Eat, Drink and Be Merry
Monty Python got me through my finals, clowns gave me the creeps even before seeing Stephen King's 'It', and I have no memory whatsoever for jokes (well there's one, it's about a mild green hairy lipped squid and the punchline is a play on washing up with 'mild green Fairy liquid ... it's not that good). It's always interested me how widely humour varies. After growing up with shelves of Private Eye in the loos at home and Viz through college, I have a pretty robust sense of humour (is Viz is international? - Sid the Sexist, Fat Slags, Finbaar Saunders and his Double Entendres, Modern Parents - not to everyone's taste or politically correct but very funny). Maybe you've heard of 'The Aristocrats'? It is the fabled rudest joke on earth - comedians compete to come up with the most disgusting version. They made a film of it a few years ago - in isolation you could see how funny the gag was but it went on so long, and was so relentless I couldn't finish it. Timing is everything with humour - like music, it can't continue endlessly at a high pitch, it needs rhythm and pacing.
What makes you laugh? Do you use humour in your work or blog? For those of us who have been having something of a tense few months, laughter really is the best medicine (but let's ignore Robin William's 'Patch Adams' ...). When do we stop laughing so much? Children apparently laugh over 300 times a day, whereas adults manage a measly 15. I suspect parents must laugh more than that simply being around kids all day.
In film, there are great humorists like Woody Allen, and the visual humour someone like Steve Martin excels at comes to the fore, ('doing a Ruprecht' has gone down in family vocab as a polite euphemism for the baby needing a nappy change soon - that glazed, ecstatic expression). Writing fiction relies solely on wit and intelligence - your readers have to imagine the scene and physical comedy. What are the funniest passages you can think of in fiction? Sharpe? Wilde? Amis? Stand up comedy is a great way to study lean, humorous writing - over here I love Jack Dee's deadpan delivery, Eddie Izzard's surreal stream of consciousness and Billy Connolly always leaves you gasping for breath. The man I would have loved to have dinner with is Peter Cook - his wit and intelligence were elegant, graceful, whip sharp (if you were to draw wit, I think it would look like the Georgia O'Keefe sketch at the start of the post). Cook's verbal dexterity was dazzling - he didn't tell jokes in the most literal sense, but had a unique view of life. Terry Jones relates how he first saw Pete and Dud bouncing around on trampolines dressed as nuns - he said it was the most elegantly funny thing he had ever seen. 'What is the speed of darkness?' is one of my favourite Cook lines. Who wouldn't enjoy an evening with a man who thought like that?
TODAY'S PROMPT: It struck me reading around everyone's blogs last night that we are all having a bit of a tough ride at the moment - maybe it's the change of seasons, or we should all stop reading the doom'n'gloom news. Times like these, making a good stew, cracking open a bottle of wine and settling down in front of the fire with a comedy is one of the best things you can do. Maybe it's just me but there's something about chopping seasonal vegetables always makes the world seem better (perhaps this ties in with Rowena's excellent insights about feeling 'grounded' - taking care of your home and self). Why not share your favourite line or situation from a comedy, and give us all a laugh. Or perhaps think about how you can inject humour into your work if appropriate - making your reader laugh is I think like taking your date on a rollercoaster (apparently the best way to make a hit - if you're scared or laughing barriers just fall away). Great comedy takes you on a ride, makes you laugh, leaves you breathless - let's lighten up and have a good night.
