A Mostly Serious Word on Humor

How finding the funny draws us into story.

Jun 13, 2024

by Selah Bell

Although it is not my favorite book in the Narnia series, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader has one of my favorite opening lines in all of literature: “There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.” (In fact, I’m not alone, as the line recently won a vote for best opening line over on Close Reads HQ!)

It wouldn’t surprise anyone who knows me to find that given the choice between a quote that makes me laugh or one that conveys a serious truth, I would almost always choose the first. However, the two aren’t necessarily exclusive.

Ironically, we don’t seem to take comedy seriously enough. It’s something we enjoy but not always something we seek out in a book, and many authors who focus on how they can sound profound seem to end up taking themselves a little too seriously.

Most people have, at some point in their lives, read a book that was an absolute slog to get through. I’m willing to bet that few, if any, of these people would describe that book with any simile of the word “witty.” It’s not as if comedy cures all ailments in the world of stories, but it can certainly help to make a story bearable or even memorable.

Not only does a bit of comedy increase a story’s entertainment value, it has the potential to open us up to more serious messages. I don’t know anyone who would claim to like the feeling of being preached at. There is a quick way to test that claim, and I’m betting it wouldn’t hold up. Fortunately for all of us, humor can be used to soften hard lessons. Think, for example, of satire. Satire is one way, if not the only way, you can show the audience all of the flaws in society and themselves, all while they cheer you on. Satire does what a person who says “no offense” hopes to do. The difference is that satire is often effective. Laughter, then, is not just the best medicine but one of the best ways to flavor the otherwise bitter medicine we so often need.

I won’t pretend that humor is always effective, and it certainly won’t be effective for every reader. We’ve all heard offensive jokes or said, “Who’s there,” only to regret it immediately: clearly, what one calls funny can make another groan. One time, I had a class where my professor assigned The Crying of Lot 49. Apologies to those of you who disagree, but I absolutely hated it. As much as I wanted to enjoy the story, my disdain for the too-frequent jokes about incest and eye-gouging won out. If I’m being completely honest, I don’t know if I was more upset with the book itself or by the fact that my professor kept going on and on about how brilliantly hilarious it apparently is. Although it didn’t work for me, and it’s not a story I would ever recommend, a large portion of the class agreed with my professor. Because they were invested in the humor, they became invested in the story and the themes it contains.

When something as seemingly simple as humor draws us into a story, we find ourselves more aware of the other components. Although comedy is a delight in its own right, it has the added bonus of enabling us to read in a more immersive way. When you laugh or smile because of something you read, you are not just mentally engaging in the story but physically as well.

While I don’t think the delight of reading and of stories, in general, can be boiled down to something as simple as a joke, humor adds to this delight for myself and many others. The joy people feel from reading a good story is what turns them into lifelong readers.

July 17–20: Sponsor Table at the CiRCE National Conference in Charleston, SC
Late July: Open submissions! More info to come.
August: Red Rex release (preorders open in June)
November: Above, Not Up release (preorders open in September)