Comedy Techniques in Writing

Why do people laugh?

• Incongruity or Non sequitur. Humans are rational (supposedly) and laugh at anything that breaks a pattern or does not logically follow.
• Farce or physical humor (often pratfalls, slapstick, hurting people, etc.) What doesn't kill us makes us laugh.
• Superiority vs. inferiority (we laugh at those weaker or in a worse situation than us)
• Mistaken identity (using aspects of feeling superior or inferior, when the true identity of a character is revealed, this also includes surprise--so we laugh)
• Absurdity (if it doesn't make sense, and we are logical people, we laugh)
• Surprise: humans may laugh when startled to release adrenaline. It's part of our monkey brain.

How can writers use these techniques in their writing? Like everything else, choice allows us to skillfully craft our work for a desired effect. You may want to try a few of these techniques in addition to the ones listed above:

Hyperbole: an exaggeration
Understatement: Often used at the end of a paragraph or idea, an understatement reverses the importance of the subject matter.

• Selections from the Allen Notebooks & The Early Essays: Both these essays parody the publishing industry’s love affair with memoir, creative non-fiction, and publishing a well-known author’s private writings after they have died. Hence, the humor of these weird insights into the famous “Woody Allen” journals. Traditionally, creative essay form always used the same form: the word “ON” and then the subject of the essay.
• Examining Psychic Phenomena: The supernatural is always a good subject to parody. In this case, a review of a newly published “non-fiction” book on Psychic Phenomena. Look up Psychic Phenomena on the internet to see the sort of thing Allen is parodying.
• The Guide to Some of the Lesser Ballets: When you attend an opera or ballet, inside your program you often get the story synopsis. Since opera is usually in another language, and ballet is hard to follow if you don’t know the story, these sorts of program notes are helpful in interpreting the performance. Allen, of course, is poking fun.

In the lab: Try writing something funny using the techniques described above. You can combine many of these elements to make your writing funnier.

HOMEWORK: Begin to prepare your fiction portfolio. Read the stories: "The Scrolls", "Lovborg's Women Considered", and "The Whore of Mensa" (pages 24-41). As you read identify comic elements in the stories. See post above for more details and notes. (see post below)