For a book about comedy, Comic Relief is remarkably dry. And "dry" is putting it nicely.
Maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe this is my fault. I had hoped to be laughing to the point of tears, reading about different ways to evoke laughter and what people find funny, viewing examples and reading jokes. Instead, I find myself falling asleep after two pages of Morreall's saga. You'd think that a man who has spent his life researching humor would add a little comedy to his book. But you'd be wrong.
The only cognitive dissonance I experienced during this read was from dashed hopes about comedy in Comic Relief.
I understand and value the theories on humor and the research Morreall has done. Educationally, I understand why this book is important and why we are reading it. Learning about Aristotle, Plato, and Hobbes' views on humor allows us to better understand comedy throughout the past 2500 years. But at what cost? I am not asking for a lot here; I'm very easy to please. A little pun every now and then or a even a simple sarcastic comment at the end of the chapter would make this book more enjoyable.
Furthermore, Morreall's favorite past time seems to be repeating himself. One could condense this book into half its size and it would still hold all the necessary information. Clearly "short and sweet" does not apply to theories of humor.
What confounds me the most, though, is how he blatantly ignores every tactic of evoking humor. Morreall goes on for pages and pages about how to make someone laugh, but he fails to give it a whirl himself. I'd love to see him attempt to be a eutrapelos and utilize bons mots or flyting. But alas, Morreall is content with researching and reporting on humor as opposed to trying it out himself.
Humor plays an invaluable role in my life. I approach every situation as a new opportunity to laugh and use comedy to cheer up, simmer down, distract, and entertain my friends and myself. I will laugh at just about anything, often at inappropriate times (sorry, social norms). But you know one thing that makes jokes un-funny? Dissecting them down to the bone and explaining why you should be laughing. I remain extremely uninterested in exactly what aspect of the joke makes me laugh; all I know is the joke is funny. And I think we should leave it at that.
I have hopes and dreams. But I have let any positive expectations about Comic Relief fall by the wayside. Maybe I have become too pessimistic about Morreall's well-researched report, maybe too cynical in my old age (I recently turned 20). But I am now asking, begging, even, to be proven wrong.
In conclusion, I think I will help Morreall in his eternal quest to answer the question "what's funny?". Not this book.
I find this post to be terribly accurate. Hannah makes so many sarcastic remarks throughout her post, which is one type of humor that will inevitably make me laugh in almost any situation. Morreall, on the other hand, objectively talks about humor as if it is rocket science. But the fact of the matter is, my friends and I do not spend lengthy periods of time planning ways to manifest humorous techniques into normal conversations to prove that we are funny. We simply say that witty comment or walk that line of what is or is not appropriate. I can hardly think of a time when something truly hilarious that I said was premeditated. Instead, most of the humor I experience is in the moment. Humor, comedy, and laughing is something that comes too naturally too break down historically. I can not investigate it as if I am an archeologist, digging up an ancient civilization. Just as one naturally feels uneasy making light of a serious situation, so I feel uneasy turning something as light and prevalent as humor into a serious, academic pursuit.
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