Thursday night, Stephen Colbert opened his show proudly “wearing a new hat”: that of children’s book author. Holding a copy of his I Am a Pole (And So Can You) to the camera, he announced that his book was #1 on the New York Times Advice, How-to, and Miscellaneous list. He then entertained his own question—“Why are you in that category, Stephen, a pole can’t give you advice, it’s pure fantasy.” He countered with the fact that his book appeared last week at #2 on Publishers Weekly’s adult nonfiction list—emphasizing to the roaring crowd, “Nonfiction! Nonfiction! That means everything in this book actually happened.”
Indeed, PW considers I Am a Pole (described by Colbert as the story of “a talking pole who finds purpose in life and in strip clubs”) to be nonfiction for adults—decidedly not a children’s book, and more in the vein of social satire, not unlike Go the F***k to Sleep, which was also on PW’s adult nonfiction list. In any event, in our editors' estimation, I Am a Pole has just the requisite amount of truthiness to confirm its place on our nonfiction list, right there with the work of Colbert’s Papa Bear, Bill O’Reilly.
