History Literature / TheOnionBookOfKnownKnowledge

* ILoveTheDead: PaulNewman could get any woman he wants, despite being dead.

* CaptainObvious: LudwigVanBeethoven would've had an easier time writing music had he not gone deaf.

** The entry on UsefulNotes/WilliamHowardTaft is the only bio that is completely normal [[spoiler: until the end mentions [[NeverLiveItDown how fat he was.]]]]

* NeverLiveItDown[[invoked]]:
** [[DefiedTrope Defied]] with UsefulNotes/CatherineTheGreat.
---> “She died of a stroke. Now move on to the next entry.”
** [[LampshadedTrope Lampshaded]] with UsefulNotes/TheodoreRoosevelt.
---> ”[He] deserves to be remembered for so much more than just the famous story of how he was shot before a campaign speech and delivered it with the bullet lodged in his chest, but you know what, too bad, because we’re going with the bullet thing.
** [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed]] with Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo, which despite being the time the great general was defeated, is the part of him most everyone knows.
---> “The problem—and it’s endemic to all of modern society—is that we’ve become so quick to find the flaws in others that we are virtually incapable of putting our petty jealousies aside and giving people the credit they deserve.”

** The book starts insulting the reader right from the second sentence,

** Zweibel says this of Onion readers

** The Harry Potter series has netted JKRowling more than more than $32,500.

* ShootTheShaggyDog: Thescholars who died gathering information on their entry—and many hundreds did—were within 48 hours replaced with a new academic who was forced to start entirely from scratch.

* TheCaligula: UsefulNotes/JamesBuchanan's spent his entire presidency holding monumental orgies and/or bloody gladiator combats.

* {{Filler}}: The bottom of the page for the entries starting with x admits few words in the english language start with x, so it put a bunch of x’s to fill the empty space.

* IronicHell: OsamaBinLaden is in a dimension of hell where he's the sole mail-room clerk in the still-standing World Trade Center.

* AltumVidetur: The definition of Lorem Ipsum is in Latin.

** The [[http://i.imgur.com/ZxjZW5M.png entry for lorem ipsum]] is in [[AltumVidetur Latin]].

* BrowserNarcotic[[invoked]]: {{Youtube}} is a device that can transfer users hours into the future without consciously experiencing or being aware of the intervening period.

* SpellBook: TheBible is full of spells such as re-animating the dead or cursing an enemy.

* NukeEm: UsefulNotes/HarryTruman used the nuke option as often as he could after using it during WorldWarII.

* IThoughtItMeant: Manpower Inc. is ''not'' a male escort service.

** The [[http://i.imgur.com/QnWJWxP.png entry for Cthulhu]] is in [[CthulhuMythos r'lyehian]].
* BlackSpeech: The entry for Cthulhu is in r'lyehian, an evil language from the CthulhuMythos.

* TrueArtIsIncomprehensible[[invoked]]: Yoko Ono’s bizarre art was so good, TheBeatles broke up due to imtimidation.

* WardrobeMalfunction: [[ImpliedTrope Implied]]. Nipples have the ability to temporarily reignite an actress’s career.

** [[DefiedTrope Defied]] with CatherineTheGreat.

** [[LampshadedTrope Lampshaded]] with TheodoreRoosevelt.

* TheAce: JimmyCarter led such an impressive life, his presidency was actually the ''least'' interesting part of it.

* NukeEm: HarryTruman used the nuke option as often as he could after using it during WorldWarII.
* OddNameOut: GeorgeWBush’s nicknames included “Old Fuckup,” “Old Massive Fuckup,” “Old Huge Pile Of Fuckup,” and “Squirt.”

* AccidentalMurder: Leon Czolgosz was so excited to have his gun signed by WilliamMcKinley, [[IJustShotMarvinInTheFace he forgot to unload his weapon and accidentally shot and killed the president]].

** The entry on WilliamHowardTaft is the only bio that is completely normal [[spoiler: until the end mentions [[NeverLiveItDown how fat he was.]]]]

** Leon Czolgosz was so excited to have his gun signed by WilliamMcKinley, he forgot to unload his weapon and [[AccidentalMurder accidentally shot and killed the president]].

* StealingTheCredit: ThomasEdison invented the credit-taking machine.

* AirQuotes: $142.5 million dollars were devoted to research, while another $84 million dollars were devoted to "research."

* OddNameOut: GeorgeWBush’s nicknames included “Old Fuckup,” “Old Massive Fuckup,” “Old Huge Pile Of Fuckup,” and “Squirt”.

** Under the definition for slump, the book is called “a goddamn pointless abortion of a book”.

* SpoilerTitle: In-Universe, with the book “Lord Murderson Is The Killer”.

* DrosteImage: The image for “Meta” is this.

** The preface has "A note to our Filipino readers", which is in Tagalog.
** The entry for fascism starts to define it normally, before SuddenlyShouting in Italian.
** The entry for lorem ipsum is in [[AltumVidetur Latin.]]
** The entry for Cthulhu is in [[CthulhuMythos r'lyehian]].

** Puberty is a stage in human development where fully functioning limbs sprout from the torso.

* CPRCleanPrettyReliable: [[InvertedTrope Inverted]]. CPR is a [[{{Gorn}} brutal]] process in which the user [[InsaneTrollLogic breaks bones to allow the heart and lungs more room to function, punctures holes in the throat with a screwdriver to facilitate airflow]], and other equally graphic steps.

** CPR is a brutal process in which the user [[InsaneTrollLogic breaks bones to allow the heart and lungs more room to function, punctures holes in the throat with a screwdriver to facilitate airflow]], and other equally graphic steps.

* PhlebotinumKilledTheDinosaurs: The shadow cast from a colossal azalea bush shrouded half of the planet in darkness for 2,000 years, causing the famous mass extinction event.

* TerribleArtist: The artist for the picture of the turnip is this.

* IronicHell; The entry on OsamaBinLaden says he's in a dimension of hell where he's the sole mail-room clerk in the still-standing World Trade Center.
* PuffOfLogic: One entry that reads as follows:
--> '''Duane Reade''' (b. Feb. 12, 1919): American entrepreneur and the founder of Duane Reade drug stores, who promptly evaporated into thin air upon discovering that Duane Reade pharmacy was actually named after the corner of Duane Street and Reade Street in New York, and that he did not exist.
* RunningGag:
** The narrator waxes wistful about his ex-girlfriend Caroline.
** Griping about statutory rape laws.
* StoryArc: Anders Van Braak and sonic-neural technology.
* TakeThatAudience: The introduction makes it clear that ''The Onion'' isn't kidding with its motto, "Tu Stultus Es." (Latin for "You are dumb.")

* CompleteMonster: T. Herman Zweibel, in case it wasn't already clear.

* RunningGag: The narrator waxes wistful about his ex-girlfriend Caroline.