Humor

A man walks into a bar with a chunk of asphalt under his arm. He says to the bartender: "I'll have one drink for me and one for the road."

Here is today's story, straight from my source: Uncle Bouqui and Little Malice. What really struck me about it was how funny it was. It takes a lot, I think, for something written in a book to be really funny, especially when that thing was originally told as a story. I'm sure someone telling the story of Uncle Bouqui and Little Malice well could have his audience rolling with laughter pretty much the whole time. It's a very special gift, this particular aspect of good storytelling, and it's one I'd really like to nurture in myself.

I was riding home with some friends tonight from a very somber play (Sleep No More if your interested - in a league of its own regarding storytelling), and we spent most of the time telling each other really terrible jokes. Sure, we were all exhausted, so that helped, but a lot of the fun of it came from how we were telling them. A stupid joke told poorly is no fun. A stupid joke told well is hilarious, or at least worth a groan, even if the audience has heard it thousands of times before. I was reminded of a kind of Japanese theater called Rakugo that seems to work on the same principle. Unfortunately English examples of it are sparse, but what I've seen of it suggests that it's all in the storytelling. The performers use a very few props, and act out different characters in silly ways, all leading up to one very simple, often predictable punchline, but it's hysterical if done well.

My drawing professor is asking us to examine the role that humor can play in our work this week, so I think I'll be focusing on it for a little while here as well. It feels a bit strange to be taking on this topic when, I'll admit, I haven't been very happy lately. Yes, plenty is going well for me, and I'm very very grateful to be surrounded by people I love, but there's been a lot of bad news in my life lately, for myself and people I care deeply about. That being said, I've always been of the opinion that a good sense of humor has its place in even the most dire of times, or when dealing with difficult subjects, and maybe even especially then. Some people insist that there are some things that shouldn't ever be the subjects of jokes, and I respect that opinion, but on the other hand I would insist that humor is often the healthiest way to deal with unfortunate but inevitable truths. If something makes me uncomfortable or, frankly, scares the hell out of me, I joke about it. I make fun of it. It takes away the power of a fear and makes me feel in control and less confined by what scares me.