A foreword is a (usually short) piece of writing, sometimes placed at the beginning of a book or other piece of literature . Typically written by someone other than the primary author of the work, it often tells of some interaction between the writer of the foreword and the book's primary author or the story the book tells. Later editions of a book sometimes have a new foreword prepended (appearing before an older foreword if there was one), which might explain in what respects that edition differs from previous ones.
50-474: The Book of General Ignorance is the first in a series of books based on the final round in the intellectual British panel game QI , written by series-creator John Lloyd and head-researcher John Mitchinson , to help spread the QI philosophy of curiosity to the reading public. It is a trivia book, aiming to address and address many of the misconceptions, mistakes and misunderstandings in 'common knowledge'—it
100-467: A Clue since 1972, The News Quiz since 1977, My Word! from 1956 to 1988, and My Music from 1967 to 1994. The British version of What's My Line? may have been the first television panel show in the UK, with an original run from 1951 to 1963 and several remakes in later years. The word game Call My Bluff aired from 1965 to 2005, the charades show Give Us a Clue ran from 1979 to 1992, and
150-513: A Secret and To Tell the Truth . At times, they were among the top ten shows on U.S. television, and they continue to experience occasional revivals . All three Goodson-Todman primetime shows were cancelled by CBS in 1967 amid ratings declines and trouble attracting younger viewers, although the programs were consistently profitable by being among the cheapest television shows to produce. Their cancellations came as attention to demographics and
200-465: A Secret is about secrets ; To Tell the Truth , Would I Lie to You? and The Unbelievable Truth deal with lies ; and It Pays to Be Ignorant and I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue are parodies . Some panel shows are variations of classic parlor games. Twenty Questions is based on the parlor game of the same name, Give Us a Clue is modelled after charades , and Call My Bluff and Balderdash are based on fictionary . Frequently,
250-546: A charades show on NHK General TV from 1953 to 1968; and 私の秘密 ("My Secret"), based on I've Got a Secret on NHK General TV from 1956 to 1967. Currently, a wide variety of Japanese variety shows are popular, and many of them feature owarai comedians, Japanese idols , and other celebrities playing games. Some games involve bizarre physical stunts. Brain Wall , adapted in English-speaking countries as Hole in
300-515: A focus on younger viewers gained currency among advertisers. The departures of these three New York–based shows were also part of a mass migration of television production to Los Angeles, leaving only one primetime show produced on the East Coast. Later years saw several successes in the format, with Match Game ; The Hollywood Squares ; Win, Lose or Draw ; Celebrity Sweepstakes ; Password and Pyramid primarily running in
350-951: A linguistic game on ORTF and TF1 from 1969 to 1981; L'Académie des neuf ("The Academy of Nine"), based on Hollywood Squares on Antenne 2 from 1982 to 1987; Cluedo , based on the board game Cluedo/Clue on France 3 from 1994 to 1995; Burger Quiz on Canal + from 2001 to 2002; Incroyables Expériences ("Incredible Experiences"), about scientific experiments on France 2 and France 3 from 2008 to 2012; and Canapé quiz ("Sofa Quiz"), an adaptation of Hollywood Game Night on TMC in 2014. German panel shows include 7 Tage, 7 Köpfe ("7 Days, 7 Heads"), Genial daneben ("Idiot Savant"), Kopfball ("Headball"), Die Montagsmaler ("Pictionary"), Noch Besserwissen ("Even Better Knowledge"), Pssst … (similar to I've Got A Secret ), Die Pyramide (the German version of Pyramid ), Quizfire , Sag die Wahrheit ("Tell
400-576: A local French language adaptation of Taskmaster . In 2014, Super Channel ordered 36 episodes of a panel show called Too Much Information . A revival of Match Game aired on The Comedy Network from 2012 to 2014, the news quiz Front Page Challenge aired on CBC Television from 1957 to 1995, and the charades show Party Game aired in syndication from 1970 to 1981. French panel shows include Vendredi tout est permis ("Friday, Everything Goes"), an improv game on TF1 since 2011. Earlier panel shows include Le Francophonissime ,
450-462: A loose adaptation of BBC Radio 4 's The News Quiz . HIGNFY , as the show is sometimes known, began airing in 1990, and has been the most-viewed show of the night, regularly attracting as much as a 20% audience share . The show's success grew after its transfer from BBC Two to the flagship BBC One in 2000. After HIGNFY' s success, panel shows proliferated on British TV. Notable example include QI on various BBC channels since 2003, Mock
500-522: A panel of celebrities, largely writers and intellectuals, but also actors and politicians. Listeners would mail in questions, winning prizes for stumping the panel. U.S. panel shows transferred to television early in the medium's history, with the first known example being Play the Game , a charades show that aired on DuMont and ABC beginning in 1946. The celebrity charades concept has been replicated numerous times since then. The most popular adaptation
550-479: A panel show features recurring panelists or permanent team captains, and some panelists appear on multiple panel shows. Most shows are recorded before a studio audience. The first known example of a panel show in the world is the radio program Information Please , which debuted on 17 May 1938 on the NBC Blue Network . An evolution of the quiz show format, Information Please added the key element of
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#1732798039598600-455: A semi-annual celebrity quiz. There are many other games featuring celebrities within Japan's variety genre. Prime Minister Ōta is a show featuring many comedians and politicians debating fictional proposals in a sort of game show version of a legislative chamber. Foreword When written by the author, the foreword may cover the story of how the book came into being or how the idea for
650-646: A theme topic beginning with the Series' initial letter (each Series is alphabetically structured, with Series 5 being "E", etc.), "General Ignorance" contains questions on a range of diverse subjects, linked only by common misunderstanding. Occasionally the round differs, in particular during the Christmas specials. During the course of the "B" Series special, Fry and Davies swapped places for "General Ignorance", with Fry attempting to answer questions ostensibly written by Davies to stump him. During "D"s Christmas Special, all
700-477: Is Play the Game , a charades show in 1946. The modern trend of comedy panel shows can find early roots with Stop Me If You've Heard This One in 1939 and Can You Top This? in 1940. While panel shows were more popular in the past in the U.S., they are still very common in the United Kingdom . While many early panel shows stuck to the traditional quiz show format in which celebrities tried to get
750-435: Is already the amusing trivia success of the season," containing many "eye-watering" and "eyebrow-raising" facts, even if he thinks it a little smug. Both the "question and answer" format and indexing issues were addressed for the follow-up The Book of Animal Ignorance , which had an alphabetised structure (with contents page), and stand-alone facts, rather than responses. A "Pocket edition" of The Book of General Ignorance
800-539: Is no index. It's not possible to look up a subject about which you are ignorant". Marcus Berkmann drew attention to the over-abundance of similarly themed books (to which the QI title—and series—clearly owe a certain debt), commenting that: A book of the show has become all but necessary, if only to allow us to ingest this information at normal brain speed, and because such fine and creative research genuinely deserves to be captured in print. So it's slightly disappointing that
850-768: Is therefore known not as a 'General Knowledge' book, but as 'General Ignorance ' . As well as correcting these "all-too-common" mistakes, the book(s) attempt to explain how the errors have been perpetuated, and why people believe incorrect 'facts' to be true. First published by Faber and Faber in Britain on 19 October 2006, The Book of General Ignorance was published in the United States (on 7 August 2007 by Harmony Books ), in France as Les autruches ne mettent pas la tête dans le sable: 200 bonnes raisons de renoncer à nos certitudes (on 3 October 2007 by Dunod ) and in
900-473: The Los Angeles Times , Monsters and Critics , USA Today , Seattle Times , Chicago Sun-Times and Seattle Post-Intelligencer . However, some reviews were critical; Kirsten Garrett suggested in her review that, The Book of General Ignorance "is in danger of being too smart for its own good. In fact, a bit smart-arse." She also noted that "It's a disgrace that in a book of this kind there
950-408: The "GI" questions revolved around saints . The Book of General Ignorance contains a list of 230 questions, most of which previously appeared in episodes of QI . Each question explains the correct answer, and usually attempts to show why people tend to make the wrong assumptions, or believe certain myths. Each book contains two forewords , one by Fry, the other by Davies. Davies' initial "foreword"
1000-466: The Horn as part of its daytime block of sports news and discussion shows. While presented as being a roundtable debate show , the series does contain some game show-like elements; the panel of sports journalists earn points from the host based on the strength of their points and arguments in specific topics (and may also mute panelists, if needed), with the lowest scorers eliminated at points throughout
1050-461: The Netherlands as Het grote boek van foute feiten (on 1 November 2007 by Uitgeverij Forum). A surprise Christmas 2006 best-seller in the UK, the book became " Amazon 's number one Global bestseller for Christmas 2006." By the end of January 2007 it had sold more than 300,000 copies, and later passed half a million. Unexpectedly high sales led to a sequel and an annual . In the United States
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#17327980395981100-552: The Truth", the German version of To Tell the Truth ), Typisch Frau – Typisch Mann ("Typical Woman – Typical Man"), Was bin ich? ("What am I?", the German version of What's My Line? ) and Was denkt Deutschland? ("What Does Germany Think?"). Early Japanese panel shows include 話の泉 ("Source of the Story"), based on Information Please on NHK Radio 1 from 1946 to 1964; 二十の扉 ("Twenty Doors"), based on Twenty Questions on NHK Radio 1 from 1947 to 1960; ジェスチャー ("Gestures"),
1150-753: The United Kingdom, where they have found continued success since the BBC adapted its first radio panel shows from classic parlor games. Perhaps the earliest UK panel show is the BBC radio adaptation of Twenty Questions , which debuted on 28 February 1947. Panel shows can have decades-long runs in the UK: Twenty Questions lasted until 1976, while Just a Minute has remained on the air, and had Nicholas Parsons as host from 1967 until 2019. Other long-running games on radio include I'm Sorry I Haven't
1200-491: The Wall , has comedians attempt to jump through oddly shaped holes in moving walls without falling into water, DERO and its successor TORE have celebrities solve mental and physical challenges to escape traps and hazards or presumably die trying, VS Arashi has a team of celebrities compete against J-pop group Arashi and their Plus One guest(s) in physical games, Nep League has various celebrity teams competing in various quizzes that test their combined brainpower in
1250-915: The Week on BBC Two from 2005 to 2022, 8 Out of 10 Cats on Channel 4 since 2005, Would I Lie to You? on BBC One since 2007, and the annual special, The Big Fat Quiz of the Year on Channel 4 since 2004. On the radio, The News Quiz , Just a Minute , I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue and The Unbelievable Truth are among the most popular and long-running panel shows, all of which air on BBC Radio 4. British comedy panel shows feature mainly male guests. A 2016 study that analysed 4,700 episodes from 1967 to 2016 found that 1,488 of them had an all-male lineup, and only one an all-female cast. The proportion of women rose from 3% in 1989 to 31% in 2016. Australian panel shows include advertising-focused The Gruen Transfer and its various spinoffs on ABC1 since 2008,
1300-533: The Week . 8 Out of 10 Cats is based on opinion polling ; What's My Line? is about occupations ; Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Face the Music center on music ; A League of Their Own , A Question of Sport and They Think It's All Over are sports -themed; Was It Something I Said? , Quote... Unquote and Who Said That? feature quotations ; My Word! involves wordplay ; I've Got
1350-522: The book arrives in the question-and-answer format made so familiar by last year's big hit Does Anything Eat Wasps? There are actually about 20 such books out this year, all asking these quirky questions (Do Sheep Shrink in the Rain? Do Fish Drink Water?), all piled up in Waterstones , making book-buyers feel a bit depressed. Berkman's complaints, however, are countered by his admission that "this book
1400-788: The book received good reviews from both Publishers Weekly , and the New York Times , who recommended it in their "Books Holiday Gift Guide". It has a different cover (above ) to the UK edition, downplaying links with the QI TV series which had not been shown in North America. The book remained in the top 15 places on the New York Times Best Seller list for "Hardcover Advice" books from 9 December 2007 to 13 January 2008. The title "General Ignorance", chosen both to emulate and parody general knowledge quizzes,
1450-466: The book was developed, and may include thanks and acknowledgments to people who were helpful to the author during the time of writing. Unlike a preface , a foreword is always signed. Information essential to the main text is generally placed in a set of explanatory notes, or perhaps in an introduction , rather than in the foreword or like preface. The pages containing the foreword and preface (and other front matter) are typically not numbered as part of
1500-408: The celebrity guests buzzing in to earn points from the host for punchlines and responses in various segments. In 2024, a reboot of the show, now titled After Midnight and hosted by Taylor Tomlinson , premiered on CBS . The streaming service Dropout has received attention for many of its shows' similarities to panel shows, notably Game Changer . Panel shows are particularly popular in
1550-479: The concept of penalising answers that were overly predictable, especially obvious jokes: one such question in the pilot was, "What is the sixth most popular name for a baby boy in Germany?" The answer to the question is, in fact, "Tim". However, QI's regular panellist Alan Davies answered with the jokey suggestion " Adolph ", allowing host Stephen Fry to produce a prepared piece of card reading "Adolph," whereupon
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1600-401: The daytime and airing in their greatest numbers during the '70s and '80s. These panel shows marked a shift in the format: whereas CBS' primetime shows had panelists guessing secrets about the guests, these new shows largely featured civilian contestants playing games with celebrity partners, or competing to either predict how the panelists will respond to a prompt or question, or determine whether
1650-431: The fields of Japanese, English, General Knowledge, Etc., and AKBingo! similarly features members of pop group AKB48 and others competing in physical challenges and quizzes. Other shows include 日本語探Qバラエティ クイズ!それマジ!?ニッポン ("Is it really!?"), a celebrity word game; くりぃむクイズ ミラクル9 ("Miracle 9"), a show somewhat similar to Hollywood Squares; Numer0n , a celebrity numbers game; and オールスター感謝祭 ("All Star Thanksgiving"),
1700-413: The improv game Whose Line Is It Anyway? aired from 1988 to 1998. Current British panel shows have become showcases for the nation's top stand-up and improv comedians, as well as career-making opportunities for new comedians. Regular comics on panel shows often go on to star in sitcoms and other TV shows. The modern British panel show format of TV comedy quizzes started with Have I Got News for You ,
1750-576: The introduction, "Welcome to Whose Line Is It Anyway , the show where everything's made up and the points don't matter." QI ' s opaque scoring system is purportedly a mystery even to its creator, I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue dispenses with points altogether, and many other shows mention points only occasionally or at the end, instead of continuously displaying scores in front of players. Panel shows can have any number of themes. Many are topical and satirical , such as Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! , Have I Got News for You , The News Quiz and Mock
1800-409: The main work, which usually uses Arabic numerals . If the front matter is paginated, it uses lowercase Roman numerals . If there is both a foreword and a preface, the foreword appears first; both appear before the introduction, which may be paginated either with the front matter or the main text. The word foreword was first used around the mid-17th century, originally as a term in philology . It
1850-498: The maximum five stars for the Librarian Book Review at TeensPoint.org, writing: This book is just fun to read, alone or with your spouse or friends. And it broadens your horizon. Even if you don't plan on attending a trivia-gameshow anytime soon, your newly acquired knowledge will be beneficial when the need for smalltalk arises. The book was favourably reviewed in other places, among them such American newspapers as
1900-538: The music quiz Spicks and Specks on ABC1 from 2005 to 2011 and again since 2014, news quiz Have You Been Paying Attention? on Network Ten since 2013, and tabloid quiz Dirty Laundry Live on ABC1 and ABC2 since 2013. News quiz Good News Week aired on ABC1 from 1996 to 1998 and on Network Ten from 1999-2000 and again from 2008 to 2012, sports quiz A League of Their Own aired on Network Ten in 2013, and pop culture quiz Tractor Monkeys aired on ABC1 in 2013. Currently running New Zealand panel shows include
1950-415: The news quiz 7 Days since 2009, Have You Been Paying Attention? New Zealand since 2019, Taskmaster New Zealand since 2020, and Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont-Spelling Bee since 2023. CBC Radio One currently broadcasts two long-running radio panel shows: The Debaters , which debuted in 2006, and Because News , which debuted in 2015. In 2022, Noovo began broadcasting Le maître du jeu ,
2000-500: The obvious-but-inaccurate answer was revealed to carry a penalty score of −10 points. When the pilot was shown to the then-controller of BBC Two ( Jane Root ), it was this feature that particularly caught her attention, and penalties remained a regular feature throughout the first nine series of the programme. Due to the nature of the questions in the final round, however, the majority of penalties would always be awarded during "General Ignorance". While most episodes are structured around
2050-481: The panelist answered a question correctly. Later, Nickelodeon premiered the youth-oriented panel game Figure it Out in 1997, the American version of Whose Line Is It Anyway? had a primetime run from 1998 to 2004 on ABC and a revival in 2013 by The CW , while Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! has become a popular weekend show on NPR since 1998. Since 2002, the sports channel ESPN has broadcast Around
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2100-467: The rhetorical question of interested parties—"In the Information Age, can you afford to remain ignorant of these precious factoids?" Doug Brown reviewed the book for Powell's Books, noting that it has a "UK-heavy emphasis", and that "Overall The Book of General Ignorance is a lot of fun, and you're guaranteed to learn something you didn't know (but thought you did)." Aileen Marshall rates it with
2150-412: The right answers and win, the primary goal of modern panel shows is to entertain the audience with comedy, with the game or quiz structure providing subjects for the comedians to joke about. Panel shows also feature comedic banter, friendly ribbing and camaraderie among the panelists. Scoring is often deemphasised in panel shows. The American version of Whose Line Is It Anyway? acknowledged this with
2200-421: The show, a list of all the episodes made at the time, an index , and a new collection of "Four words" from Davies. On 1 November 2007 another QI spin-off title was produced: The QI annual , intended as a continuing work focusing on the Series' alphabetic themes. The annual featured contributions from most of "QI"s guest panellists and the comedian Rowan Atkinson . In 2010 the second book of General Ignorance
2250-413: The show. The winner receives 30 seconds at the end of the show to discuss any topic unopposed. In 2015, ABC announced primetime revivals for Match Game , which ran from 2016 until 2021, and To Tell the Truth , which ran from 2016 to 2022. From 2013 to 2017, Comedy Central aired @midnight , an internet culture and social media -themed panel game which used a more quiz show-styled presentation—with
2300-488: Was Pantomime Quiz , airing from 1947 to 1959, and having runs on each of the four television networks operating at the time. Other charades shows have included Stump the Stars ; Movietown, RSVP ; Celebrity Charades ; Showoffs and Body Language . TV panel shows saw their peak of popularity in the 1950s and '60s, when CBS ran the three longest-running panel shows in prime time : What's My Line? , I've Got
2350-475: Was credited as "Four words," which read simply: "Will this do, Stephen?" Response to the book has been mostly positive, both critically and commercially. Critic Jennifer Kay said, " The Book of General Ignorance won't make you feel dumb. It's really a call to be more curious." Liesl Schillinger in The New York Times praised the book for gathering "so much repeatable wisdom […] in one place," asking
2400-566: Was first used to describe the final round of the panel game QI , which was created by Lloyd and had Mitchinson as head researcher. Appearing initially in the unbroadcast pilot (subsequently available on DVD), the round has varied little in content and style since, although the questions became slightly more obtuse. From the start the round consisted of several deliberately misleading questions which appear to have obvious answers that are actually inaccurate (for example, aircraft black boxes are in fact orange, for visibility.) The pilot also introduced
2450-504: Was published on 3 April 2008. A second book in the series, The Book of Animal Ignorance , was released in the UK a year after The Book of General Ignorance , on 4 October 2007. An audiobook adaptation called The Sound of General Ignorance was scripted and read by the authors on 4 November 2008. On 25 December 2008 an extended version of the book, entitled The Noticeably Stouter Edition , was published to coincide with QI moving to BBC One . This new version included new facts, quotes from
2500-509: Was released. Panel game A panel show or panel game is a radio or television game show in which a panel of celebrities participate. Celebrity panelists may compete with each other, such as on The News Quiz ; facilitate play by non-celebrity contestants, such as on Match Game and Blankety Blank ; or do both, such as on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me . The genre can be traced to 1938, when Information Please debuted on U.S. radio. The earliest known television panel show
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