Poundstone, Zotti, and Adams

minty_green · February 13, 2003, 4:22pm

As long as we have Cecil and the Ark of the Covenant, no army can ever conquer us.

whitetho · February 13, 2003, 4:39pm

We are informed by the illustrious Woody Allen that the Russian Revolution was caused when the populace became convinced that “the Czar” and “the Tsar” was the same person. So you never know what sort of chaos you might be unleashing with this sort of speculation.

However, I do believe that the “Noo-Noo” on Teletubbies is some sort of vacuum cleaner.

Meatros · February 13, 2003, 4:42pm

I’ve noticed that Cecil has been posting a lot more than usual. I’m not sure if there’s any connection to anything, but I figured I’d stick my head in here and say that.
I’m still not giving up my idea that Cecil is either a vampire or a robot…Both are equally valid in my mind…

Duke · February 13, 2003, 4:44pm

Are you suggesting that your real name isn’t Anthracite? I, for one, am shocked.

Just to throw another iron in the fire–doesn’t The Straight Dope predate Ed Zotti’s tenure at The Reader? Ed may be Cecil, but I don’t think Cecil was always Ed.

pravnik · February 13, 2003, 4:58pm

This is known among the conspiracy buffs as “the ‘Dread Pirate Cecil’ theory.”

Revtim · February 13, 2003, 5:09pm

I seem to recall “The Tale Of Two Cecil’s”, some story by which the column was started by Cecil’s brother (with the same name??) at first, then the current Adams took over. My best guess is that someone started the column under the psuedonym ‘Cecil Adams’ before Ed came aboard, but it got turned over to Ed.

3waygeek · February 13, 2003, 5:28pm

Either that, or you have shockingly bad taste in literature

Revtim · February 13, 2003, 5:28pm

From TESS, the Trademark Electronic Search System:
http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=c9mmvr.2.1

Now my question is, why was it abandoned as a trademark?

whitetho · February 13, 2003, 5:34pm

Perhaps I have led a sheltered life, but some of the above comments suggest that many of the participants in this thread do not own a copy of the first volume of The Straight Dope series, or, worse, did not read the introduction to same. For them, I reproduce below the contents of same (copyright 1984):

Introduction

I first became acquainted with Cecil Adams, self-proclaimed omniscient, in the fall of 1978, when I was asked to become his editor. The previous occupant of that post, the noted film critic Dave Kehr, had been driven to the brink of madness by Cecil’s obnoxious personality, and desperately wanted out. Being young and foolish, I accepted the job without hesitation. It was a decision that changed my life. I was innocent then; now I am hardened and brutal. Dealing with Cecil on a regular basis will do that to you.
    Cecil first surfaced in February, 1973, in the pages of the Chicago Reader, a weekly alternative newspaper. The format of the Straight Dope, as Cecil’s column was called, was (and remains) straightforward: readers submitted questions on whatever oddball topics struck their fancy, and Cecil answered them, inevitably managing to work in numerous wisecracks, insults, and rambling digressions in the process. At first Reader management (and no doubt the reading public) was skeptical that the column would be anything more than a trendy Action Line. But it soon became clear that Cecil possessed two remarkable qualifications: he was never wrong, and he knew everything Moreover, he had a prose style that was strangely addictive, in an irritating sort of way. The first clear demonstration of these qualities came only a few months after the column started running, when someone inquired about the calorie content of the average male ejaculation. Cecil’s reply drew a vitriolic response accusing him of cheap sensationalism and inaccuracy. It was a challenge that Cecil could not afford to ignore, and he rose to the occasion majestically. (The exchange is reproduced on pages 54 and 55 of this volume.) His reputation thereafter was assured.
    Cecil’s editor in the early years was Mike Lenehan, who has since gone on to glory as a contributor to the Atlantic magazine. Lenehan found working with Cecil a bizarre experience. It was a full year before the two ever met face to face, Cecil preferring to conduct his business via phone and anonymous mail drops. As often as not, the columnist wrote his weekly opuses in crabbed longhand on the backs of old envelopes, sandwich wrappers, or bus transfers, which Lenehan had to decipher as best he could. As a result, errors occasionally found their way into print. Cecil was livid on these occasions, but the unflappable Lenehan pointed out that if Cecil would simply behave like an ordinary human being instead of a two-bit combination of Horace Greeley and James Bond, such problems could be readily avoided.
    Cecil eventually saw the wisdom of this, and consented to show up from time to time in the paper’s editorial offices—usually about three minutes before deadline, and invariably with copy that looked like it had been sitting underneath the canary all night. He would stroll around in Bermuda shorts, sandals, and shirts with the sleeves torn out, muttering incongruous non sequiturs to himself. No one ever actually saw him at work, but Lenehan reported after a visit to Cecil’s house that tottering mounds of mildewed newsprint were piled everywhere, the rugs were worn through as though from incessant nervous pacing, and dirty coffee cups and fast-food containers were scattered all over the place. Cecil himself sat at his battered desk in the middle of the room rummaging through heaps of papers, mumbling, “Wait a second, I know I’ve got it here somewhere.”
    At an early stage of the game the Reader was fortunate enough to obtain the services of Slug Signorino to illustrate the Straight Dope. This was a shrewd move in two respects. Not only was Slug an artist of authority and vision, as a glance through these pages will confirm, but he also possessed a personality nearly as poisonous as Cecil’s own. The two took to one another with the enthusiasm of the Apaches for the First Cavalry, thus deflecting much misery and aggravation from the rest of us. Cecil over the years has been particularly peeved at Slug’s habit of depicting him as a turkey with a mortarboard, which he does not feel adequately conveys his stature in contemporary American culture. “It’s a good thing the guy’s a genius,” Cecil has been heard to say, “or I would have murdered him in his sleep long ago.” Slug, for his part, merely grins evilly.
    Their personal feuds notwithstanding, the Cecil-Slug combination has proven to be enduringly popular. The column presently appears in the Baltimore City Paper, the Dallas Observer, the Los Angeles Reader, the Phoenix New Times, and the Washington D.C., City Paper, as well as the Chicago Reader. Cecil now spends the bulk of his time shuttling between the cities, while Slug stays home in Michigan City, Indiana, where, he says, “the humidity is good for the Rapidographs.”
    Of his life and methods, Cecil will say little, preferring to let his work speak for itself. “Before my arrival, people would go to their graves without ever knowing why wintergreen Life Savers make clouds of sparks when you chew them in the dark,” he says. “Now they know—or they will once they read this book—and their lives are the richer for it. Ditto for the many other vital questions on politics, culture, and reproductive physiology that I have dealt with over the years. In fact, I think it is safe to say that no one today can hope to achieve a fully satisfactory and meaningful life without reading the Straight Dope regularly.”
    That may be putting it a bit strongly, but we’re sure you’ll find the present volume, a collection of the best columns from the last eleven years, a useful addition to your library, coffee table, or bathroom. Oh, and if you like the book, be sure to tell your friends. This has been a labor of love, but if we make a few bucks off the deal, it sure wouldn’t hurt.
            —Ed Zotti

Kal · February 13, 2003, 6:27pm

This raises two issues:

The first is that if Ed Zotti is Cecil Adams then he is breaking the board rules by posting under a sock puppet account.

The second, which is far more serious, is that Cecil Adams was the most “fanciful name” the Chicago Reader could come up with.

Revtim · February 13, 2003, 8:53pm

whitetho, do you seriously take that forward as evidence of anything? Nobody is arguing that they aren’t trying to make it appear that Cecil is real person or that Zotti pretends he exists.

whitetho · February 13, 2003, 9:11pm

I posted the Introduction because people seemed to be unaware that there have been three different Cecil-editors.

Revtim · February 13, 2003, 9:36pm

Oh, I see. But it’s clear from TESS that “Cecil Adams” is not a real person, so some or all of these “editors” probably were writing as Cecil, not editing.

Is it standard practice that a column has an editor just for that column? Or is it generally such that there’s a one or more editors that edit the whole paper? Maybe it’s common knowledge in the industry that when a column has an editor that only edits that column, the editor is really the author. Just speculating.

leander · February 13, 2003, 10:00pm

The last time I was in Chicago I met a guy who once worked for The Reader. I asked him, of course, What’s the deal with Cecil? His reply, IIRC, was that Cecil was first “invented” by Lenehan for a new column in '73. According to him, there have been several writers of the Cecil column since then, but now it is the sole domain of Mr. Zotti. Has been for years.

But you will never, ever get a current employee of The Reader to admit the truth, despite the fact that this board is all about “fighting ignorance.” I guess they feel it’s like the Wizard of Oz - if you know that it’s just a little guy behind a curtain, you might not take it as the perfect truth.

ukfayupay · February 13, 2003, 10:00pm

I’ve been reading it in the Reader since the 70’s. One thing you can’t get out of the books, since they’re not particularly sequential, is the DISTINCT changes of style that occurred with the changes in the editor. Little Ed’s been the editor for years now, so that’s less clear than it might have been. But I’m telling you straight up the guy who wrote in in 1973,4 and so forth ain’t the guy who’s been writing it lately.

Enderw24 · February 13, 2003, 10:06pm

Remember, Cecil Adams also spells “I C Ed Scam Al”
So if we figure out who this Al guy is, I think we’ll have found our smoking gun.

pravnik · February 13, 2003, 11:05pm

I think you’re on to something here. If we rearrange

ED ZOTTI

we get

ED TIT OZ

ed tit…edit?? The EDITOR OF OZ!!

But wait, CECIL ADAMS is also

ED ACCLAIMS, which speaks for itself, and

CIA ED CLAMS. Obviously some sort of CIA funding connection with Ed…we were told to follow the money…but to what end? What end??

The truth may be more disturbing than we want to admit. Cecil Adams is also

ACID MESCAL. Good good, they’re not reviving the CIA MK ULTRA experiments?? God I hope not, because we also get

MEDICAL SAC and

CIA SAC MELD. Government sponsored mind control drug experiments through our genitals? We’re through the looking glass here, people…

DrDeth · February 13, 2003, 11:07pm

If we are discussing this seriously- Yes, in a way- Zotti= Adams. But in another way, no. Ed is the man who wrote much of the original Straight Dope, and is the “original” Cecil. But Cecil Adams is a pen name, and thus, Ed can (& has) allowed others to write under that name. So- Ed “made up” Cecil Adams, and is the primary writer under that name. But not nessesarily the only writer. Some columns in the last years suffered a clear decline in the wit & humour that Ed brings to the genre. (Poundstone & Feldman are also entertaining writers in this feild, but neither has quite got the “bite” of a classic Cece answer).

To get a perspective on it, all the Doc Savage books were written under a common pen name. That pen name was used mostly by one original author, and fans claim they can tell the difference between books not written by him, and that he is the best of the Doc writers. (Umm, I think the pen name was Roberson, and the writer was Dent? I have a bad memory for names…)

Thus, you could both be technically wrong, and yet right if you claimed “Dent = Roberson”.

pravnik · February 13, 2003, 11:08pm

I’d like to apologize for that. Apparently a raving lunatic was posting on my computer while I was in the restroom. Security has escorted him out of the building.

leander · February 14, 2003, 12:13am

No, no…please bring back the raving lunatic. I think he was on to something.

DrDeth, actually Ed could not be the “original” Cecil as he did not join The Reader until several years after the column debuted.

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Poundstone, Zotti, and Adams

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