A Newsletter of Humorous Writing #241
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
For June 15-21, 2022, a roundup of the week's finest prose 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. A reminder that if there's an older humor piece you love, you can write about it for our "Old Favorites" section! Just fill out this form to submit your pick, and we may run it in a future edition of the newsletter!
What We Enjoyed This Week
Which 1990s Action Director Would Have Most Likely Made "Lightyear"? by Tim Grierson (MEL Magazine) This isn't just an excuse to poke fun at Lightyear's overly convoluted premise, it's also a fascinating thought experiment--and all the arguments are satisfyingly well-reasoned and backed up by compelling evidence. A good rule of thumb in funny writing is "more specific = more funny," and so we always love reading an expert deep dive on highly specific subject matter.
Florida's Iguana Crisis by Sara Merkin (Gawker) Speaking of expert deep dives on highly specific subject matter: this article on iguanas in Florida! It's filled with well-chosen details and anecdotes that are rendered in delightful prose, with lots of well-calibrated jokes sprinkled throughout. You'll probably even learn a thing or two while reading.
How to Get Him Interested in a Relationship by Calling It a ‘Collab’ by Madison Dillard (Reductress) Looking at relationships through the lens of collabs is very funny, but also by the end of this we were like, "Maybe all relationships, and all social interactions, really ARE just different types of collabs?"
An Old Favorite
As the Token Female Member of This Action-Adventure Team, My Job Is To Kick by Juliana Gray (McSweeney's) There are so many great action movie details and tropes in every paragraph of this piece, but they're not just references for the sake of making references; they're all deployed in service of building out a character and exploring her unusual, funny point of view. Another great entry in the canon of "giving interiority to characters or people that are usually presented as flat" humor pieces!
Do you have an Old Favorite of your own? Let us know by filling out this form and we may run your pick in a future edition of the newsletter.
Updates From Your Hosts and Friends of the Show
Luke's got another edition of his Let's Write a Short Humor Piece workshop starting on July 9th! In it you'll write a short humor piece in four weeks, going from idea to draft, getting feedback every step of the way. (His other July workshop has just two spots left!) Writing from past workshops has gone on to be published by McSweeney's, The New Yorker, Points in Case, The Belladonna, Slackjaw, and more!
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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.
This newsletter is free, but if you enjoy it and want to support the work we do putting it together, you can send us a tip here. Any amount is greatly appreciated, and 1/3rd of each donation will go to Stand Up To Cancer.
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.
This newsletter is free, but if you enjoy it and want to support the work we do putting it together, you can subscribe to our paid tier, or you can send us a tip here. Any amount is greatly appreciated, and 1/3rd of each donation will go to Stand Up To Cancer.
If you'd like to place an ad in the Newsletter, please fill out this form.
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!