Billy Connolly's Greatest Hits

'Tall Tales and Wee Stories' by Billy Connolly (Two Roads, 2019)

Billy Connolly is one of Scotland's greatest exports.  Now well into his 70s, the musician, actor, artist and stand up no longer performs live, but you can relive some of his best bits through 'Tall Tales and Wee Stories'. 

'Tall Tales and Wee Stories' is a collection of Connolly's classic monologues, drawn from sixty years of sell out performances across the globe.  The ex-welder first found fame as a folk singer, but discovered a talent for public storytelling when he forgot a song's lyrics while on stage.  He filled the gap with a story and it was so well received that it became part of the act.  Eventually, storytelling routines took over from the music altogether.  This book includes favourites such as a Cardinal's school visit, a children's countryside outing, a working class Scottish house party, the workings of airplane toilets, how a cat caused trouble for a film armourer, the infamous Crucifixion sketch and many, many more.  These 'Tall Tales and Wee Stories' are silly, sweary and surreal, in short everything you'd expect from the Big Yin.

First things first - if you're not a Billy Connolly fan for one reason or another, you're not going to like this book.  It's full of the colourful language, bodily functions, vulgarity and mischief that you'd expect from one of his shows, so if any of that bothers you, do not bother with this book.  It'll just wind you up.

Secondly, it helps if you're familiar with Connolly's performance style, rather than coming to 'Tall Tales and Wee Stories' cold.  The written word is not like the spoken, obviously, and you need a knowledge of Connolly's vocalisations and physicality to get the most out of these stories.  So long as you have a bit of imagination and / or a decent memory, you should be able to conjure Connolly and breathe life back into the text.  Heaven help anyone who tries to read this without having seen him on stage!

A small number of sections haven't aged well (interestingly, including the Crucifixion sketch, perhaps because it's no longer as daring as it once was), while others just sound curmudgeonly ('Computers', 'Parenthetically Speaking', 'American Cinema'...) and I didn't find them particularly funny.  On the one hand, this gives a more complete picture of Connolly's development as a storyteller, but from a purely entertainment perspective, I can't imaging many people complaining if some of them had just been chopped out.

Overall, if you're entertained by Billy Connolly's stand up shows and are willing to use your imagination, this is an enjoyable way to re-live some favourite performances.  It's certainly perked me up in what is a challenging time for everyone.  If you have the choice, however, a definitive CD or DVD compilation of the same material would probably be a much better option.  Shock horror - sometimes the film is better than the book!

Now, what next...?

This review is based on the hardback version of 'Tall Tales and Wee Stories' by Billy Connolly.  It was published by Two Roads, an imprint of John Murray Press, in 2019.