Today's blog is about humor... about writing for those readers who have a funny bone and aren't afraid to use it (I happen to have two, myself). And, though I can understand the confusion, never confuse your funny bone with your humerus, which has a different zip code on your body, though it still has a healthy sense of humor.
One good humor trick is using something unexpected to startle the senses with mundane things that don't necessarily belong together. For example, the sentence "I woke up and looked at the ghastly visage in the mirror" isn't as fun as "My reflection in the mirror looked like a startled gopher."
Two things work here, 1) Visualization: as you imagine how a startled gopher might look, 2) the fact that 'gopher' is a funny word, and 3) you wouldn't expect to see a gopher in your bathroom.
Now if you want to add another element, say 'fear', a simple tweak works, "I woke up, stared into the mirror and saw George Bush."
Didn't this give you goose bumps? No, scarier than that, ostrich bumps.
Anyway, incorporating humor in your writing is fun to do and can be fit into just about any kind of story. Also, tongue in cheek is a lot more fun than tongue in nose, and doesn't nearly tickle as much. Unless you're talking about the other kind of cheek, and I probably don't want to go there.
Take care and anything else you can get your hands on.
Norm
The Adventures of Guy ... written by a guy (probably)
and the upcoming The Next Adventures of Guy ... more wackiness
www.normcowie.com
2 comments:
Norm, I suppose the only thing worse than finding George Bush in the bathroom is finding Dick Cheney in the bathtub.
heh...
... or Imus on your couch.
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