Don't Mr. Disraeli

Don't Mr Disraeli is set sometime in the nineteenth century. Exactly when is unclear, since not only do famous people from the entire century appear in it, but Queen Victoria appears at all ages from a young princess to an old widower, whilst other parts of the plot have only moved on a few months or a couple of years. Disraeli himself appears in a running joke through the book, which provides the title, and other running jokes include the committee which has been formed to name one of London's first stations and is having some problems, to put it mildly.

Genuine historical personnages, albeit in fictionalised form, are not the only characters to appear in the story. It is filled with nineteenth century literary cliches, complete with the archetypal mustachoied Villain, and the main plot concerns a pair of typical Victorian lovers. The book moves quickly from character to character in a series of short passages reminiscent of Terry Pratchett's manner of writing- except that as this book was written in the forties, it's probably Terry Pratchett's writing that's reminiscent of Brahms and Simon's style.

A pleasantly dreamlike quality runs through the book, probably due to the inconsistent time scheme, and the large number of stereotyped characters. It is also tremendously funny- I don't usually laugh out loud but I was doing so almost continuously whilst reading Don't Mr Disraeli. The authors intended it to keep morale up during the Second World War, although they also wrote comic books before and after the war, and I can easily believe that it did the trick. It hasn't dated, though, maybe because the nineteenth century was equally in the past for the authors and the present reader. It's the sort of book that compels you to go out and encourage all your friends to read it when you've finished, and I would recommend it to anyone!

Caryl Brahms, S.J. Simon

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