cover image Dare to Be Square

Dare to Be Square

Chris Gilson, Chri Gilson. Penguin Books, $6.95 (192pp) ISBN 978-0-14-011112-5

Dry, uneven and ultimately inane, this sardonic look at the ``New Establishment'' is doomed by the weight of its own subject matter: the square, the dull. Everyone can be square is the author's premise``even if you stand before your mirror a fully grown adult, hair spiked with mousse to resemble a porcupine's back, and shoulders padded like an aircraft carrier deck, you can still be one of us.'' Gilson ( Consumer Revenge ) effectively quotes from books ( Radical Chic , Etiquette , etc.) and magazines ( Fortune et al.), and cleverly cites Dick Cavett's Eye on Cavett to explain the ``Cavett Curse'' or ``terminal cleverness.'' ``Making Perfectly Square Children: The Joy of Marital Sex'' and modifying the ``one mode of sex which will probably be ruled permissible by the Supreme Court, the familiar `Missionary Position' '' into several creative versions (No. 6: ``The Your-Mission-Should-You-Decide-to-Accept-It Position'') elicits a few chuckles. But the repetitive celebration of repression, suppression and the WASP ethic grows stale and ennui seeps into the text with ``Where to Work: The Squarest Companies,'' ``The 7 Best Career Changes for the 1990s'' and ``Reliving the Glorious Past in Musicals.'' Illustrations not seen by PW. (September)