Humour writing:

Fine art of escapism

CHARMAINE FERNANDO

“Humour is by far the most significant activity of the human brain” Edward De Bono

Good humour is a tonic for the mind and body. It is the best antidote for anxiety and depression. It is most expressly, a business asset. It attracts and keeps friends and it lightens human burdens. It is the direct route to serenity and contentment.

Humour is a means by which you can escape for a moment from the harsh realities of life. Living in a world hampered by stress at every turn, humour is the only antidote to help you keep your equilibrium, shaking you out from falling apart, to virtually going insane.

Humour does bring insight and tolerance. It has that intrinsic sensitivity to seep inside touching the inner most depths of our soul, to stir us in to realization, that there is a lighter side to any heavy story.

Humour virtually opens the floodgates of laughter. It trickles out and overflows in torrents. Within our soul humour has the power to lift the weight of a heavy and gloomy fog of sadness, like a sun-drenched vapour. It dawn in us then that the secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow.

Writing humour is the ultimate form of escapism. Writing humour is the most fun activity ever but it is really difficult and requires a very special frame of mind. Try writing humour when you’ve just had a fight with your best half or when your best piece for the month has just been made redundant or been rejected by that out of focus features editor for the third week in a row. It’s not easy.

It is never easy to write humour off the cuff. But I tell you it’s the only way and the best time to do it. When you are emotionally moved something inside you crack. It’s from that source that the soul out-pours humour writing like lava. And humour is the shield, the body’s natural in-built system uses, to counter and mitigate the harshness that hits you flat from the outside.

On the other hand, I like writing humour because it gets me out of my own skin so much and leads me to some very strange places. It is the ultimate form of escapist writing.

The more ridiculous the circumstances and storyline the better, although it is always necessary for the humorous storyline to be just believable. It is most often my own life experiences, looked at with high zoom levels. It sometimes seems ridiculously outsized, blown up beyond proportion.

Nevertheless that is exactly how it is intended and that is what makes one lose it when writing and reading humour.

In fact it is as exhilarating to write as well as read it. Writing humour is absolute fun. It gets you out of yourself but it’s also very difficult to write and most often the online market is verycompetitive. But, when your sides are splitting as you re-edit your best piece, perhaps it’s all worthwhile after all.

Humour is the buffer that saves you from humiliation. If you have a good sense of humour you can never be humiliated. And if you refuse to be humiliated you become invincible. Humour brings everyone together, while humiliation tears them apart. In a society torn with humiliation and insult, humour is like a breath of fresh air. A good sense of humour relieves you from fear and anxiety.

Humour should be coupled with care and concern not to hit back or hurt. But writing to bring out the smiles and guffaws is an art in itself.

Mere humour without care and concern or appropriate action often irritates those who come to you with serious problems. Humour can keep the spirits high, yet if overdone it leaves a bad taste. Humour without wisdom is shallow. Humour with wisdom creates an atmosphere of celebration.

Humour without sensitivity is cruel satire – it comes back to you with more problems. Satire sometimes after all is humour with a dash of too much pepper that doesn’t always leave a pleasant aftertaste. But it is self exploitation, turning inwards to laugh at oneself.

Not many can write satire, and I am only too proud to be associated with one who excels in the art.

And only fools take humour too seriously! To make an effort to be humorous is contrived and sounds nonsensical. Because one has to be born with an exceptional gift to see humour in any given situation and more so write to make those who don’t see it that way, share your perspective with a total relaxation of their facial muscles.

Embrace humour! Then humiliation will not touch you. And the most interesting part about humour writing is that you have your first real laugh at yourself and that, I believe, is the best compliment one can pay oneself. I join, Ralph Waldo Emerson, to salute the humour writer,and am a firm believer of his refined statement that, ‘Sometimes, a scream is better than a thesis’.