Augustus Carp, Esq., by Himself

The story of Augustus Carp, as only he could tell it. This satirical faux autobiography from 1924 was a delight to read. It felt like a vacation from reading contemporary books, even though we all know someone like Carp in every generation.

The pomposity and lack of self-awareness of Augustus Carp (and his father, also named Augustus Carp) is the source of humor. In the first paragraph he explains his moral duty to write about himself so as to set an example in society as a man of such high moral character. He then tells of his birth, his dignified father (pompous & insufferable), his mother (who is only mentioned when she is in servitude to him or his father), and others who seem to all have character flaws as a reason they do not get along with Carp. One must read between the lines to enjoy this as Carp unwittingly reveals to us his own lack of character.

I enjoyed this very much, although I felt that the humor probably runs even deeper than I realize, as it was written in early 20th century Great Britain, and some of the references are lost on me, I'm afraid, nearly 100 years later on the other side of the pond, as they say.

This is such a delightfully funny gem of a book, very British in its satire and irony, and very much in the tradition of British comic writing, with its priggish, pompous and self-satisfied narrator, Augustus Carp himself, who is firmly convinced of his own self-righteousness, but who in reality is an insufferable hypocrite and bore. First published anonymously in 1924, and later discovered to be the work of a doctor, Sir Henry Howarth Bashford, honorary Physician to George VI, it’s a book that truly deserves to be better known.