What is comedy? Andrew Stott tackles this question through an investigation of comic forms, theories and techniques, tracing the historical definitions of comedy from Aristotle to Chris Morris's Brass Eye via Wilde and Hancock. Rather than attempting to produce a totalising definition of 'the comic', this volume focuses on the significance of comic 'events' through study of various theoretical methodologies, including deconstruction, psychoanalysis and gender theory, and provides case studies of a number of themes, ranging from the drag act to the simplicity of slipping on a banana skin.
Comedy (The New Critical Idiom)
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About the Author
Andrew Stott is Assistant Professor of English at the State University of New York, Buffalo, USA.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
Umberto Eco's novel imagines a book on comedy, Aristotle's lost sequel to Poetics. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
Umberto Eco's novel imagines a book on comedy, Aristotle's lost sequel to Poetics. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
By Al Ashton
Format:Paperback
If you're looking for a smart but easy history and critique of comedy from the Greeks to the present day, this is it. Full of examples, and able to take a long historical view that shows the complex and ever-changing nature of comic form without devoting itself to a single school or methodology, this is the most interesting and accessible book on comedy that I've ever read. Nice and concise too.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
By David Blast
Format:Paperback
Failing to identify any clear definition for the genre "Comedy", Stott seems to be on a mission of reviewing the classics, by picking and choosing between films and litterature, thus making the genre fit the argument.
What is this book trying to achieve? Skipping through time, from Shakespeare to Monty Python, there is an overall lack of focus. There's a big difference between comedy in tv-series, films, blogs and litterature, to say nothing of the different eras in which the different works were produced. This problem is largely ignored as Stott struts through time, posing as a movie and litterary critic, not a scholar.
Most troublesome I found the constant flirting with feminism, and the dreary academic appendix, that is feminist film theory. Surely in a post-"Sex and the City" or "Desperate Housewives" world, the madonna/prostitute bi-polar ramplings of deluded Freudians are finally deemed as void of relevance as they are of meaning. Men may gaze. But women gaze back.
I was in search for litterature for my thesis - and found little of value here.
What is this book trying to achieve? Skipping through time, from Shakespeare to Monty Python, there is an overall lack of focus. There's a big difference between comedy in tv-series, films, blogs and litterature, to say nothing of the different eras in which the different works were produced. This problem is largely ignored as Stott struts through time, posing as a movie and litterary critic, not a scholar.
Most troublesome I found the constant flirting with feminism, and the dreary academic appendix, that is feminist film theory. Surely in a post-"Sex and the City" or "Desperate Housewives" world, the madonna/prostitute bi-polar ramplings of deluded Freudians are finally deemed as void of relevance as they are of meaning. Men may gaze. But women gaze back.
I was in search for litterature for my thesis - and found little of value here.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
5.0 out of 5 stars
2 reviews
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
great blend of critical reading and philosophy
12 Dec 2009
By Jordan Smith
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
First of all, I should mention that I have a very specific reason for loving this book: I teach a course in Comparative Literature called Comic Spirit at a public university in CA, and after trying many of the available critical/theoretical/philosophical texts on the subject of comedy and humor, I've found this to be the best by far.
Stott's essays blend interesting discussions of the work of major philosophers/theorists on comedy/humor (Bergson, Freud, Erasmus, etc.) with close readings of major comedic texts.
I have two light critiques:
1.) the book lacks truly global perspective, and focuses largely on Anglo-Euro-American traditions. This reflects my interests and goals in teaching, so this is not a shortcoming so much as my personal desire to see a broader perspective (of course, it can be said that the book is limited in length and therefore scope).
2.) the film/media examples are limited to "classics" (think: Charlie Chaplin, Monty Python, Mel Brooks, Billy Wilder, Woody Allen, etc.), which are fantastic and give the book a feeling of authority, a mature distance from the baggy monstrosity and wild diversity of contemporary comedy film. That said, if you're looking for something to connect to contemporary film/media studies (and hence pique student interest by engaging their predispositions, if you're teaching), you would need to fill in some gaps.
That said, after much trial-and-error, this is the book I return to for accessible writing style, broad coverage of what is becoming the critical canon of comedy thinkers, and clear exploration of challenging theories.
Highly recommended too for writers of comedy who want to leverage a way of thinking about various approaches to comedy creation without all the lame rhetoric and packaging of "how to write comedy" guides.
Stott's essays blend interesting discussions of the work of major philosophers/theorists on comedy/humor (Bergson, Freud, Erasmus, etc.) with close readings of major comedic texts.
I have two light critiques:
1.) the book lacks truly global perspective, and focuses largely on Anglo-Euro-American traditions. This reflects my interests and goals in teaching, so this is not a shortcoming so much as my personal desire to see a broader perspective (of course, it can be said that the book is limited in length and therefore scope).
2.) the film/media examples are limited to "classics" (think: Charlie Chaplin, Monty Python, Mel Brooks, Billy Wilder, Woody Allen, etc.), which are fantastic and give the book a feeling of authority, a mature distance from the baggy monstrosity and wild diversity of contemporary comedy film. That said, if you're looking for something to connect to contemporary film/media studies (and hence pique student interest by engaging their predispositions, if you're teaching), you would need to fill in some gaps.
That said, after much trial-and-error, this is the book I return to for accessible writing style, broad coverage of what is becoming the critical canon of comedy thinkers, and clear exploration of challenging theories.
Highly recommended too for writers of comedy who want to leverage a way of thinking about various approaches to comedy creation without all the lame rhetoric and packaging of "how to write comedy" guides.
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
The best book on this topic by miles
7 Jun 2005
By Jessica Fleischman
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
It's really hard to find decent critical books on comedy as they're either too specific or subscribe to just one theory. This one, however, is wide-ranging, up-to-date and smart and full of examples from tv and movies. It's got historical background, explains a ton of stuff and uses modern theories really well.
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