"The Day My Butt Went Psycho" - The Beginning Quiz

Answer: False

The book does carry a warning, but not the one above. Rather, the publisher warns parents, teachers, and anyone over the age of eighteen NOT to read the story! Specifically, it admonishes the mature reader to: "put this book down now! You won't understand it...please put the book down immediately and go find something more suitable for a grown-up. Like a book on home decorating, for instance. Or economics. Or health and nutrition. If, on the other hand, you find yourself vaguely amused, slightly curious, or even excited by any - or all - of the things that you have just been warned about, then by all means be our guest and read the book.... Just don't say that you weren't warned!"

Answer: True

Accordingly, every occurrence of the word "bum" was changed to the American synonym. The book's cover was also changed. In Australia, the publication sported a picture of a toddler's bare bottom. In the more prudish US, this was changed to a stylized drawing.

This followed a brief scandal in Australia when the unclothed toddler cover used to promote literacy and an official with the Department of Education, Training and Youth pulled Griffiths' work from the poster. "I always wanted to be banned," Griffiths said, "I just didn't think it would be this easy."

Answer: False

In fact, the dedication page reads: "This book is NOT dedicated to my parents, by request." The reader is left to imagine why.

Answer: No

Since Zack's twelfth birthday two months prior to the story's beginning, his butt has made a habit of running around at night doing nefarious things. Zack and his butt were already on probation; if Zack's butt is caught again, it will be sent to jail. It goes without saying that this would be quite inconvenient.

Answer: A giant buttcano

As the plan goes, butts from all over the world have assembled to build the giant buttcano. Its eruption will be so overwhelming that all the heads in the world would be momentarily disabled. Then, the butts will make their move.

Answer: The local buttcatcher

Overconfident, the buttcatcher charges into the football stadium with a powerful buttmagnet. However, he is overwhelmed by the sheer number of insurrectionist butts. They take him by force and liberate his butt (described as "very white and very frightened"), placing it triumphantly atop the buttcatcher's neck. As Zack's butt proclaims: "Butts are not slaves! We are not owned by anybody!"

The pervasive theme of class conflict is reiterated here: the buttcatcher states, rather matter-of-factly, that "a butt without an owner is just a...a...a butt!" Likewise, Zack muses to himself that "all he wanted was a butt that would settle down and just be a butt." Clearly, the butts are not interested in keeping their assigned place in the class structure and have risen to violent revolution. As Zack himself admits: "once a butt gets a taste for killing, it is very difficult for it to stop."

Answer: Skis

The clothespins are useful for plugging off one's nose from the stink of the revolting butts. Soap is imperative for the first rule of butt fighting: always clean up afterward. And air freshener...well, that speaks for itself. All these are hung upon the buttcatcher's utility belt emblazoned with his motto: "BE BOLD, BE BRAVE, BE FREE". A tall order when confronting an apocalyptic insurrection of butts.

Answer: A tennis racket

From instinct, Zack repels the first attack with a swat of his racket. When two more butts initiate a double-pronged attack, Zack ducks and lets them collide, annihilating each other. However, when the entire squadron of butts (a cluster butt, as Griffiths puts it) sets upon him, he has no choice but to seek cover in a storm drain.

Answer: Prince, Leader of Butt Intelligence

Of course, Prince and his cohort think Zack is a buttcatcher. They threaten the hero with the most feared weapon in their arsenal: a match. As Griffiths writes, "Butts and matches [are] a bad combination."

In the original Australian edition, the word "bum" is used 1,243 times. Since the novel only contains about 50,000 words, this term for posterior accounts for over 2% of the book. I did not count, but "butt" probably occupies a similar proportion of the United States version.

Answer: Eleanor

Using a gun that fires, in succession, tacks, staples, and the feared rusty nails, Eleanor repels the butts holding Zack. Their relationship does not get off to a good start, however, as Eleanor berates him for ignoring the butt siren and openly disdains any civilian who is out on the streets during a butt curfew. (This is, to get back to reality just a bit, quite reminiscent of survival tactics during the second World War when air raids were rife in Britain and continental Europe.

They were also hotly anticipated in the United States, where cities would be blacked out and sirens sounded in drills for the air raids that, thankfully, never came.)