PurchaseExerpt
July 22, 2003
Dear Editors,
I received your piquant flush letter, the one that said "to publish your piece would violate a pact Mirth of a Nation has with its readers--namely that its contents will be, in fact, mirthful."
In light of your rejoinder, I have reviewed my essay and found it to be side-splittingly hysterical. Perhaps my rejection stems from a more sinister reason. I believe you are discriminating against me because, as the subject matter of my submission indicates, I am a male model. You assume that because I model, I cannot be funny.
Now I admit there may be some inverse correlation between beauty and humor (humor as an evolutionary compensation for the aesthetically challenged), but please keep an open mind. Models can be funny too! I remember a particularly amusing anecdote Tyra Banks told on The Tonight Show. Something about a limousine being late to pick her up to go jewelry shopping while she was vacationing on Ibiza (service is so spotty in the Balearic Islands!).
Do reconsider my article (and your prejudices). Must humor be borne of parental neglect, schoolyard trauma, and chronic romantic rejection? Can't it rise from adoration, flattery, and pampering? Must my comedy career be hamstrung by my high cheekbones? I ask you, are cheekbones destiny?
Yours truly,
Steve Altes
Humorist, first; Hot Male Model, second
****************************************************August 14, 2003
Dear Editors,
I see you've passed on a second round of my submissions. I think you're being short-sighted. Mirth needs me because, unless Advertising Age has been lying to us all these years, sex sells. Having a model as a contributor would give Mirth sex appeal.
Anna Kournikova's career owes more to her backside than her backhand. Even staid old CNN promoted Paula Zahn as "just a little sexy" over the sound of a zipper opening!
Picture this: "Mirth of a Nation… Now with Humorist Centerfolds!"
Writing humor is like being naked anyway--baring your soul, exposing your vulnerabilities. Why not take it all the way? Nude humorists! Who among us doesn't harbor a secret desire to see Sarah Vowell in the raw? I know I do. Rick Moranis sprawled languidly on a bear-skin rug (caption: "Honey, I Shrunk My Gonads"). David--no, wait… Amy Sedaris in a bed of rose petals!
Enthusiastically,
Steve Altes
P.S. I'm nude right now!
****************************************************September 1, 2003
Dear Editors,
Evidently you found my online portfolio. Hooray for Google. Yes, I am a hand model. And yes, hand modeling is a real form of modeling. I don't tell you that humor isn't a real form of literature (even though, ahem, my bookstore sandwiches Mirth of a Nation between The Duct Tape Book and The Tenth Garfield Treasury, not with Twain and Thurber).
It was good of you not to make the obligatory "did you see the Seinfeld episode where George Costanza was a hand model" remark. You rise in my esteem as a result.
Anyway, pursuant to my previous letter, I enclose a photo of myself, on the job as a hand model--your inaugural humorist centerfold!
Persistently,
Steve Altes
