Gallows humor is a survival skill for Dilbert and his coworkers in the series that makes “the dronelike world of Kafka seem congenial” ( The New York Times ).

Why is Dilbert such a phenomenon? People see their own dreary, monotonous lives brought to comedic life in the ubiquitous strip. In the twenty-third collection of Scott Adams’ tremendously popular series, Don’t Stand Where the Comet Is Assumed to Strike Oil , suppressed and repressed workers everywhere can follow the latest developments in the so-called careers of Dilbert, power-hungry Dogbert, Catbert, Ratbert, the pointy-haired boss, and other supporting—but don’t you dare call them supportive—characters. Each “funny because it’s true” scenario bears an uncanny, hysterical, and sometimes uncomfortable similarity to cubicle-filled corporate America.

“Once every decade, America is gifted with an angst-ridden anti-hero, a Nietzschean nebbish, an us-against-the-universe everyperson around whom our insecurities collect like iron shavings to a magnet. Charlie Chaplin. Dagwood Bumstead. Charlie Brown. Cathy. Now, Dilbert.” — The Miami Herald