NONFICTION - Oct. 25, 1992

IF I HAD A HI-FI: A Cornucopia of Brand-New Palindromes That Will Get You Coming and Going, text by William Irvine, illustrated by Steve Guarnaccia (Laurel: $5.99; 128 pp.). The first one, they say, was coined in the Garden of Eden: “Madam, I’m Adam.” They’re palindromes, sentences or words that read the same backward as forward. They come short (as the First Woman’s pithy rejoinder: “Eve”), long (“I maim nine men in Saginaw; wan, I gas nine men in Miami”), very long (a 394-letter poem has been recorded) and foreign ( “Allar munum ralla”-- Icelandic for “We shall all have a wild time”). But never before have they come with pictures. Irvine’s inspired constructs and Guarnaccia’s aptly wacky drawings tickle the mind and weaken the moral fiber. How would you illustrate “Roy, am I mayor?”; “Parma ham rap”; “Tit peccadillo doll? I’d accept it”; “Rabbi bib bar,” or “Spit Q-Tips”? It’s all gloriously demented and impossible to review. Only: Wow!