"Where have you put all the dinosaurs?" I asked the old security man. "Dinosaurs? You won't find any dinosaurs in here, you want the Natural History Museum."Turns out I was at the V & A. I don't know why they have all the museums so close together...If another meteorite hits Earth and wipes out civilization, then in billions of years time, when humans grow back again, some archaeologist is gonna be well confused when they start digging round here and find human bones, dinosaur bones, bits of old Chinese art, polar bears, fish and computers all within a 1-mile radius.
I was given this for my birthday yesterday and I finished it this morning. It's not short at around 220 pages, but a lot of space is taken up by a large typeface, quotes, photographs, and Karl's magnificent illustrations.
Karlology, the follow-up to Happyslapped by a Jellyfish, is a collection of essays about Karl's trips to various museums and exhibitions in a bid to garner more knowledge and perhaps some wisdom.
There is, still, some debate as to whether or not 'Karl Pilkington' is a real person, or if he is a comedy construct - an allegation that Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant have both strongly denied. I'm still on the fence, if I'm honest. I'm sure there are certain aspects of his character and personality that he plays up, but for the most part believe that it would be impossible to script such elaborate digressions.
It's his self-awareness (along with the knowledge that he makes massive amounts of money) that stops any sneaking feelings that someone with below average intelligence is being exploited for laughs and japes. I used to get this niggling feeling of sadness in the pit of my stomach whenever they would tickle him with a fact and wait for him to say something improbable. Now I'm just sad that he only puts out one book a year.
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