Encyclopaedia Brittanica Adds Fictional Narrators

London (NBp) - The two-centuries-old Encyclopaedia Brittanica has announced the largest change to the venerable encyclopedia's format in its history.

"The recent success of Dutch has shown us that fiction can have a place in non-fiction," explained EB President Nigel Woodsworth, referring to the best-selling biography of Ronald Reagan. Dutch uses a fictional character to narrate the life of the former president of the United States.

Rather than create a new character to narrate the encyclopedia, EB has chosen to license a number of popular characters to explain each term. Each volume has a different set of characters. There is "Looney Tunes Presents Volume C", "Pokemon Reads Volume G" and "Bill & Ted's Excellent Volume U".

Here is the beginning of the new entry for Julius Caesar:

Caesar, Julius (E. Fudd) - Juwius Caesar was a vewy powewful man who wuled much of the wolld a wong time ago. I met him in 78 BC when I was out hunting wabbits in Wome.

Here is another sample:

United States Civil War - "Dude, there's like a war going on," said Bill S. Preston, Esquire.

"Whoa," said Ted Theodore Logan.

"According to my history book, that dude over there is General Custer, leader of the Confederate Army!"

"Excellent!"

Characters, including Pikachu, from the popular Pokemon narrate volume G.

The entry for the Galapagos Islands starts out:

Galapagos Islands (Pikachu) - The Galapagos Islands are a Pacific archipelago belonging to Ecuador. Pikachu recently had this to say about the islands: "Pikachu".

This bold new move by EB will doubtless increase the appeal of the encyclopedia to younger audiences.