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Writing Humor Creativity and the Comic Mind Mary Ann Rishel

Providing both theory and praxis, this insightful and creative textbook explains how to write humor, comedy, satire, parody, nonsense, and both the literary and the joke monologue. Through its close analyses of short stories, sketches, essays, and scripts, it is a must-read for serious and not-so-serious writers of every genre. Guiding aspiring writers through the many techniques for creating humor, it illustrates and analyzes what works and what doesn't, suggests ways to energize passages that fall flat, and offers insights into brainstorming, team writing, and revision. This book includes the history and cultural background of each major genre, followed by a rich array of writing exercises. Readers will find an inventive selection of examples to learn from, including a script from M*A*S*H and pieces by such humorists as Woody Allen, Ogden Nash, and Art Buchwald—and by students as well.

"Even for students not planning to become comedy writers, Professor Rishel's book is valuable because she demonstrates how the skills needed for the writing of humor are the same as those needed for many other kinds of writing: originality of vision, a keen eye for observation, inclusion of the telling detail, and most importantly, succinctness."—Alleen Nilsen, Arizona State University Mary Ann Rishel is an associate professor in the Department of Writing at Ithaca College.

Humor in Life and Letters Series $44.95s cloth / ISBN 0-8143-2959-4 $26.95s paper / ISBN 0-8143-2960-8 288 pages / 6 x 9 15 illustrations 2002 contents > introduction > extract > index >