Buckshot ?a Schott.4) This Book and That Book by Mitchell Symons (Bantam Press). Says Schott: “I haven’t read it, but I’m sure it’s unoriginal and I’ll take their word for its being shite.”2) Accomodating Brocolli in the Cemetary [sic] by Vivian Cook (Profile). Eats Shoots & Leaves rewritten in the style of Schott.3) Essential Militaria: Facts, Legends and Curiosities about Warfare through the Ages, by Nicholas Hobbes (Atlantic). Includes choice gobbets such as “Twelve random British TV VideoPlus codes for 28 June to July 4 2003″; “Abandoned trade names for instant mashed potato”; “Days of the week”.

On a purely commercial level, it just increases sales of my book. And the idea that my elaborate joke has brought all these other books into the world I find very odd.”1) Shite’s Unoriginal Miscellany, by A Parody (Michael O’Mara). People expect me to be really upset about them and tiptoe round the subject But I think it’s just part of the madness Am I worried? Absolutely not. You’d have the war, you’d have all the gadgets, and I think it would add a bit of style and elegance to it.”SCHOTT PARODIES OR BRAZEN IMITATIONSWhat does Ben Schott make of the dozens of rip-offs of his book that have appeared since his own book became the publishing sensation of Christmas 2002? “There are many dozens of them,” he concedes “I’ve lost count. Did anyone know that there was a comparative scale for chilli heats?” (The scale was determined by Wilbur Scoville in 1912, and determined with the use of his Scoville Organoleptic Test.) “Or that sign-writing brushes are named after birds – swan, eagle, condor – because they have the number of fibres it was possible to fit inside a quill formed from one of their feathers?”3) Schott’s Prescription for James Bond “I think James Bond should go retro. It should be in black and white and set in the 1920s and 1930s.

The things that sound profoundly banal, like forensic accountancy, are really quite interesting when you get into them I love any kind of expert. No matter how boring the original subject is, a real expert will make it interesting.”2) Schott’s Distinction between Trivia and Miscellany “Trivia is competitive I know this and you don’t Miscellany is different No one knows this stuff. Maybe a slim volume of haiku, but that’s it.”THREE SCHOTT THEORIES1) Schott’s Theory of Inverse Dullness: “The things that sound really sexy and exciting – like advertising, for instance – are profoundly banal. “If you ever catch me toying with the idea, you have my permission to shoot me. I like food, but I can subsist on a meal a day, perfectly happily.” To illustrate the point, he quotes Samuel Johnson: “For my part, I consider supper as a turnpike through which one must pass, in order to get to bed.”5) He claims to be rubbish at quizzes.6) “I’m quite a snob when it comes to tea,” he says, describing the discomfort he would feel at the prospect of having to eat scones in a Thistle hotel “Just tea?” I ask “Yes,” he says, levelly “Just tea.”7) He’ll never write a novel.