A Newsletter of Humorous Writing

For October 31-November 6, 2019, a roundup of the week's finest prose humor and prose humor-related news.
Our next show is November 26th, tickets here.

Hello and welcome to A Newsletter of Humorous Writing, the email propaganda arm of the acclaimed humorous readings show, An Evening of Humorous Readings. There's a weird-looking squirrel hanging around outside Humorous Readings Headquarters (HRHQ). We don't know what it wants. It seems harmless, it just has an unsettling air about it. If you're in the neighborhood, drop by and take a look at this freaky-looking squirrel.
 

What We Enjoyed This Week

We Shouldn’t Bother the Feral Scooters of Central Park by Janelle Shane (The New York Times) This is a little different from your typical short humor fare, but in addition to being quite funny, it illustrates some interesting connections between science fiction and humor writing. In both genres, one of the tasks of the writer is to figure out how to present (often outlandish or unconventional) ideas in a way that makes them comprehensible to the reader, and then to explore those ideas as fully as possible. SciFi and humor also both take an interest in creating worlds that operate according to different rules and logic than those that are familiar to us, and both use those alternate worlds to shed light on and provide insight into real experiences and struggles. Also the feral scooters in this piece are divided into population groups that have names like "ThreeBeeps" and "BeepBoops".

What I Imagine The Fleetwood Mac Tour Bus Is Like by Gary M. Almeter (Slackjaw) There are some great Fleetwood Mac specifics and jokes in here, but the real highlight is Jeremy the tour bus driver. He's a funny well-drawn character, and his presence adds a great additional layer of texture and variety to an already compelling premise.

Running Is My Therapy and My Nutritionist Is Kale by Rebecca Turkewitz (The New Yorker) When a humor piece is based on a turn of phrase or a way that people have of talking, it can often be difficult to sustain the premise, but this piece does a wonderful job of keeping things fresh, surprising, and funny.
 

An Old Favorite

Destined for the Dirty-Book Bin by B.J. Novak (The Paris Review) It can be difficult to be funny when you're writing about writing, especially when you're writing about funny writing. This is a great example of funny writing about a funny book by a funny writer. Funny!
 

Updates From Your Hosts and Friends of the Show

The Satire and Humor Festival is coming to Chicago over the weekend of November 22-24! The Fest is partnering with Second City to put on a weekend of shows, panels, and workshops! Take a look at our page for more details and tickets! Would be lovely to see all our Windy City pals there!
 

See you next week!

@brianagler, @lukevburns, & @jamesfolta

Did we miss a piece you loved? Did you love a piece we mentioned? Let us know! This is an experiment and we're hoping to continue to make it better and better. If you have any thoughts, notes, wishes, or dreams for this newsletter, please email us or respond to this email and tell us what the score is.