Customer Reviews

How to Write Funny

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This 228-page trade paperback offers an excellent index and is divided into three sections. Part I covers the basics of writing comedy. Part II discusses writing comedy in the context of numerous genres, including general fiction, literary fiction, science fiction, romance and various non-fiction forms such as columns, articles, fillers and books. Part III includes interviews with multiple humor greats, ranging from Dave Barry to Peg Bracken to Denise Duhamel. The writing in each of the 30 articles of this collection is wonderful. Every contributor--these are humor experts, afterall--writes in a style that is so lively, you can laugh your head off and have a ball while learning absolutely terrific inside tips on comedy.

What a coup for Writer's Digest to add this fabulous book to their lineup of writing-instruction books! It's a gold mine of information for every type of writer, fiction and nonfiction, long and short format. Whether you simply want to occasionally leaven intense drama with humor, or you plan to write all-out, belly-busting comedy, this book is for you.

Instead of "every kind of writing," the subtitle should say "fiction and personal narrative." Some of the big names have interesting things to say, but this book is mostly little-known short story writers telling you that Mark Twain is great, people in their families were great story tellers, well-developed characters in stories are important, read a lot, humor writing doesn't get the respect it deserves, and then again, Mark Twain is great. And, that you can't have great humor writing without great writing, but there's plenty of mediocre writing in this book, like too many cutesy parenthetical asides.

There are some interesting points here and there, but the price of a used copy will be more in line with the book's value.

I thought this book was going to offer more insight into how to write comedy, but it didn't. This book does a nice job of disecting the humor markets and experts give you tips on how to aim your writing at each market, but I found the "interviews" written by respected humor writers to be pretty boring and repetitive. They talk about how their senses of humor developed and why they write what they do, but they all basically said that humor can't be taught and it's up to each individual writer to dedicate themselves to writing, which I guess is good advice but doesn't offer any real answers.

Some of the writing in this book to me came across as arrogant, as though some of these humor writers thought their work was the funniest stuff ever and could never be topped by an aspring comedy writer. They seemed to feel bitter about something.

The negative review earlier about how many of the authors sound like one another is correct but misleading.

To me, though most of the commentary is similar, that's because they are shared impressions of comic writers, rather than an indication that this is a poor selection.

As proof of the variety, just think: in addition to Barry and Bryson, you also get writers of comedic fantasy, children's books, romance, a Hawaiian-Asian ethnic humorist, newspaper writers and so on. You even have the guy who wrote a "comedic" story about a man who chopped up his mother and put her in the fridge (not ever going to be on my reading list).

The biggest reason to read the book is that variety of voices, which contrasts strongly with the usual book on comic writing: I'm a comedian, here's my take. If eighteen different writers say "comic fiction writers get no respect", "teaching humor is impossible", and "family history is important to my work", I'm inclined to think they're probably truisms of the field.

I picked up this book at a writers conference and started reading it several times, only to set it down because I just couldn't get into it. It felt like going to the movies expecting a romantic comedy starring Ben Stine but finding out it was a documentary on romantic comedies narrated by Ben Stine in his best monotone. But once I realized that those who write funny aren't always funny when explaining to other writers how to write funny, I realized the book is full of good information. Really! The reader has to understand that the purpose of the book isn't to entertain; it's to teach.

Each chapter is by a different humor writer. Some know how to be funny when they teach, others are downright textbook-like in explaining the craft, but they gave helpful examples of humor techniques. I saw a common thread in many chapters where authors said it is very hard to teach someone to be funny--you either have it or you don't . There were other common threads in the advice given, which was also helpful. If eight experts say the same thing, I'm more likely to accept their advice.

The book has a nice balance of showing humor in both fiction and non-fiction, and I recommend it to anyone who is already able to write funny, but who needs to take that raw talent and hone it into something that is publishable. A better title for the book would have been "How to Write Funnier".

The book is a collection of opinions about humorous writing by several well published humor authors. It's good reading, and darned interesting (my favorite was a transcript of a discussion of comedic writing, by 5 authors).

The funniest part of the book is the contrast. One writer will give advice saying, "I don't read other humor authors works," while another will say to read everything you can get your hands on. There's a LOT of contradicting ideas in each chapter, which actually tells you a lot.

Well, sadly the answer is "yes."

For a "how to" guide, there was very little "how to." For a humor book, there was very little "funny." Still, it was interesting to get a glimpse into the minds of some of my favorite humorists (especially those mentioned above in the subject).

The book is a collection of essays by various writers and humorists discussing techniques for writing humorous fiction. There are some basic principles of good writing (story & character development) and the individual essays and interviews are interesting. The only disappointment is that because they are general essays developed by various authors, there's a good deal of repetition, as well as contradiction.

I think this book would have tremendous as a "panel discussion." The humorists I named are quick on their feet, and would have played off each others' ideas to build a much more cohesive (and entertaining) book... of course, most of us would have wanted the DVD or at least the CD.

Some of the comic principles or techniques discussed in the book are: surprise, incongruity, exaggeration & understatement, word play, parody, and visuals.

Am really enjoying this book. Every chapter is written by or about a different author and their individual perspectives really come through. The writing and editing are top-notch, whether reading straight from the beginning or jumping around to different chapters. One of my favorites is an interview with Sherman Alexie, a Native American humorist. It's wonderful to discover that someone so uniquely funny can influence my own aspirations. Of course with all the writers come different opinions as to what's important in humor writing. (If they didn't, now that'd be funny.) For me, that means I'm getting the big picture, insightful tips, and a great read rather than the usual "There's Only One Correct Way" stuff. I have dog-eared about 1/3 of the pages and yellow highlighted (if that's a word) much of the rest. It is not a Step 1-2-3 sort of book, so if you're looking for that, save this book for later. But if you want a broad perspective from successful writers, consider this book.

This book is essentially a lineup of authors who have been recognized for their ability to write humor, authors who are recognized for their skill in writing and authors who agreed to fill out the rest of the book. The is book does about a good of a job dissecting humor and describing what it is as any book can. If you read the book, you will find that some of these writers do no come across as funny. When trying to describe humor it often loses its ability to make people laugh. What one person thinks is funny another person will not, so we all may have different thoughts about which writers are funny and which are not. And some of these guys just aren't funny. Don't let that keep you from reading the book. Some of these guys offer some very good insight into what makes writing funny. They talk about things like timing, delivery and the use of jokes. They talk about humor versus jokes and how characters should deliver their lines. They talk about how a person who can deliver a humorous performance may not be skillful at humorous writing. There is a lot of information to absorb in between those writers that don't know what they are talking about. I got a few laughs from the book, but mostly it is a serious book about How to Write Funny.