A Newsletter of Humorous Writing #413
A Newsletter of Humorous Writing
For October 1-7, 2025
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. We blasted right past our newsletter anniversary at the end of September, but wanted to take a second to say thank you for reading us every week, especially if you’ve been with us for all eight years. The eighth anniversary gift is traditionally bronze or pottery, so we’re expecting a lot of Neolithic age presents in the mail.
What We Enjoyed This Week
A Series of Messages Tied to Bricks Thrown Through My Ex’s Neighbor’s Window by Daniela Fava (McSweeney’s) We love an original format and big swings. Daniela’s piece does both and keeps the reader on board by building out the premise one step at a time. The situation is wacky, but the character’s decisions have a clear, albeit wacky logic. You can get to fun places by being big, but clear.
My Wife and I Are Getting a Divorce, Help Us Decide Who Gets What (Also I'm a Wizard) by Michael Riotto (Points in Case) Speaking of wacky situations, Michael’s piece sells us on another big-swing premise by keeping most of his piece grounded and emotionally relatable, with one big, silly exception. Makes for some great juxtapositions.
An Open Letter to the Bra Store Clerk Who Gave My Enormous Breasts an Embarrassing Nickname When I Was Coming of Age by Katherine Di Napoli (McSweeney’s) Katherine does a wonderful job of finding humor in the emotions and reactions of this memoir piece. When you can’t reach out to fiction and invention to heighten and explore, you have to reach inward, to deeper places. And Katherine finds some great lines in the interiority.
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Writers & Comedians Wanted
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Hosted by four Belladonna editors sharing one non-referential pair of traveling jeggings, The Jeggings Jubilee has been described as "wait, your parents are going to be there? I have to take my pants off in front of your parents??" With staged readings, stand-up, sketch, interstitial bits, and a closing musical number with all special guests and performers, The Belladonna Comedy Presents: The Jeggings Jubilee brings you right back to your middle school slumber parties, if your middle school slumber parties had a cash bar. October 12th at The Annoyance Theater in Chicago OR livestream the show.
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An Old Favorite
I’m Jeff Bezos, and I’m Your Dad Now by Brian Agler (The New Yorker) We’re missing our pal and cowriter Brian on this eight year anniversary. But I’ve also been thinking about Brian this week because it’s that time of year when nearly every publication runs constant free-advertising for the second-largest company and private employer in the world. Pretty much the only good thing Amazon or Bezos has done is inspire Brian to write this very funny piece.
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
Nothing from us this week except thanks again for eight great years of Newslettering!
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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