num_pages: 369
description: Stephen Fry is not making this up! Fry started out as a dishonorable schoolboy inclined to lies pranks bringing decaying moles to school as a science exhibit theft suicide attempts the illicit pursuit of candy and lads a genius for mischief and a neurotic life of crime that sent him straight to Pucklechurch Prison and Cambridge University where he vaulted to fame along with actress Emma Thompson. He wound up starring as Oscar Wilde in the film Wilde costarring in A Civil Action and writing funny distinguished novels. This irresistible book the best-written celebrity memoir of 1999 concentrates on Fry's first two tumultuous decades but beware! A Fry sentence can lead anywhere from a ringing defense of beating schoolchildren to a thoughtful comparison of male and female naughty parts. Fry's deepest regrets seem to be the elusiveness of a particular boy's love and the fact that despite his keen ear for music Fry's singing voice can make listeners claw out their inner ears electrocute their genitals put on a Jim Reeves record throw themselves cackling hysterically onto the path of moving buses... anything anything to take away the pain. A chance mention of Fry's time-travel book about thwarting Hitler Making History (a finalist for the 1998 Sidewise Award for Best Alternative History) leads to the startling real-life revelation that Fry's own Jewish uncle may have loaned a young shivering Hitler the coat off his back. Fry's life is full of school and jailhouse blues overcome by jaunty wit  la Wilde. The title from Psalm 108:9 refers to King David's triumph over the Philistines. Fry triumphs similarly and with more style. --Tim Appelo
language: English
title: Moab Is My Washpot
publisher: Soho Press