How not to… write humour

How Not To Write Humour - by Ruth Leigh

If you’re trying to write humour, there are two things you absolutely do not need.

1.    A crowbar.

2.    A sledgehammer.

These may seem odd choices to you. “Has Ruth perhaps lost her mind?” you may be wondering. “Have those long days locked away in her writing studio researching sea bathing and carriage types in Georgian times addled her feverish little brain?”

Gentle reader, they have not. As a funny writer, I spend a lot of my time not making jokes, per se, but weaving wit and humour into everyday situations in my books. I have read works pertaining to be humorous where the author has seized the tools named above and set to with a will, putting me off ever reading their output again.

Jokes are crowbarred in. There might be unrealistic dialogue to set them up, or an extremely unsubtle run-up to what is meant to be an amusing scene. This kind of technique is visible a mile off and is deeply unfunny.

Sledgehammer wit, where the writer is determined to make a joke which they find hilarious is also something to be avoided at all costs.

Let’s have a go, shall we? Give me a minute while I park my sparkling wit and delicate touch (that’s humorous, self-deprecating irony, but did you see it coming?) and assume the persona of Ms Una N Funnie (one of the Hampshire Funnies).

“Oh Bernard!” laughed Gloria, throwing back her head with its recently permed hair, dancing eyes and over-sized parrot earrings. “What shall we do with you? Stop eating that banana and join me a few feet over here by this shop selling novelty joke items.”

Bernard finished his snack, discarded the skin and cupped his hand to his ear.

“Speak up, Gloria,” he shouted over the noise of the pneumatic drills and manly banter of the builders who were digging up the road. “I can’t hear you. Since you lost all that weight and became so skinny, your voice has become much quieter.”

Gloria motioned him over and he began to walk, obediently, towards her.

All that just for a man to slip on a banana skin and fall down a manhole. I crowbarred in the word ‘skinny’ to make absolutely sure everyone remembered the banana skin, but did that make it funny? No. Bernard belongs down that hole. Gloria needs to think carefully about her fashion choices and her place in this story.

Delicate allusion will often do the trick, as will clever wordplay, extended metaphor and good characterisation. It’s hard to be professionally funny, but my advice is to read as much humour as you can and keep your ears open.

Folks, don’t slip on the banana skin of earnest endeavour and fall down the gaping manhole of clunky humour[1]. Keep it light.

 

[1] Oh look. An extended metaphor for comic purposes.

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How Not To… write dialogue

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