A Newsletter of Humorous Writing #138
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
For May 7-13, 2020, a roundup of the week's finest prose humor and prose humor-related news.
Hello and welcome to A Newsletter of Humorous Writing, the email propaganda arm of the acclaimed humorous readings show, An Evening of Humorous Readings. Over the past week at Humorous Readings Headquarters (HRHQ) we've been testing a print-and-play RPG version of the newsletter. We're still tinkering, but you'll be able to choose from one of three classes (Brian, Luke, and James), each with their own unique spells and skill tree, and race against time to see if you can assemble your own newsletter before 11AM on Thursday! All you'll need to play is a pencil and some dice.
What We Enjoyed This Week
A Brief Description, Organized By Inseam Length, of the Shorts Tom Selleck Wears in Three Men And a Baby by Jonathan Bender (McSweeney's) This is perhaps the prose humor equivalent of Ed Ruscha's Every Building on the Sunset Strip. The fundamentals of humor writing are on display here: Unique observation; compelling description; judicious arrangement.
Want to Make a Throw Pillow or Some Shit? by Dima Kronfeld (Reductress) What else do you need to say? The tone and voice of this piece are just marvelous.
Hard Truths From a Joke Book Consultant by Dan McCoy (McSweeney's) It's often tough to make jokes about things that are already supposed to be funny, but this piece does a wonderful job skewering the conventions of joke books. The details and specifics are excellent, and the narrator, a "Joke Book Consultant," provides an original angle on the premise.An Old Favorite
I'm So Happy, I Think I'll Flip a Car by Christine Nangle (McSweeney's)
"I must now echo the shirtless." What takes this piece to the next level is the contrast between the narrator's tone (a wonderfully specific kind of eager formality) and the activity the narrator is engaged in (flipping a car). You could imagine a version of this where the voice of the narrator didn't provide that contrast, and it just wouldn't have the same spark. Because while it is pretty unusual to express joy by flipping over a car, it's also something that does happen in the real world, and so simply describing the thought process of the person doing the flipping might not provide quite heightened enough jokes.
Updates From Your Hosts and Friends of the Show
Nothing from us this week! Too busy balancing the Newsletter RPG. (The Brian Class spell "Charm of Compulsive Chuckles" is a little OP right now.)
News About The Next Show
As soon as we have more info, you'll be the first to know! Well, okay, technically the fourth to know, after the three of us. Or the fifth to know, counting the person who gives US the more info. Or maybe in that case the three of us would be tied for second making you the third to know? At any rate, we guarantee you'll be pretty high in the order of people to know!
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.
See you next week!
@lukevburns & @jamesfolta
We started this newsletter with our dear friend Brian Agler, and we want it to always honor his memory and his love of all things humorous. You can find our newsletter tribute to Brian here.
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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!