It's early evening. The family races home from its daily pursuits: Bart and Lisa from school, on skateboard and bike respectively; Homer in his car from his job at the nuclear plant; Marge in her car with baby Maggie from the supermarket. They all arrive at precisely the same time, and make a dash for the living-room sofa, all five hitting it at precisely the same moment. It's a little crowded, but they slump there, watching a television set that has magically turned itself on, or perhaps is never turned off. This is The Simpsons, a show on TV and all about TV. What are they watching? The real-life show of us watching them maybe. They are just a typical cartoon family, amazed or stupefied, drugged anyway, by the programmed antics of humans. Or they are watching their own world's version of The Simpsons, an endlessly recurring comic dream of what their compatriots imagine a family, a town and a country to be.

LRB 16 August 2007 | PDF Download