A Newsletter of Humorous Writing #342
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
For May 22-28, 2024
Hello and welcome to A Newsletter of Humorous Writing, a roundup of the week's finest short humor pieces and funny articles, and a celebration of the fantastic writers who wrote them. Would someone be willing to discreetly let us know what a trellis is? The word kept coming up at our barbecues and garden parties this weekend and we had to keep pretending we know what it means. Trellis. Trellis? Trellis. Based on context clues, we think it’s some kind of tiny piano. Let us know if we’re on the right track!
What We Enjoyed This Week
I Am the Only Person on the Fury Road Who Still Drives a Sensible Car by Johnathan Appel (McSweeney’s) “I just don’t understand how we reached the point where the number of skulls on your car means more than the number of awards your car got from J.D. Power & Associates.” A terrific juxtaposition of a down-to-earth, practical narrator with totally bonkers Mad Max details.
Pep Talk by Teddy Wayne (McSweeney’s) Longtime readers of the newsletter know we’re big fans of Teddy’s writing, both his humor pieces and his novels (and hey, he’s got a new novel out this week). This piece is very funny and is also a great addition to the canon of pieces about halftime speeches, which includes Zhubin Parang’s hilarious one about a world where robots are allowed to play college football.
At Cannes, the Dogs Were Good Again This Year by Esther Zuckerman (The New York Times) A very fun deep dive into a lesser-known award given out during the Cannes Film Festival, The Palm Dog (a pun on “Palme d’Or”). This article is chock full of great details and quotes from interviewees: “‘I think it’s a great prize and I hope all the dogs will win, because I don’t want any competitiveness between dogs.’”
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Come see New York City’s funniest writers read satire about the city we love (and love to hate). Featuring Chandler Dean, Colin Nissan, Mai Tran, and more. Hosted by Bobbie Armstrong.
Tuesday June 4th, 9:30 pm @ Caveat
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Hey, it's Ned. How you been? Anyway, come see Teacher's Pet Saturday June 8th, 7 PM at Fiction Bar. It's about an affair I had in college with my film professor. Yeah.
Find out about the many close calls we had hiding our affair from the school administration, as well as the twists and turns (bleh I can't believe I just wrote 'twist and turns' I feel like a CVS novelist) our relationship took (cheating, accusations, betrayals, bankruptcy, raccoon adoption, witchcraft, high stakes parkour, etc.). Get tickets here. Free tickets with promo-code THISADWORKED or AGECHASM. Thanks!
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An Old Favorite
This week's Old Favorite is a Brian Agler Selection (TM)--a piece whose accompanying note was written by Brian--from Newsletter #130.
How I Wish to Receive Notifications by Emily Flake (The New Yorker) This is a fun one--pure and simple. We get to explore so many different takes on a solid premise. Every joke works and they're all surprising; you get the feeling that this piece could have been 4x as long and still totally felt sharp the whole way through.
Updates From Your Editors and Friends of the Newsletter
Luke’s got just a few spots left in his advanced short humor writing workshop starting on Saturday, June 8th! Write three pieces in four weeks, get feedback and deadlines, and meet other funny folks. (He’s also got just ONE spot left in his Summer Fridays workshop starting June 21st.)
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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