# Explain Bill Bryson to me
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [June 28, 2007, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847 "2007-06-28T23:57:42Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Elret](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elret)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2007, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/1 "2007-06-28T23:57:42Z")
I’ve noticed a lot of love for him around here, and I recently started reading my first Bill Bryson book, _The Lost Continent_. I went in with high hopes, but halfway through I am about ready to give up. He constantly complains about how ugly and run-down everything in America is, but whenever he comes across a place that has put effort into looking attractive and keeping things up, he complains that it seems fake. It just seems like no matter what he encounters it’s just bitch bitch bitch.
Now, don’t get me wrong, a) I do like his actual writing - his imagery is amazing and there are many very funny parts, b) I’m not even American so am definitely not offended or anything, and c) the catty bitch in me loves some good judgmental indignation like anyone, but he just seems so inconsistent and whiny. Is it just me? Am I missing something? Is it just sooo clever and brilliant that it’s over my head? Or is he kind of a pompous prick?
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### Author:  [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/2 "2007-06-29T00:18:03Z")
Try _A Walk in the Woods_. He bitches in that one too, but it’s lots more fun.
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/3 "2007-06-29T00:22:31Z")
**I’m A Stranger Here Myself** is better.
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### Author:  [@Laughing\_Lagomorph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laughing_Lagomorph)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/4 "2007-06-29T00:45:28Z")
[QUOTE=koeeoaddi]
Try _A Walk in the Woods_. He bitches in that one too, but it’s lots more fun.
[/QUOTE]
I agree, I have read several of his books and this is by far the best. In case you don’t know it is about his attempt at the age of forty-something to hike the Appalachian trail with an old friend he hasn’t seen in years. Part of the reason the book is good is he makes a lot of fun of himself, and he is clearly way out of his normal element on the trip.
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### Author:  [@Elret](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elret)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/5 "2007-06-29T01:14:17Z")
Thanks. The AT one actually sounds very appealling - my favourite bit of _The Lost Continent_ so far has been the Appalachian part so I suspect I would really enjoy that, and I’ll have to check out the one **silenus** recommends too, as I really do like his writing and _want_ to be a fan.
Thanks for the advice, all!
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/6 "2007-06-29T01:19:18Z")
I also recommend **In A Sunburned Country**. For his non-travel related writings, try **The Mother Tongue** or **Made In America**.
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/7 "2007-06-29T02:05:24Z")
While Mr. Bryson is a very good writer, if you pick up a book of his which delves into word origins, etc. , do **NOT** take what he says as gospel. He possibly is one of the worst at doing this kind of thing. He picks up on popular assumptions, does little to research his statements, and offers etymologies which are at best out of date and at worst are completely wrong. Other than that, enjoy. ☹
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### Author:  [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/8 "2007-06-29T02:07:06Z")
_A Walk in the Woods_ is a fine read. But it has as much to do with actually walking the AT as does _The Sound of Music_ with the Von Trapp family’s adventures in WWII. His books are mostly non-fiction, just not very accurate.
But fun to read.
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### Author:  [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/9 "2007-06-29T02:07:51Z")
In A Sunburned Country inspired me to take a long road trip in WA. I hit The Tree Top Walk and checked out the Stromatolites at Shark Bay. He described each place perfectly, by the way. His work was responsible for me experiencing these two wonderful places…what more could you ask from a travel writer?
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### Author:  [@Savannah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Savannah)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/10 "2007-06-29T02:11:58Z")
I really enjoyed his memoir of growing up in the fifties. I think it’s his most recent book, but I can’t draw the title from my brain at the moment. And I also enjoyed the walk around England book–Notes from a Small Island? Try those two.
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### Author:  [@straight\_man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/straight_man)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/11 "2007-06-29T02:12:20Z")
You’re just taking him seriously, that’s all. He’s a humourist, but unlike many of his colleagues, he often has no (or little) intent. YMMV, of course (especially in a travel book :D.)
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/12 "2007-06-29T02:26:16Z")
[QUOTE=Savannah]
I really enjoyed his memoir of growing up in the fifties. I think it’s his most recent book, but I can’t draw the title from my brain at the moment.
[/QUOTE]
**The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: A Memoir**
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### Author:  [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/13 "2007-06-29T02:37:01Z")
I love Bryson. The only “miss” among his books to me is _A Short History of Nearly Everything_. I find it pretty much unreadable. Anything that Bryson writes, I usually finish in one evening because I can’t put it down. Not so with that one.
I love his language books, _I’m a Stranger Here Myself_ and _Notes from a Small Island_. Wonderful stuff.
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### Author:  [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/14 "2007-06-29T02:56:39Z")
[QUOTE=samclem]
While Mr. Bryson is a very good writer, if you pick up a book of his which delves into word origins, etc. , do **NOT** take what he says as gospel. He possibly is one of the worst at doing this kind of thing. He picks up on popular assumptions, does little to research his statements, and offers etymologies which are at best out of date and at worst are completely wrong.
[/QUOTE]
His bestselling _[A Short History On Nearly Everything](http://www.amazon.com/Short-History-Nearly-Everything/dp/0767908171)_ goes even better at taking misunderstanding and oversimplificaiton of scientific concepts to an entirely new and outrageously incorrect level. Just in thumbing through the first few chapters at a bookstore I found numerous errors which were just not quite wrong enough to be glaring, but sufficiently incorrect to completely misinform the reader. That alone irritates me (to the point of wanting to write a book which corrects those misapprehensions), but I’m not fond of his writing style or authorial persona, either: he seems to be attempting a blue-collar impression of Paul Theroux (who can be annoying in his own right, but at least has actual writing chops) or the travel literature version of Ray Romano. I, too, tried _The Lost Continent_ (a gift from a girlfriend), _A Walk In The Woods_ (on the bookshelf at the lodge I was staying overnight in), and _Made In America_ (left in the card pouch in the seat in front of me on the airplane\*, and couldn’t get more than a few dozen pages into any of them.
He’s got quite a following, here and otherwise, so I guess there’s something to him, but I can’t figure out what it is. I’ll pick up Graham Greene or John McPhee any day over Bryson.
Stranger
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### Author:  [@pokey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pokey)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/15 "2007-06-29T02:59:43Z")
I’ve never read any Bill Bryson but I’ve heard all his CDs and he’s adorable and hilarious. He’s got the perfect voice for his personality. Something about it always sounds sort of gleeful.
I’m not sure how to explain what I think is so great about him. Lost Continent is one I didn’t hear. Life and Times of the Thunderbolt kid is my favourite by far. There is a [flash clip](http://www.vidlit.com/bryson/) of him reading from that one.
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### Author:  [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/16 "2007-06-29T03:27:58Z")
Good things about Bryson:
-He’s so hilarious he makes me snort beverages out my nose.
-He’s wide-ranging and prolific.
-He has a genuine love of history and a pleasant light touch with it.
Not-so-good things about Bryson:
-He may enjoy visiting a place at first, but he rarely seems to leave happy. (Especially in Europe.)
-He’s a regular Typhoid Mary for urban legends.
-His half-assed somewhere-over-the-North-Atlantic accent.
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### Author:  [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/17 "2007-06-29T05:49:41Z")
[QUOTE=samclem]
While Mr. Bryson is a very good writer, if you pick up a book of his which delves into word origins, etc. , do **NOT** take what he says as gospel. He possibly is one of the worst at doing this kind of thing. He picks up on popular assumptions, does little to research his statements, and offers etymologies which are at best out of date and at worst are completely wrong. Other than that, enjoy. ☹
[/QUOTE]
_Mother Tongue_. By God I hated that book. Bryson always goes for the amusing third-hand anecdote over the actual truth, to the extent of repeating idiot canards like “Eskimos have over forty different words for snow”. There are any number of decent popular books about linguistics out there, but that ain’t one of them, and I wouldn’t trust a word the man wrote on any factual subject without verifying it.
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### Author:  [@Small\_Clanger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Small_Clanger)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 10:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/18 "2007-06-29T10:11:03Z")
[QUOTE=Stranger On A Train]
His bestselling _A Short History On Nearly Everything_\*\*\*\*\* goes even better at taking misunderstanding and oversimplificaiton of scientific concepts to an entirely new and outrageously incorrect level.
[/QUOTE]
It’s a very odd book. It would seem that it was written with a noble purpose but then goes and gets _everything_ a bit wrong. I jogged though it until I got to a chapter where I had some proper knowledge of the subject and just put it down as untrustworthy. Why couldn’t he have done some real research, where on Earth did he get his information? He is also guilty of the occasional gratuitous use of the word ‘fuck’\*\*\*\*\*\*.
\*\*\*\*\* by the way, the source of the information about when and for how long the Marianas Trench was last explored, which has cropped up here occasionally. Does anyone remember the details?
\*\*\*\*\*\* Not in this book but it crops up in \*Notes from a Small Island \* and the _Thunderbolt Kid_ and seems quite out of place in both.
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### Author:  [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 11:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/19 "2007-06-29T11:06:24Z")
[QUOTE=Small Clanger]
It’s a very odd book. It would seem that it was written with a noble purpose but then goes and gets _everything_ a bit wrong.
[/QUOTE]
A hundred people have said this, but nobody ever explains what all these alleged mistakes are.
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### Author:  [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2007, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-bill-bryson-to-me/409847/20 "2007-06-29T14:33:47Z")
[QUOTE=silenus]
**I’m A Stranger Here Myself** is better.
[/QUOTE]
Shit, I wanted to use that title on an autobiography.
A few of my friends love Bryson, and my mother just discovered him. She read me a passage about the worst meal he ever ate (“a meal of gristle baked whiffle ball”) and it was very funny. I’ll have to borrow that book.
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