The Art of Comedy WritingJust as a distinctive literary voice or style is marked by the ease with which it can be parodied, so too can specific aspects of humor be unique. Playwrights, television writers, novelists, cartoonists, and film scriptwriters use many special technical devices to create humor. Just as dramatic writers and novelists use specific devices to craft their work, creators of humorous materials from the ancient Greeks to today's stand-up comics have continued to use certain techniques in order to generate humor. In The Art of Comedy Writing, Arthur Asa Berger argues that there are a relatively limited number of techniques forty-five in all that humorists employ. Elaborating upon his prior, in-depth study of humor, An Anatomy of Humor, in which Berger provides a content analysis of humor in all forms joke books, plays, comic books, novels, short stories, comic verse, and essaysThe Art of Comedy Writing goes further. Berger groups each technique into four basic categories: humor involving identity such as burlesque, caricature, mimicry, and stereotype; humor involving logic such as analogy, comparison, and reversal; humor involving language such as puns, wordplay, sarcasm, and satire; and finally, chase, slapstick, and speed, or humor involving action. Berger claims that if you want to know how writers or comedians create humor study and analysis of their humorous works can be immensely insightful. This book is a unique analytical offering for those interested in humor. It provides writers and critics with a sizable repertoire of techniques for use in their own future comic creations. As such, this book will be of interest to people inspired by humor and the creative process professionals in the comedy field and students of creative writing, comedy, literary humor, communications, broadcast/media, and the humanities. |
From inside the book
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... example, you can use the techniques to see how Shakespeare evolved as a comedy writer—or Neil Simon, or whoever strikes your fancy. You can use the list offorty-five techniques for sociological investigations of what kind of humor ...
... examples of how various playwrights have used these techniques. I make use of material from many playwrights—Plautus, William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Oscar Wilde, Samuel Beckett, Tom Stoppard, Trevor Griffiths, and Eugene Ionesco. In ...
... example of a humorous technique, “theme and variation.”) Writers may use a number of different styles depending upon what they are writing and who their audience is. You don't use the same style when you are writing to a loved one that ...
... examples. I would argue that the choice an author makes of the techniques and the way an author uses them allow us to define an author's style with much more precision than was possible before. In the second part of the book I discuss ...
... example, are not funny—except in a play frame where make-believe, fantasy and imagination are part of the situation. 7. I have taken my examples from dramatic comedies of all kinds, but each example is somewhat decontextualized. I have ...
Contents
1 | |
Miles Gloriosus | 51 |
Twelfth Night | 65 |
The School for Scandal | 83 |
The Bald Soprano | 97 |
6 Beyond Devices | 111 |
Bibliography | 119 |
Name Index | 123 |
Subject Index | 125 |