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Why is humor such an unpopular form of literature?

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BetsyandtheFiveAvengers Since: Feb, 2011
#26: Feb 20th 2012 at 3:45:04 PM

I would also recommend Woody Allen's essay collections. His style of humor is...kind of niche, to be honest, but I love his work.

I'm not sure anyone mentioned his name, but David Sedaris is another good one.

FreezairForALimitedTime Responsible adult from Planet Claire Since: Jan, 2001
Responsible adult
#27: Feb 20th 2012 at 6:13:25 PM

Funny you mention David Sedaris, because I rediscovered him just recently. I posted a query on an online community recently looking for an essay I fondly remembered, and it ended up being part of his Santaland Diaries.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
DoktorvonEurotrash Lex et Veritas from Not a place of honour (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#28: Feb 21st 2012 at 2:31:47 AM

If you're looking for comedy that's fantasy or speculative fiction, Tom Holt and Robert Rankin are pretty good. Tom Holt's books can be a bit fluffy, but there's no faulting his sense of humour. (Maybe it's a bit too Pratchett-like for comfort, Idunno.) Robert Rankin's comedy is very different: absurd, and often (but not always) very dark. (The Dance Of The Voodoo Handbag is about as dark as it gets: the plot elements involve And I Must Scream and sexual slavery.)

edited 21st Feb '12 2:32:51 AM by DoktorvonEurotrash

YsaSlayerOfSporks Since: Jan, 2012
#29: Mar 15th 2012 at 8:01:48 PM

For me, it's because I'm not looking for humor, but with a plot, I'm looking for a good plot and something funny as a bonus. And as for the footnotes, they're a large part of the funny in The Bartimaeus Trilogy for example.

edited 15th Mar '12 8:02:08 PM by YsaSlayerOfSporks

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Journeyman Overlording the Underworld from On a throne in a vault overlooking the Wasteland Since: Nov, 2010
Overlording the Underworld
#30: Mar 15th 2012 at 8:57:01 PM

Robert Asprin. Especially the Phule series and Myth series. They're comedy to the hilt.

feotakahari Fuzzy Orange Doomsayer from Looking out at the city Since: Sep, 2009
Fuzzy Orange Doomsayer
#31: Mar 16th 2012 at 3:03:38 AM

Dare I mention Xanth? It was seriously flawed as early as book 2, and it only got worse over the years, but it was still good for a laugh or two for quite a while.

edited 16th Mar '12 3:03:48 AM by feotakahari

That's Feo . . . He's a disgusting, mysoginistic, paedophilic asshat who moonlights as a shitty writer—Something Awful
leafeon Since: Mar, 2011 Relationship Status: YOU'RE TEARING ME APART LISA
#32: Mar 13th 2013 at 9:37:24 PM

This article may answer the question [1]. I have been wondering this for years.

don’t call me nerdy [url=http://dragcave.net/view/lgru9][img][/img
Xtifr World's Toughest Milkman Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
World's Toughest Milkman
#33: Mar 15th 2013 at 8:33:40 PM

The Road to Mars by Eric Idle (!) is actually more about humor than it is a book of slapstick or anything. It's quite different, and I think, more interesting, than I expected it to be when I originally grabbed it. Nothing at all like Hitchhikers Guide (which is what I was expecting), but well worth checking out, IMO.

John Moore's Fractured Fairy Tales for Grownups are also better than I expected when I first saw them. They are rather slapstick, but they've also got a surprising amount of intelligence. I tried one, liked it, tried another, and ended up with the whole set.

Walter Jon Williams' Drake Maijstral series is an entertaining blend of Comedy of Manners and SF that I definitely recommend.

Or if you want something darker, Robert Sheckley's stuff from the sixties and seventies is definitely good dark humor. He basically invented the concept of a reality show with life at stake, back in the sixties. Those who think Hunger Games was a rip-off of...whatever it is they always call it a rip-off of...obviously haven't read Sheckley. :)

But yeah, comedy's hard, and good comedy even harder.

Speaking words of fandom: let it squee, let it squee.
Twentington Since: Apr, 2009 Relationship Status: Desperate
#34: Mar 17th 2013 at 4:20:21 PM

Big Trouble by Dave Barry is proof that his style of humor can last far longer than the length of a newspaper article.

Xtifr World's Toughest Milkman Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
World's Toughest Milkman
#35: Mar 17th 2013 at 7:24:44 PM

We do have a whole index for Comic Literature (although I suspect it's not as complete as it should be).

eta: Feel free to add stuff that's missing if you know of any... :)

edited 17th Mar '13 7:29:50 PM by Xtifr

Speaking words of fandom: let it squee, let it squee.
VincentQuill Elvenking from Dublin Since: Jan, 2013 Relationship Status: Sinking with my ship
Elvenking
#36: May 11th 2013 at 3:05:51 AM

i'm not a huge fan of comedy in general as a genre (humour shouldn't be the only purpose of a work IMO, it should balance it with plot&characterisation etc.), so in a book the characterization plotline and world building etc. is far more important than in a movie, and in a book dedicated to humor these often take a backseat. writing just isn't very suited to humour. like action, humour rarely carries well into text. it can work, but it needs... more. i've read pratchett and adams, and they were decent, but i still prefer a mediocre serious book to an excellent humourous one.

edited 11th May '13 3:15:27 AM by VincentQuill

'All shall love me and despar!'
Lightningnettle Nettle Since: Apr, 2012 Relationship Status: Shipping fictional characters
Nettle
#37: May 14th 2013 at 8:35:30 PM

A seconding of the Drake Maijstral books for funny SF. I also like Wodehouse. For simple wit Austen and Heyer both write a nice romance. Donna Andrews' mystery series starting with Murder with Peacocks is great frothy fun, and she maintains it through most of the series. I adore Pratchett, and admit to being a bit baffled that some people don't like him. If you can find them Elisa deCarlo wrote a pair of lovely books that feature a Wooster-type character as a psychic detective.

Fair warning, I also giggle madly throughout Judith Martin's various etiquette books. My sense of humor may be too childish for many. I also don't care for dark humor in the least.

TamH70 Since: Nov, 2011 Relationship Status: Faithful to 2D
#38: May 16th 2013 at 8:03:36 AM

Hmm. My favourite form of comedy literature is black comedy, mostly in a military setting. I read and sort of liked "Catch 22" by Joseph Heller, but my preference is for Sven Hassel. His war novels featuring the 27th Panzer Regiment (Penal) - that word in brackets is very important - in their picaresque adventures across most of the battlefields of the Second World War (save North Africa, the Far East and the Pacific Islands) are rammed full of moments that are bleak, brutal yet blackly hilarious. They lighten narratives that are at times completely bleak, brutal and blackly tragic.

The books may lack 100 percent historical accuracy, but since most works that are supposed to be completely historically accurate are either anything but or as boring as watching Sevco, I can live with that.

BigMadDraco Since: Mar, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#39: Sep 10th 2013 at 11:48:45 AM

Too few people do it well, coupled with the fact that most of those that can opt to write plays or screenplays instead of novels.

swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#40: Sep 10th 2013 at 12:03:44 PM

For one, humour is not made for long stories. Often humor and plot are two things which contradict themselves (take a look at the vaudeville theatre and perhaps you might get what I mean, the less you have to think about it, funnier it tends to be). It is possible to do a humorous movie, but to fill a book, you need even more of it.

And two, a lot of humour is visual. That is why reading a funny play is never the same as watching it.

and three, humour is in a way more difficult to write than drama.

WarriorEowyn from Victoria Since: Oct, 2010
#41: Sep 14th 2013 at 9:01:22 PM

I wouldn't say it's unpopular, it's just rarely the sole element of a book. The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy is humour and science fiction. Most of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books (except for the most recent ones) are fantasy combined with side-splitting humour; so is The Princess Bride. Aaron Allson's Star Wars: X-Wing books are hilarious, but they also have strong characterization and action.

edited 14th Sep '13 9:02:09 PM by WarriorEowyn

Squeakythemaster Since: Dec, 2011
#42: Sep 29th 2013 at 12:39:26 PM

I believe the primary reason is that visual are a big part of humor. That and it's very hard to right well and everybody has a different sense of it.

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