The Wonderful Man

Author: Edward Monkton
Title: The Wonderful Man
Original publisher: HarperCollinsEntertainment
Released: 2004

This is an illustrated book that can be finished in less than 5 minutes, however its brilliance lies within its simplicity. If, like me, you have read any ‘Mr. Men’ books in your adulthood and smiled at how their teachings and simple observations are actually quite philosophical at their core, you will also love this book. The story of the ordinary, yet wonderful man is quite simple, he is nice. He does nice things, he’s a sweet man, and he happens to come across three very ‘impressive people’ one of whom has a great singing voice and ‘fashionable haircut’, one of whom has big muscles and a perfect smile, and one of whom has a limousine and a girlfriend with ‘large breasts and overly tight outfits’. These are all illustrated in a very child-like, quite hilarious way. The nice nature of the wonderful man slowly begins to rub off on these ‘impressive people’, and by the end of the story, they are all nice, swimming together, stripped of their outer shells that made them so abhorrent before.

Sounds a bit simple doesn’t it? Well it is. And I wouldn’t recommend you buy it just for yourself unless you felt you’d treasure it as much as I do. For me, it was a gift from a departing friend who I’ll never forget, and one of the most needed reminders in my life that not everyone takes you for granted. You know the feeling [being taken for granted]. So it’s quite special to have a reminder of someone’s love on your bookshelf that is also so accessible. With regards to the ‘impressive people’, it’s very easy for the nice, [dare I say] special ones (we know who we are deep down) to create a mindset of ‘us against them’, and to put these good-looking, powerful, rich people into a box labeled ‘bad guys’. This sweet book, rather uncomfortably sometimes, forces you to realize that as a special person, you should, you must be just as nice to these ‘privileged’ people. And you must mean it. I suppose in that respect (regarding the equal treatment of rich and poor), the message author Edward Monkton is giving is not too dissimilar from that any Muslim scholar I love might preach. Wherever or whoever the advice comes from though, it is never easy to follow that righteous voice inside of you that tries to warn you away from isolating yourself into thinking ‘because of your talent, these other people don’t understand you, and they can never understand you’. They can and they will. These people, the rich, the show-offs, the superstars, the ‘good-looking’, are all more in need than you or I. We have not been placed up high by others in society who tell us that what we have materially makes us 'better', so we have been forced to look inside us and figure out what it is that makes us special. What do we have that is not material, what is it inside our souls that no-one can take away? We are closer to knowing that than the ‘impressive people’. We are the privileged ones, and we need to spread this feeling.

The friend who gave me this book was sitting in my kitchen one day as I baked chocolate brownies, and she was laughing. We were both laughing because of the conversation we were having. It went like this,

Me- “I like being nice! I ENJOY IT”
Flower- “Yes! Also, it is so easy!”
Me- “Exactly! It doesn’t cost anything, It’s free!”
Flower- “If you are nice to someone, they can be nice to you also.”
Me- “Right, and even if they’re not, you still feel good by being nice anyway!”
Flower- [Laughs at my loud voice]
Me- [Laughs because flower is laughing] … "I think the brownies are ready!"

So you see, my softly-spoken Japanese friend had already brought about in me a realization that being good 'payed off'. This was before I got the book. In the company of special people, you see your soul mirrored and can begin to gain perspective on what it is that makes you you. When you find a friend like that, make the most out of it, because it’s not often you get to meet yourself, and have everything you dared to dream come true in words of honesty. This book is written with a mastery of contemporary culture and a beautiful simplicity that only a person in touch with his creativity could muster. I hope if anyone out there receives it in a moment of sincerity as I did, he’ll be moved enough to thank the person from the bottom of his heart. Maybe you’ll even be man enough to cry, God knows that being who you are in this dead society is not easy, and this book is an acknowledgment of that, touching the bottom of your tired heart with a seed and lifting it up with your spirits; motivating you to continue being who you are- a wonderful man.

Y.Misdaq aka Yoshi, 29th Aug 2004

PS- Here are two related films that you may want to see in conjunction with this text. They occurred to me whilst writing this review:
'Mr. Deeds goes to town (1936)
'Down and out in Beverly Hills (1986)