A Newsletter of Humorous Writing #343
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
For May 29-June 4, 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. Help! We over-refined our palates and now we’re painfully sophisticated! We’d explain more, but we’re in agony because we spotted some wine being improperly decanted.
What We Enjoyed This Week
Overheard at the Lesser-Known Dinosaurs Support Group by Andrew Duthie (McSweeney’s) This is such a fun, specific premise—but what’s particularly impressive about this piece is that the reader doesn’t have to know anything about these dinosaurs ahead of time in order to enjoy it. Each joke is very much tailored to a specific detail about each obscure dinosaur, but Andrew finds subtle ways (not so subtle that you might miss ‘em) to give you all the information you need.
Are You a Werewolf, Or Did You Eat Too Much Cheese Last Night? by Bradley Meyers (Points in Case) The heightened prose in this piece is great. Every time you remember that the narrator is also talking about “eat[ing] too much cheese last night” (a very funny phrase, by the way) it’s delightful: “You stare at your own face in the mirror. It is yours, that is certain. But at the same time, you feel that this visage has lived in ways you have not. Reveled in ways you would not allow. Tasted delights that you would never sanction.” Bradley nicely balances having the piece play out as a continuous scene without getting too much into short story territory, and while also making sure that it still moves briskly from beat to beat and joke to joke.
The Idea of You: Stockholm Syndrome by Fran Hoepfner (Bright Wall/Dark Room) It’s a true joy to read a well-written funny review of an unsuccessful film. “The weight of the movie rests on the shoulders of Anne Hathaway’s Solène, a beautiful, divorced art gallery owner who suffers from having no two characters in the film pronounce her inexplicably French name the same way.” Fran delivers not only a ton of great jokes, pointing at the film’s absurdities, but also thoughtfully engages with the film and delivers genuine insights, something that many funny reviews scrimp on in the rush to make sick burns. “I won’t overthink it because we don’t go to the movies for accuracy, we go to them for kissing and/or trauma.”
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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
Adobe Acrobat Pro Really Really Wants You to E-Sign Something During Your Seven-Day Free Trial by Viktoria Shulevich (McSweeney’s) It feels like so much of the experience of dealing with current technology is having a bunch of features that that you don’t want and didn’t ask for constantly shoved in your face. (Ahem, AI integration.) Viktoria takes that very relatable experience and spins it into a terrific piece that is further elevated by a narrator with a wonderfully unhinged tone.
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 Editors and Friends of the Newsletter
James has still been blogging for Lit Hub, and if you haven’t taken a look recently, two funny pieces that he’s especially proud of include this definitive ranking of bookmark styles and a choose-your-own-adventure about trying to read a book at the beach.
Luke’s advanced short humor workshop starting THIS SATURDAY (June 8th) has just ONE spot left, so there’s still time to jump in if you want to do some humor writing in a supportive environment! (He’s also got a section starting on July 9th if you need a little more time to check your schedule.)
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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