While biking out to the Tessman Farm this morning, I stumbled onto a truth that I had never realized before: my favorite stories are a weird combination of science fiction (hard SF often, softer SF sometimes, and more-often-than-not having aliens) plus a bit of a mystery plus humor. What I just discovered, is that since I wrote and posted my first Possibly Irritating Essay in June of 2007 (fifteen years ago!), I’ve written about HUMOR often. Why is that? Because I love to laugh and I love to make people laugh!
I’m good with verbal humor. I’m able to make my students laugh…but honestly? I’ve never analyzed my humor; nor have I successfully applied what I know about making people laugh to my WRITING! Or, as my 12-year-old grandson is fond of saying these days, “Or DO you????”
So, let me analyze my writing and see if I MIGHT have figured it out and just don’t realize it – or if I don’t have any idea what I’m doing and turn to writing hack-and-slash horror stories. I think I’ve gotten the hard SF part down – with seven stories published in ANALOG Science Fiction and Fact (plus one more coming out in the November/December 2022 issue), as well as another nineteen in various other professional and/or semi-professional venues. I think I have a reasonable grip on the mystery as well. My most recent completed novel, THE LEOPARD’S SPOTS, is a straight-up future mystery. Not long before that, I completed and shopped around “The Murder of AutoTech #47269”. I’ve got some mysteries in several of them, like “Mystery on Space Station Courage” and “Road Veterinarian”. Am I consistent yet?
Maybe.
I’ve got the deadly serious concept down pretty well: “A Pig Tale”, “Dear Hunter”, “Firestorm!”, “Oath”, “The Penguin Whisperer”, “Invoking Fire”, “Pigeon”, “Kamsahamnida, America”, are just a few of them.
Hmmm…humor? I think the following stories have definite humorous veneers: “Road Veterinarian”, “Dinosaur Veterinarian” (less so than “Road”), “A Woman’s Place”, “Baptism of Johnny Ferocious”, “The Last Mayan Aristocrat”, “Bogfather”, “Doctor to the Undead” might be humorous (try it here and let me know what you think: https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/2021/08/doctor-to-undead-by-guy-stewart.html)
What do the pros have to say?
Regarding Spider Robinson, O’Leary writes: “And for those who underestimate his art, I ask: You think it's easy to make someone laugh?
“Perhaps people condescend because most of Robinson's Art is between the lines, in what Albert Brooks would call "Timing...sayitwithmeTiming."…The way his characters suddenly feel like friends…Robinson's chief speculative leap is to imagine a place where community is possible. And the task he has taken upon himself is to embody the spectrum of Happiness. Now, that may seem a rather hifalutin way of saying he's funny and his books make you feel good. But what Robinson is up to is nothing less than a participatory utopia that a reader enrolls in by reading.
“Robinson himself describes Mike Callahan. ‘Fixed broken brains. Made sad people happy and happy people merry and merry people joyous. Tutored in kindness and telepathy. Smoked hideous cigars. Forgave people. Accessory before and after the pun.’”
“Think of the audacity and courage it takes, in these days of cynical Family Values and jaded Pulp Sensationalism, to create an art about the possibility of Joy. I suspect that's either a dream that terrifies, or a dream so many times broken that it hurts to contemplate.” http://www.spiderrobinson.com/oleary.html )
LOIS MCMASTER BUJOLD is another writer who has mastered the art of subtle humor: “I’ve been reading science fiction since I was nine years old…Eleanor Cameron’s ‘The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet’…What drew me was the adventure and the humor I occasionally found.’ Randall Garrett was always a good bet. Adventure was offered by too many writers to name, but then as now, smart humor was thin on the ground.” https://awthome.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/an-interview-with-author-lois-mcmaster-bujold/
JOHN SCALZI is obviously a sharp humorist as well as an amazing SF writer. When asked, “‘What role does humor play in your writing?’ he responded: ‘It plays a pretty important role, but it's a role that has to be integrated with everything else you're doing. It's like life -- there are funny parts and then there are the parts that aren't so funny, and you move between the two all the time…putting humor into the mix as part of the events that fuel the plot is a good way to make the reader feel the story has a natural flow. Of course, sometimes it's also fun just to write something, but even when I write something that's in a comic mode, I try to get a mix of other emotional moments in there -- if you go for funny every single second, you're going to burn out your readers.’ https://www.writersdigest.com/improve-my-writing/scalzi-1
CONNIE WILLIS Noted, “Learning to Write Comedy or ‘Why It's Impossible and How to Do It.’
From the beginning, she notes, “Writing comedy is a real pain, made more painful by two persistent myths. The first is that writing comedy is a hoot, something people do for fun when they! While reading comedy may be an amusing experience, writing it is the same pain in the neck as any other kind of writing, only more so.
“The way to learn to write comedy is to watch and read comedies and analyze what you’re watching and reading…writing comic science fiction is no different from writing any other kind of comedy. Which is why I use them as examples along with science fiction writers. After you’ve read a bunch of comedy, you’ll see that why it’s funny. If something is funny it’s due largely to the comic bag of tricks the writer uses and has nothing to do with the situation at hand.” (https://www.scribd.com/document/357893022/Willis-Connie-Learning-to-Write-Comedy)
The Stack Exchange (see link below), notes: “Humor in stories and novels, regardless of genre, is a function of the author's sense of humor, and the traits of the characters in their stories.”
Last of all, from SFWA’s blog, KE Flan had this to say: “Instead, channel real people who make you laugh. Funny people tend to view life through a slightly different lens. Perspective is a tool that’s very much available to a fiction writer. By filtering action through a character, you keep humor in-world rather than impose it. For example, Martha Wells’s “Murderbot” offers us an askew perspective that lends itself well to humor. The key is to ensure the perspective is consistent and nuanced, just as it would be in a real person.”
Hmmm…food for thought. Food for thought…What do you think?
References: https://www.tor.com/2013/07/15/eleven-funny-science-fiction-books/, http://www.ufopub.com/stories-archive/, https://dailysciencefiction.com/hither-and-yon/humor, https://writing.stackexchange.com/questions/46446/sense-of-humor-in-your-sci-fi-stories, https://www.sfwa.org/2022/04/12/i-feel-funny-humor-tips-novelists/, https://www.eldersignspress.com/?p=387, https://www.epicreads.com/blog/funny-science-fiction-books/
Image: http://best-sci-fi-books.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/funny.jpg
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