Sex, Sex and More Sex
If theme is the word for what a book is about, then there is no question that the theme of My Uncle Oswald is sex. Every page is steeped in sexuality. Sex is the driving force of Oswald’s life and it is also the driving force behind Yasmin Howcomely’s pursuit of wealth. Oswald considers himself the kind of prodigious lover that Casanova fantasizes about being while many pages are devoted to Yasmin’s multiple sexual conquests. The whole point of all this sexuality seems ultimately to be that Oswald considers everything else that makes up living something of a joke so why not devote one’s life to something which brings pleasure?
Eugenics
Eugenics is a pseudo-science briefly embraced by people smart enough to know better around the turn of the 20th century and then later adopted as a fundamental scientific principle of their ideology by Nazi leaders too stupid to know better. Essentially, it proposes the concept of manipulating so-called “genetic purity” to create a superior race while damning “inferior” races to extinction. One of themes of this book is a wholesale brilliantly vicious satire of the essential stupidity of the entire idea of eugenics as played out in the book’s “plot” to create a sperm bank made up entirely of men considered geniuses.
Historical Pastiche
The book is populated by a number of famous historical figures who actually play a rather substantial role, many of whom have at least one big scene. Although for the most part these characters remain true to biographical facts: Marcel Proust remains a homosexual despite being targeted for his sperm by Yasmin. At the same time, however, there is also an element of parody and satire in their appearances; for instance, the deep German accent with which Sigmund Freud speaks when psychoanalyzing Yasmin.
