What makes you laugh? Why are some jokes funny and dad jokes aren’t?
Probably the best way to make a joke less funny is to explain it. But The Humor Code: a Global Search for What Makes Things Funny tries anyway to take humor seriously. A psychology professor and a journalist travel around the world to find out what is universally (or at least globally) funny.
Try these on for a laugh:
- Jokelopedia: the biggest, best, silliest, dumbest joke book ever!
- Just Joking Sidesplitters: 300 hilarious jokes about everything, including tongue twisters, riddles, and more!
Now, you give it a try. This book can help you get started writing hysterical one-liners, quips, and puns.
- The Make Your Own Joke Book by Sharon Holt
Once you’ve got a couple of gut-busters, come on down to the Discovery Studio at the Quakertown Branch for May’s installation, Humor Us, and share your witticisms.
Need some more inspiration? How about some about some books guaranteed to make you laugh?
- Maxx Comedy: the funniest kid in America by Gordon Korman
- Funny Kid for President by Matt Stanton
- Millicent Min, Girl Genius by Lisa Yee
- Funny Girl: Funniest. Stories. Ever
Adults need a good chuckle too. As you get older, you find different things funny. Two-year-olds are learning that the world has rules and order, which is why placing your sock on your ear is hilarious. But by the time you’re six, that trick is old. Now you are ready for riddles and wordplay. By the time you get to be really old, like 29, your palate for humor has grown and you are ready for things like irony and parody. Here are some books for the ancients:
- Funny in Farsi : a Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America by Firoozeh Dumas – a light-hearted memoir chronicling the author’s move from Iran to America.
- Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris – I recommend listening to all of David Sedaris’ books on audio while driving to work so that when you laugh so hard you start crying, your fellow commuters can stare at you.
- The Sellout by Paul Beatty – compared to the books of Kurt Vonnegut, this is a quintessential African-American satire.
Whatever your age, no matter your predilections, everyone can take refuge in the fact that humor, as Mel Brooks once pointed out, is “just another defense against the universe.”
— Recommended by Brian W., Assistant Library Manager, Quakertown Branch
