The Seriousness of Comedy

Comedy is an important part of storytelling, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Beyond pure comedies, careful insertion of humour can be good for many other stories.

"But Sketchley," I hear you hypothetically say, "My story is far too serious and deep to include anything that might make someone laugh!"

Fair enough! Comedy is not for every story. I couldn't see books like 1984 or Lord of the Flies being improved by humour, but still, there are interesting and useful applications which should at least be considered.

The main appeal of comedy in otherwise serious situations is that of 'comic relief,' the concept that too much emotionally heavy material will weigh down on the audience, and that comedic breaks can help combat this. As well, a bit of comedy can help make writing more believable. After all, comedy occurs in real life. People make jokes. Funny things happen. That being said, one should always be careful not to overdo comedy, insert it into inappropriate situations, or make it obnoxious.

In her article, Kay Reynolds suggests three main forms of comedic relief: situations, dialogue, and recurring jokes. While all three are viable options, the main form I personally think requires the most focus is dialogue, as it presents many choices in method.

There are a few ways to go about comedy through dialogue. You can give the bulk of the cast a sense of humour (as seen in Firefly or Homestuck), have a smaller group of characters prone to joking around who still fill vital roles in the plot (as seen in Game of Thrones or The Avengers), or include one or two characters whose primary role in the story is that of comic relief. While comic relief characters are often despised in principle, and for good reason, when done properly, they can actually serve to further serious narratives.

Please don't think this is what I'm advocating

An excellent example of an effective comic relief character in such a manner is Cabaret's Emcee for a highly specific reason: what happens when he stops being funny. The Emcee is the flamboyant, gaudy host of the titular cabaret in Weimar Germany, whose dialogue is rife with innuendo and flirtation towards anyone he sees (including the audience). At the beginning of the play, he is a cheery, colourful character, but as the story gets progressively darker, so does he. With the subtle rise of the Nazis, the Emcee follows the story's more serious, depressing turn. In his single appearance outside of the cabaret, he reveals how devoid of hope he has become, and his final appearance, in harsh parallel to his first, is as bitter and defeated as the rest of the cast. This transition, the most powerful moment of the play, drives home the message of the play's bleak ending. While one might argue that this makes the Emcee ineffective as comic relief in the second act, I would say instead that he has gone beyond his basic role, using his previous comedy and present tragedy to strengthen the play as a whole.

Voice: The Underdog

When I was six, my grandfather made this pink notebook for me. “Kathleen’s Love Stories” was its title. I wrote some pretty ratty writing in it. A few years later, he and I started writing together; mostly short stories that I’d make up and that he’d edit.

He had been the editor of a small-time magazine in our hometown. After reading something that I’d written, he’d tell me not to use such big words. “It’s bogging your story down. Your voice isn’t coming through.” I'd muddled this over and decided I completely disagreed, at 11 years old. Using big words made me look smart! I now appreciate the lesson my grandfather was trying to teach me.

Voice is probably one of the trickiest things to master as a writer. In theory, it sounds simple. How hard can using your own voice be? But when you sit down and start writing, the autopilot editor in your brain takes over. Then when you’ve read over what you’ve sat down and written, you see that the voice is foreign. Who is it?

The foreign voice weakens the writing.

If you’ve struggled with “finding your voice” in your own writing, look no further for help than Annie Dillard or J.D Salinger. Both authors have extremely different voices, but both are extremely true to their writing. 

Dillard’s novel The Writing Life is one of my personal favorites. Dillard writes of the trials and tribulations of leading life as a writer. She’s brilliant. Salinger wrote Catcher in the Rye, a story with zero plot lead by the lovable fuck-up, Holden. Dillard is whimsical in her writing while Salinger is choppy and blunt. Both styles work for different reasons. Namely, the form of the writing fits the content of the writing.

Writers achieve these different "voices" not just by what is being written, but how it's being written. A writer's sentence structure, grammar, and use of punctuation all influence how a line is internally read. Experiment with these devices. Read them out loud to yourself and make different variations of the same sentence. But most of all, relax. Let your voice come through. It's the best one you've got.