugar tested. It all sounds so normal, doesn't it? In his newest collection of essays, David Sedaris lifts the corner of ordinary life, revealing the absurdity teeming below its surface. His world is alive with obscure desires and hidden motives �?? a world where forgiveness is automatic and an argument can be the highest form of love. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim is another unforgettable collection from one of the wittiest and most original writers at work today.… (more)

Media reviews

The New York Times Book Review

Sedaris is a careful writer, with a no-muss, no-fuss style that rarely misfires.

— 1 more

The New York Times

In a couple of this book's entries, the author's attempts to write humorously about subjects that are far from humorous result in essays that can be described only as contrived and cringe-making. They feel like strained, self-conscious efforts to generate material, and they should have been excised

from this volume. The rest of the book shows Mr. Sedaris in fine funny form... It is the more shaded family reminiscences..., however, that form the heart of this book and that attest to the author's evolution from comic writer to full-fledged memoirist.

Show Less

User reviews

LibraryThing member riofriotex

Sedaris' somewhat nasally, high-pitched voice was grating at times, but I like it when authors read their own work – I think they can make the stories more meaningful, and that was the case here. His nuance added poignancy to some of the sadder essays, while his mimicry of his younger brother’s

South Carolina accent and vocabulary in a live performance of “Rooster at the Hitchin’ Post” made such stories even more hilarious. This audiobook also has a live performance of "Six to Eight Black Men," a funny tale about Christmas in the Netherlands.

Show Less

24 more

LibraryThing member TPLThing

David Sedaris has a unique gift for being simultaneously outrageously funny and deadly serious. His latest collection of essays displays more of that talent that has built him such an enthusiastic following. I listened to this one on CD, read by Sedaris, who also happens to be a great speaker. This

collection includes Sedaris’s thoughts on Dutch Christmas, his accounts of problem neighbors, and more tales of his colorful brother. "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim" is a must for those who are already Sedaris fans, and a great pick for those who enjoy a keen social eye and a wicked sense of humor.

Show Less

LibraryThing member mrn945

This might be one of my favourites! If not the top, it's up there with Holiday's on Ice.

The focus of this collection was his interactions with his family. While the stories from his childhood were hilarious, the stories of Mr. Sedaris relating with his adult siblings were the best for me. There is

just something so real about the people he writes about, and the situations he has found himself in. My family can be a bit odd, and I was thinking of a few family get-together's when he described his own familial gatherings. This might not be the best endorsement for my family, but, then again, we have yet to be accused of being boring.

Show Less

LibraryThing member drmarymccormack

Very funny but I am so used to him being hilariously funny that I'm afraid he set the bar too high for himself. I still liked this book but not as much as Naked or Hollidays on Ice.

LibraryThing member dw0rd

Another example of my favorite genre, the "Read by the Author" audio. This couldn't be read by someone else anyway, right? Would someone else perform a Bill Cosby comedy album? And David Sedaris started on NPR, right? Well, the book was published first, so I suppose it could have been read by

anybody. But it wasn't and I almost wish it had been. I'm thinking specifically about his rendering of his brother's voice. It might be dead-on accurate but it came off, at least for me, as a strained attempt to mimic the stereotypical redneck. I realize his family is source material and he can fudge as far as family tranquility will allow, but I didn't like having to listen to or about this guy. Other relatives' and characters' foibles, weaknesses, and strengths have remained warm in my memory, though. Some vignettes are poignant, bordering on sad, and there are more here than ever, but they work and aren't totally depressing.Some of the sketches were on the 2003 "Live at Carnegie Hall" CD meaning I'd heard them before. Any comedy routine has to be hilarious to survive multiple retellings. One good routine can make the entire collection worthwhile.

Show Less

LibraryThing member Thomas_Cannon

On tape is the best way to experience Sedaris' books.

LibraryThing member DLayton

One of the funniest books I've ever read. Sedaris's dry wit in telling events of a dysfunctional family allows the reader to become involved with the story. Each chapter is very separate which permits the reader to pick up and put down the book easily. One of the best excerpts is his philosophy on

Christmas.

Show Less

LibraryThing member RandyMetcalfe

David Sedaris’ acerbic essays tend to either send up his personal foibles, deflect his peculiarities (such as they are) onto his equally singular siblings, or scrutinize a common practice but from an oblique angle. They are witty and dry and discomfiting in turn. His writing is both familiar (I

often think I may have read a particular essay somewhere previously) and strange (only David Sedaris, I think, would come up with that!). If you’ve got the right frame of mind, you will enjoy the collected essays in this book without stopping to think about them too much.

A couple of essays stand out for special mention. “The Ship Shape” details the Sedaris family vacations at the seashore and that special summer when their parents actively considered buying a cottage. Here the full range of characters in the family come to life and the whole is a perfectly rounded piece. On a different plane is “Possession” which is exquisitely uncomfortable as the now adult Sedaris contemplates how perfect the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam would be for he and Hugh to purchase and renovate. This one will have you cringing right up until the twist at the end which makes it heart-wrenchingly poignant.

But many other essays in the collection may strike your fancy just as much. So, enjoy!

Show Less

LibraryThing member mikemillertime

My first exposure to Sedaris was a thorough winner. His inventive humor and insight can transform the adventures of his relatively average American family in everday suburbia into harrowing, gripping, wild and zany escapades, where the tiniest banalities become pivotal turning points in these

characters' exaggerated lives.

Show Less

LibraryThing member pacifickle

This is the first book I've read by David Sedaris, and I am stupid for that. He is so good! This collection of short stories detail small moments in his life, ranging from childhood to present, all hilarious. Watch as his redneck brother applies bacon to his face (the grease holds it on there) in

order to fake having huge sideburns shortly before his wedding. Read as his mother gives a dead-on but sometimes brutal running commentary on David's early 20's apartment life, and his dad drags 11 year old David to the most popular guy in school's house to demand payment on dental work done after the popular guy threw rocks at David and messed up his teeth. David always feels like he doesn't belong, doesn't feel comfortable, doesn't know what to say, but really he does all three. Witty, secretly insightful, and amazingly able to zing you with tiny, short sentences and segments that add up to a greater whole.

Show Less

LibraryThing member brianinbuffalo

I really wanted to love this work. I thoroughly enjoyed the first half, but something weird happened at the mid-point -- I couldn't wait for it to end.

LibraryThing member furthur66

This is the first David Sedaris book I have read after hearing so many good things about him and I wasn't disappointed. I normaly have a hard time with short stories, but this collection of personal essays ends up much larger than the sum of its parts. Sedaris writes with self-conscious humor and

subtle heartbreak and he brings you love his disjointed family as much as he does.

Show Less

LibraryThing member heidialice

Sedaris recounts tales of his quirky family in a series of essays.

This collection was rather more poignant than hilarious compared with other works of his. I love his style and that I can hear his voice in my head from This American Life. As usual, tales of his brother Paul (The Rooster) have me

rolling on the floor.

Show Less

LibraryThing member jennyo

I can't listen to this audiobook when I'm driving because it makes me laugh so hard I can't see the road.

LibraryThing member sarathena1

Decent read. Not wowing, by any means. But if you have a few spare moments on the train...

LibraryThing member gpmartinson

Sedaris iswonderful. His style is fantastic. He writes simple humor that wryly observes our society and makes fun of himself and his family in a wonderful mixture of observational and situational humor.

LibraryThing member qcait

I adore Sedaris. Adore. This book is good, but not one of his bests. "Me Talk Pretty One Day" outshines it by far.

LibraryThing member name99

More David Sedaris. Funny, but with some real sadness in the background, especially the stories about his sister Tiffany and his experience helping a young boy carry coffee to his parents' room in a hotel.

LibraryThing member Shopoholic

Sedaris is so funny. I didn't understand his humor until I heard him read a bit on NPR. He is a riot, and sometimes crosses the line into a dark territory where I can no longer laugh. This book was my favorite of his that I've read so far, and I'm looking forward to his book which features animals

in rehab.

Show Less

LibraryThing member ablueidol

Shows again the extraordinariness of the ordinary if you observe

LibraryThing member carmarie

The latest from David Sedaris didn't fail to keep me laughing. Although Me Talk Pretty One Day is my favorite of his, don't miss this one either! It amazes me how he manages to turn his tragedy into our laughter.

LibraryThing member txorig

Hilarious! I think I scared the person sitting next to me on the bus as I was howling with laughter.

LibraryThing member stormchic563

I feel like he is writing about my family sometimes! Love all his stuff.

LibraryThing member Ix0x0L

Love this book! Had my copy signed by David Sedaris at a book reading. He is soooooo funny!!!

LibraryThing member paghababian

Amusing, but not his best work. Very few of the stories in this collection were laugh-out-loud funny (except for the one about Christmas in the Netherlands... that one had me gasping for breath from laughing too hard).

Fewer