Friday 20 January 2017

The De-evolution of Mankind (Pelican Books, 1975).


Many people are unaware that a young Donald Trump appeared on the cover of a book called The De-evolution of Mankind, published in Scarfolk by Pelican Books in 1975.

From the introduction:
"Scientists predict that, at some point in the early 21st century, humans will stop evolving and will start the process of de-evolution. Several signs will herald this decline:
i. People will stop reading books. It's estimated that the length of an average book will be eighteen words, including the title and copyright page.
ii. Increasingly, people will only vote for leaders who can communicate using an abbreviated, primitive dialect, a sort of "Dunce Patois" in which whole sentences will be reduced to single words: "True!", "Bad!", "Shame!", etc.
iii. The distinction between the real and the imaginary will be lost and fictional characters will ascend to the highest posts of office.
iv. Human hands will shrink through inactivity and will become little more than tiny, feeble scoops [...]

[...] The mighty space stations we once imagined in our future will drift unpopulated because the knowledge required to reach them will have been either outlawed or carelessly forgotten. The threadbare remnants of mankind will scrabble around a dying earth, daubing themselves with orange mud to avoid being burned due to the global overheating they said would never happen. We will return to this development in Chapter 4, which is entitled 'Consummate Dickheads'."

13 comments:

  1. It's already happened in Greece. From inventing maths to becoming workshy lazy reckless olive oil guzzling foreigners who steal our women.Bastards.Come back Jean I've changed I don't drink as much and I put the bins out now. Costas will leave you once he knows your hair colour isn't real. I'll kill the bastard...

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  2. He knew all along!

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  3. Once again Scarfolk leads the world!

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  4. I really love this... whatever you want to call it, a kind of fiction. It's an escape from reality and a voyage into to historical absurdity, yet truisms we had to face in a genital way. When you bring Trump into it, it shatters the whole thing. It's now political. Not what Scarfolk is based on.

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    1. If you haven't seen the political satire running through all of the Scarfolk posts all along, you must have gone to American public schools.

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    2. mitzibel, she's not talking about peculiarly British political references that, for the most part, Americans simply don't understand.
      There is nothing wrong with her perception; it is accurate. She isn't stupid because she doesn't see something the same way you do.
      Maybe you are unable to see the difference between esoteric (to Yanks) British political references and a very ham-handed attempt to characterize the Donald as a knuckle-dragger. King Barry was much more of a disaster than Donald could ever be. And, no, I did not vote for Trump.
      Scarfolk is usually straight black humor but with a layer of charm sluthered over the top; it never comes across as mean-spirited in any way.

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    3. But it's such an honest portrayal it's hard to deny....

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  5. This is brilliant! This whole blog is awesome. And I went to American public schools, about 40 years ago...

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  6. Don't forget Trump's repetitive use of truncated critical and positive verbal observations: "Very Tough", "very strong", and the abuse of the word "Beautiful"

    https://qz.com/1086942/21-unexpected-things-that-donald-trump-thinks-are-beautiful/

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    1. and then there's the fact that he almost certainlyhas dementia.

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  7. clearly the irony of seeing this series of responses on a post titled "The De-evolution of Mankind" is lost on most.
    As Hoffman famously wrote "the first principle of mind control is flattery."

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