The book of heroic failures
by Stephen Pile · first published 1980
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2012–2026first – last mentioned
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My favourite book ever is "The Book of Heroic Failures". It celebrates failure. In the introduction, Stephen Pile wrote: Success is overrated. Everyone craves it despite daily proof that man's real genius lies in quite the opposite direction. Incompetence…
on “Let there be more biographies of failures” ↗Speaking of vacuum cleaners, Stephen Pile, my very much favourite author ever, wrote an entry in his hilarious Book of Heroic Failures about the man who almost invented the vacuum cleaner. I reproduce it here verbatim, under the principles of fair use (transformative, educational, not for profit and a tiny amount of his work that won't…
on “What do grad students in math do all day?” ↗This guy created the museum of failure. I really hope he consulted Stephen Pile, who wrote The Book of Heroic Failures (possibly the funniest book of all time).
on “The “Disgusting Food Museum” in Malmo, Sweden” ↗Tangentially related: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Heroic_Failures I have a copy. It is a much-beloved source of joy.
on “German submarine U-1206” ↗This book is featured in The Book of Heroic Failures, which has made me cry with laughter since I was a child. Delighted to discover that it's real
on “English as She Is Spoke” ↗That title has got to be written in homage to the Not Terribly Good Club of Great Britain, which had to be disbanded when its founder, a Mr Stephen Pile, added an application for it in his Book of Heroic Failures and it got 60,000 applications. A true victim of its own success. As a failure, a failure.
on “A Not Terribly Brief History of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (1990)” ↗…English as She Is Spoke "Nobody can add to the absurdity of this book, nobody can imitate it successfully, nobody can hope to produce its fellow; it is perfect." >Stephen Pile mentions this work in The Book of Heroic Failures and comments: "Is there anything in conventional English which could equal the vividness of 'to craunch a marmoset'?"[7] The original has "to craunch the marmoset", an entry under the book's "Idiotisms…
on “Phrasebooks are dying out” ↗Funny, I felt the same! My favourite Portugese to English phrasebook of all time, incidentally, is English As She Is Spoke, which I learned of in Stephen Pile's book, The Book of Heroic Failures, where he comments: "Is there anything in conventional English which could equal the vividness of 'to craunch a marmoset'?"
on “Minimal Ring Alarm Clock for Couples” ↗"The funniest book of the year." - Irish Times Pile, Stephen. The Book of Heroic Failures: The Official Handbook of the Not Terribly Good Club of Great Britain. 1980. ..I see he has a newer book published too: Pile, Stephen. The Ultimate Book of Heroic Failures. 2011.
on “Let there be more biographies of failures” ↗I first read about this in Stephen Pile's The Book of Heroic Failures. He seemed particular taken with the phrase "To craunch a mamoset".
on “English as She Is Spoke” ↗> There was a wonderful book published, oh, about twenty years ago I think, by Stephen Pile called the Book of Heroic Failures. It was staggeringly huge bestseller in England and sank with heroic lack of trace in the U.S. I have this! Thumbing through it randomly, it includes The Least Successful Pigeon Race, The Fastest Defeat…
on “Douglas Adams on the English–American cultural divide over "heroes"” ↗I'm reminded of a story in the Book Of Heroic Failures which went something like "Mr Smith, who attempted to pull off the worlds largest single cheque forgery, altered his pay cheque from 14 pounds 8 shillings to 148 million pounds. The fraud was successful…
on “FE-Schrift – forgery-impeding typeface” ↗…It's Grim Up North https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20XLWEjN9eI As a non British I though this was always a bit of dark British humour tradition. See Black Adder, also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Heroic_Failures - which mentions towns like Keynes.
on “I wrote a book called “Crap Towns”. It seemed funny at the time” ↗