Mr Thundermug

by Cornelius Medvei

Mr. Thundermug is the inventive, entertaining, and—against all odds—poignant story of an animal who acquires the ability to eloquently speak human language. Using his own beautiful, eerie lithograph illustrations, Cornelius Medvei places us in a vivid world that is both familiar and alien. It's a world in which Mr. Thundermug and his family take up occupancy in an abandoned apartment building. On the roof of that building, Mr. Thundermug gazes at the heavens and thinks deep thoughts while his wife picks bugs off him and eats them. Understandably, he's somewhat confused by his complex existence as a fluent member of human society who has the essential nature of a more ancient species, but he assimilates as best he can. His worlds inevitably collide, and he is eventually brought to court for a petty crime and asked to defend himself in impossible ways. Simultaneously playful and foreboding, Mr. Thundermug announces the arrival of a bold and imaginative talent.

Genres: Fiction, Animals, Fantasy, Humor, Literature, Literary Fiction

96 pages, Hardcover

First published October 16, 2006

Reviews

[Aldrin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The dearth of baboons in popular culture is ground for belief that they’re not the most celebrated of all monkeys, let alone of all animals. Sure, there’s wise old Rafiki in Disney’s The Lion King. But aside from him, who else is there?

In its halcyon days of unbridled silliness in the 90s, Cartoon Network used to air I Am Weasel, an animated series whose title character, I. M. Weasel, is the polar opposite of his frequent rival and sometime companion, I. R. Baboon. Unlike I. M. Weasel, I. R. Baboon is untidy. Unlike I. M. Weasel, I. R. Baboon is unintelligent. In short, I. R. Baboon, who is so dumb he can’t even make the subject and the verb agree in his simple-sentence self-introduction, embodies the typical anthropomorphism of creatures of the type species Simia hamadryas: the ugly, red butt of jokes. It is really no wonder baboons in mainstream media never caught on.

Cornelius Medvei’s literary debut, Mr. Thundermug, turns the concept—cliche, actually—on its head by having for its titular protagonist a baboon that, as the book’s old-fashioned, Will Staehle-designed cover announces, has “an unsettling mastery of speech” to go with his “luxuriant mane of silvery hair.” He is, however, lest the reader be misled to imagine Mr. Thundermug as the simian counterpart of Anderson Cooper, still an unattractive baboon, furiously scarlet backside and all.

How Mr. Thundermug came to share a faculty for language with humans is not clearly explained in this novella narrated by a journalist making a short case history out of the life of an exceptional baboon, but a number of bizarre anecdotes are presented of Mr. Thundermug bumbling his way through the streets, around the corners, and on the rooftops of a city described as though it’s a slice of a wistfully remembered London. His place of origin also unknown, Mr. Thundermug, along with his baboon family—his wife and two kids who are possessed of communication wavelengths perfectly normal for baboons (squeals, grunts, etc.)—assumes residence in an abandoned house upon his arrival in the city. Thereafter he attempts to mingle with humans, who are strangely ignorant of the fact that he is a talking monkey and not a short and hairy person. More often than not, he fails, although usually through no fault of his own.

It’s hard to live in the city, especially if you’re a baboon. You are perpetually plagued by preconceptions and deprived of proper attention. When dining in a fancy restaurant, you are served a bunch of bananas even though you ordered the sole Meunière and pronounced the name of the dish correctly. When complaining about an illness, you are not taken seriously by doctors; they ask you to consult a veterinarian instead. You are spoken ill of, even while you’re being a responsible parent by sending your kids to school. You are deemed irrelevant by a society of mostly myopic and self-righteous beings, who are the first ones to prosecute you for a petty crime but the last ones to learn that, say, after showing your affection to your spouse by customarily picking the lice off her mane, you are wont to adopt “an intense, concentrated expression,” as if you are “grappling with some philosophical problem” or “trying to calculate the distance from here to the moon.” It’s hard to live in the city, especially if you’re different.

Medvei’s story is very likely to stumble into the realm of mildly amusing but ultimately unwarranted hyperbole, bringing to mind the more ridiculous scenes of the aforementioned animated TV series, yet it is brought to a state of delicate understatement by a rarely realized balance between the absurd and the everyday, punctuated by Medvei’s own surreal lithographs. Medvei’s wise and contemplative narrative voice bolsters Mr. Thundermug into becoming the whimsical allegory of equality and provocative meditation on what being human means that it is—and is not, if what one seeks is simply a single-sitting weekend read that is by turns charming and oddly sobering.

Mr. Thundermug is the story of Mr. Thundermug, master interlocutor, Baudelairean flâneur, civil rights advocate, and, above all, baboon.

—
Originally posted on Fully Booked .Me.

[Bernice Hicks · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm not much of a literary reader, but I really like some of the pictures the author drew with his words, for example:

"Every year, in the last days of July, the city was at the mercy of its special microclimate. Incontinent, boiling clouds sucked up water from the surface of the river and carried it a few hundred yards before dumping it on the cracked tiles and crumbling."

[Phortunes Tolde · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely brilliant.

[✨ Aaron Jeffery ✨ · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just could not connect to this story unfortunately. The humour was okay but the story was super boring. Also, the main character - a monkey- was rude lol.

[Raven Atkinsname · Rating 4 out of 5]

I chose to read Mr.Thundermug just because it seemes interesting to me that a baboon could supposidly speak the human language.When i read the summary, it kinda made me outomatically want to figure out how and why it spoke the humman language, and what it had to do with his everyday life.

My thoughts on the book were pretty positive. It have very good imagery on describing how things looked and sounded. It at times was pretty sad because the monkey was put in situtations that could eiher make his life worse or not. The book was wlso a pretty easy read. There were some complex words in it, but other than that it was short and easy to comprehend.

Mr.Thundermug begins with a thought to be dised man named Dr.Rotz who taught the a monkey how to speak human and a baboon named Mr.Thundermug and his family. Him and his family live in an abandoned apartment bulding in a small english city where he gazes at the heavans while his wife eats bugs off of him.Life for him is pretty unusual since he is the only monkey known to speak the human language.On random day he is arrested b y the police for indecent exposre and cruelty to animals.With this happening now tne baboon has to go to trial which could either cause him to go to jail or to e free with his family.

This book was a very good book to read. It was easy to understand and it gave great details that made you want to keep ready. The book had some things that could have been described better for example, why exactly the Mr.Thundermug was taken to jail instead of just saying what he was charged with. I can say the title of the book was pretty decieving but wants you get in to it, you quickly start to understand how things were gonna play out.

This book will cause thoughtful readers to really comprehend that anyone can have things really important to them that you may not agree with but its something you have to respect. If Mr.Thundermug was respected maybe his life would ahve been in more peace and happiness instead of him going to jail for protecting his family.

[Ruthie Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don't be fooled into thinking this is a funny tale. A dark and sinister story lurks beneath the surface. Acceptance in an unforgiving and stiffnecked society is difficult for people (animals?) who just want to exist and survive and learn. Thank goodness for the Miss Youngs of the world (Miss Young is the primary school teacher in this book) who accept and befriend the different and the ridiculed. Mr. Thundermug's speech at his trial at the end of this novella sums up the ugly side of society beautifully. This isn't simply a story about a talking baboon in London with his wife and children (who do not possess the same extraordinary ability to even learn human speech). This is about ethnocentrism in all its hideous and ridiculous glory. A completely heartbreaking story wrapped in a very thin veil of silliness.

[Anastasia · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excessively strange little volume that I picked out without much expectation for its contents--the cover image of a rather majestic looking baboon is what sold me. It's an excessively quick read--more like an experiemental short story/novella than anything--but it has its moment of cleverness. It's a basic talking animal story, but the author thinks through the consequences for an animal that makes this leap more thoroughly than usual and we see his difficulties with family life [sadly, his family remains just a bunch of, well, monkeys, while he is off educating himself] and his problems with accusations of public nudity. Doesn't get much more offbeat than this...

[Lora · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting so far...

I enjoyed the idea of this book much more than its actual execution. I think I'd classify it as 2-1/2 stars rather than a full 3. I found the ending too nebulous to satisfy me.

[Neil · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not very original, despite the way the inside leaf made it sound. I guess I thought it would be a new or unique way of presenting the ideas, but it wasn't.

[Story · Rating 3 out of 5]

An intellectually-hungry baboon learns to speak and only to find out most people are fools. A sweet little novella with some funny, absurdist passages and inspired images.

[Ani · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enigmatic short read, and entertaining enough to be a pleasant afternoon with some charmingly quirky short fiction.

A baboon family moves into an abandoned house, and the adult male of the family has somehow gained the ability to talk. What ensues is a droll tale of a town coming to terms with something that cannot be. Only one person accepts Mr. Thundermug, and still her acceptance is uneasy.

I recommend it for a quiet afternoon with tea.

[David Garza · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was thoroughly entertained by this quick & light, absurd & surreal tale. What more could I want from a book about a baboon? The nonchalant acceptance of absurdities with no real desire to establish absolute causes provides a touch of Kafka.

[Lee Yen Pheng · Rating 4 out of 5]

I chanced upon this old book that was given to me as a present many years ago. it's an easy read for a lazy Sunday afternoon. I love the simple prose and plot - quirky, satirical and hilarious..

[Haley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe with a bit of time, I’ll find myself thinking about this book and revise my rating, but it seemed a little too sparse to be doing that kind of deep work.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mr. Thundermug tells the tale of a baboon and his family. However, Mr. Thundermug is no ordinary baboon--he thinks like a human and can put his thoughts into words. Although he can't read (at first), Mr. Thundermug has a good grasp of the English language. He and his wife and two children--all three of whom are ordinary baboons--arrive in an unnamed city and take up residence in a vacant building. No one knows where the baboon family came from, though there is an allusion to a zoologist who studied a baboon colony before his disappearance and indicates the possibility that humans and baboons were cross-bred. Just as Mr. Thundermug forges a close relationship with a local teacher, Angela Young, who teaches him to read and write, city officials begin to take notice of the Thundermugs.

Mr. Thundermug is a very short novel, and it's amazing that Medvei packed a critique of modern society into just a few pages. By the end of the book, I was outraged at the treatment of Mr. Thundermug, then realized he symbolizes anyone who has been discriminated against because of race, sex, gender, income, language, weight, disability, religion, etc. I think Medvei chose to write about baboons because most people have a soft spot for animals, and it's obvious to the reader that Mr. Thundermug could easily contribute to society if people would stop seeing him only as a baboon. It makes you think about how various groups of people are mistreated in today's society and how not enough is being done to ensure equality.

[vaugnfreech · Rating 5 out of 5]

I got this hardbound copy from Booksale for only 50 pesos.

Mr. Thundermug is the story of, well, Mr. Thundermug - a baboon.

Mr. Thundermug is different from other baboons because he can talk. How? The story tells so. He once lived in a place near an asylum and learned how to talk by listening to psychos who talk to themselves. And when he finally had enough vocabulary, he lived on the streets of (I’m not so sure) England, got a lair and a family of primates.

Since he can talk, people recognized him as a citizen. And since he’s a citizen, he’s bound with his rights…like having pension and sending his children to school. And what’s even curiouser? A female human falls in love with him. How’s that?

In the end, some heartless man accused Mr. Thundermug of something unethical. And this led to the ultimate message of the book:

”You humans, you try hard to make yourselves different from us animals. You fix your hair, you trim your nails, you take a bath…but has anyone of you ever succeeded in escaping your animal nature?” -Mr. Thundermug.

The baboon said it in the courtroom. Everyone was speechless.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

On the cover of this interesting little novella, there are three statements:

~Mr. Thundermug is a baboon
~Mr. Thundermug has a luxuriant mane of silvery hair
~Mr. Thundermug has an unsettling mastery of speech

Your enjoyment of this story is largely going to be based upon your enjoyment of those three comments, because really, that's what the novella's about. A talking baboon.

It's a charming little case history of a baboon who appears and, suddenly, learns to speak like a human. Like any good fantasy or fable, there's a hidden moral somewhere in here regarding what it means to be human, but for the most part it's simply an enjoyable little what-if, and its simplicity is one of its charms.

Of course, the question becomes, is the book worth purchasing? For most people, given it's severe brevity (just over 100 pages, with some pictures) it simply won't be worth it at full price, even in paperback. However, cheap or used, it's an intriguing little addition to a shelf.

[J · Rating 3 out of 5]

After finishing the book I felt compelled to defend it though perhaps only against my own misgivings. I can't quite remember how I discovered it in the first place but Mr. Thundermug found its way onto my "To Read" list and eventually into my home.

Jose Saramago, the wizened Portuguese master of metaphor and allegory, is my favorite author and Medvei has definite stirrings of this same gift for oddball melancholia. Still, I kept feeling as though the allegory was too heavy handed. For this I withheld one star of five but at the same time Medvei's writing is entirely efficient and fun.

Saramago's "Death with Interruptions" is my favorite book and the one by which I gauge all others (as far as level of enjoyment) - giving Medvei 60% of "Death with Interruptions" is pretty good, then.

[Dannuel Delizo · Rating 3 out of 5]

A poignant story of a baboon who acquired the ability to eloquently speak human language. First of all, this is fiction. But i had a tingly feeling that this might be somehow factual. Science and history have records of accidental encounters with talking primates. In those accounts, there might be genetical and anatomical anomalies involved. Biologically speaking, chimpanzees cannot talk, because unlike humans, their vocal cords are located higher in their throats and cannot be controlled as well as human vocal cords.

On the other hand, i find the story abominable. A young teacher fell in love with a baboon? A baboon falsely accepted in human society? Forgive me, but this novel was funny enough for me to finish in an hour or so.

In the end, there were no scientific explanations on how Mr. Thundermug learned to speak the human language. Disappointing.

[M · Rating 3 out of 5]

Albeit a short novel, Mr. Thundermug provides a glimpse at the oddity and absurdity of a baboon with human speech. The self-titled Mr. Thundermug is fully capable of interacting with humans on a verbal level; his wife and two children cannot say the same. What follows is a baboon's attempts to be seen as more than ape, and a society coming to grips with something they feel is not quite human. Charming and poignant, this is a nifty little tale.

[Donna · Rating 4 out of 5]

At first I thought this was just a silly story about a talking monkey but the more I read I felt parallel lines with our society as a whole come to the surface. Perhaps I have read too much into the story but it did make me stop and ponder and give it some second thoughts. The drawings in the book were a nice touch. I don't know why I have never seen this book before. I found it on a special reading section at the library and just picked it up on a whim.

[Jessie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm sure we have all gone to the library or a book store and picked something off the shelf for no reason and begun reading with 0 expectations.
Mr. Thundermug was that book. And what a charming little book it was! Memorable? Hardly. But, nonetheless, I found it delightful.
Usually when I find books of this size, I wish for them to be longer. But I didn't feel that way with this one. Short while still maintaining enough information to make it a full story.

[Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting short story. I was expecting (and would have enjoyed) a little bit more plot. Besides a somewhat dubious ending, my only point of contention is the author's misuse of macaques as a South American species. My own pet peeve, I suppose, but if your writing a story about primates... spend a second to research which primates are found where.

[Lungkisser · Rating 3 out of 5]

Saw this quirky little thing at a user bookstore for $2 and bought it solely based on the cover and the illustrations. Wasn't disappointed. I won't lie, I may have bought it and read it hoping to add another short book toward my goal of 50 books this year, but I genuinely enjoyed it and would pick up a second novel by Cornelius Medvei if he ever wrote one.

[Kevin W. Clark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Adorable. A cute short full length novel unlike most. The author weaves an excellent story about living as the fringe of society. You may appeal and behave as human but the way you look will remain a factor nagging at the recesses of society's expectations. If you are not of us then you are a second class citizen. The cover is also an exceptional decoration piece for your library.

[Rosie · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book is delightful. Already an art piece just from looking at the cover. Judge this book from the cover-- if you like how it looks and what it says on the front, you will probably like the book itself.

[Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a lovely and strange little book. I was up late last night reading it and I eagerly await something more from this author. He has a delicate and interesting style which required me to grab my dictionary a few times!

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little Kafka, a little reverse Tarzan, a little Gogol...a little book. My point being, it's an enchanting tale that is much too short. This reader wants a full-fledged novel. Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game" started as a short story and look what happened to that!

[Jenny Schmenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Droll talking baboon! Charming but not captivating. Perhaps the formal, nearly pseudo-Victorian voice distanced me from what I'd ordinarily clutch close to my heart - an inexplicably articulate baboon. Still, I'm glad I read it. In one quick gulp.

[Kathy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Another reviewer mentioned that the IDEA of this book is quite good, but the execution is lacking, and that pretty much sums it up for me. Perhaps this might have worked better as a short story OR a more in depth novel, as it never really takes off.