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jonathonjones 's review for:
Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic
by Henri Bergson
This is the sort of book which presents a theory which cannot possibly accomplish its purpose, but nonetheless provides an interesting way of looking at things. In this case there are two main theories he gives us about laughter. First, its purpose, which is that laughter is always laughing at someone in order to act as a corrective, to promote conformance with society. (When we laugh at non-people it is by analogy with people; as if it were a person.) The second is a theory of what is laughable, which is anything that shows rigidity rather than appropriate flexibility. This is most clear in matters of character, where we often need to be adaptable to social situations. Lawyers who talk in legalese at parties are laughable.
It would be uninteresting to complain that these theories are insufficiently general, and to find counter examples and to express my skepticism of their general adequacy. Rather, I think they are best taken as a way, among others, to think of comedy and laughter. One need not choose between the absurdity theory and this one; both give us some explanatory power, and each is useful for different events to explain what is funny about it. Similarly, laughter can be both a way of confirming our social bonds and similarities, as others have theorized, while also being a corrective as argued here. So this is a welcome addition to my comedy explanation toolbox.
The biggest problem I had with the book were the examples: a reader unfamiliar with 19th century French comedies will be somewhat lost by them. I can tell by the Don Quixote examples that the other ones are surely illustrative, but without being able to follow them the book loses much of the vibrancy it has for more appropriate readers. An annotated version of this with more context for the quotations would be helpful; as it stands, it falls a little flat for me.
If you can get past that, though, it is certainly worth reading!
It would be uninteresting to complain that these theories are insufficiently general, and to find counter examples and to express my skepticism of their general adequacy. Rather, I think they are best taken as a way, among others, to think of comedy and laughter. One need not choose between the absurdity theory and this one; both give us some explanatory power, and each is useful for different events to explain what is funny about it. Similarly, laughter can be both a way of confirming our social bonds and similarities, as others have theorized, while also being a corrective as argued here. So this is a welcome addition to my comedy explanation toolbox.
The biggest problem I had with the book were the examples: a reader unfamiliar with 19th century French comedies will be somewhat lost by them. I can tell by the Don Quixote examples that the other ones are surely illustrative, but without being able to follow them the book loses much of the vibrancy it has for more appropriate readers. An annotated version of this with more context for the quotations would be helpful; as it stands, it falls a little flat for me.
If you can get past that, though, it is certainly worth reading!