The Encyclopaedia of Humans / A real Monster breaks his Silence

The Encyclopaedia of Humans is an illustrated book for teenagers and young people (from the age of thirteen). This book by Stanislav Marijanović is the counterpart of his award winning book The Encyclopaedia of Monsters in which the monsters reveal their existence and encyclopaedically, pedantically describe their numerous species and ways of life. Both books were written by the same author: the monster Nosehehow, the Blameless, permanent member of the Great Council of Monsters.

While in The Encyclopaedia of Monsters we find everything about monsters, in The Encyclopaedia of Humans we learn what we humans appear to be through the objective eyes of monsters. It could be said that from their point of view we are the real monsters! Nosehehow criticises a number of human traits and many phenomena in human society, so that things we usually try to hide (or at least not talk about) come to the surface. In 12 chapters he describes the creation, the appearance and constitution, breeding and feeding habits, character traits, the way of life, the (absurd) habits, the (dubious) past, the (problematic) present and the (doubtful) future of the human race. He keeps warning us about prejudices and lies which are a part of our nature, but of which we are rarely aware. He keeps opening our eyes and broadening our horizons, showing us a hidden reality: what we humans really believe and what are we really like. In other words, our “unique” world. The “hardness” and the uncompromising quality of Nosehehow’s criticism are delivered with humor which helps the reader to listen to things which are offensive to the human ear.

This is a book to read with pleasure (and displeasure) by the whole family.