Humor in literature depends on what people find funny. That sounds simplistic, but what tickles one person might not cause a twitch of the lip to another. Writing can feature many different forms of humor. Books can be belly-laugh funny, subtle, satirical, dry, ethnic, screwball farce, neurotic, slapstick, political, absurd, and probably a dozen more. Each style causes a different reaction to different readers. I’m going to feature a few humorists and some writers known for their wit. Writer Dorothy Parker was one of the wittiest satirists ever. Here are a few of her priceless comments I find funny: “If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.” “I hate writing, I love having written.” “There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is sim...

Mid-month seems like a good time to stop and have some fun here at The Blood-Red Pencil. First for today are some recent comic strips that made me laugh, or made me think, or both. From One Big Happy : Nick and Rose, Ruthie's grandparents, are sitting on the couch watching TV. Nick asks, "What channel is this?" "A & E, Arts and Entertainment." Nick adjusts his glasses as if he can't believe what he is seeing. "For the past hour we've been watching a deranged woman living in a cluttered, rat-infested house." Then he turns to Rose and asks, "So, is this art or entertainment?" Of course she has no answer. This one from Zits was cute: Jeremy is at school and at 10a.m. he has a history test. "Easy," he thinks. At 1p.m. he has a calculus quiz which he considers "No sweat." His 2:45 English test is a "Piece of cake." At 4p.m. he meets his girlfriend, Sara, who has a "How well do you ...

I was looking through some quotes by writers for a project I'm working on, and some of the quotes were so good I thought I'd share them here. "There's nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein." ~Walter Wellesley "Red" Smith "The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say." ~ Anaïs Nin "Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia." ~ E.L. Doctorow "If there's a book you really want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it." ~Toni Morrison "What I like in a good author is not what he says, but what he whispers." ~Logan Pearsall Smith, "All Trivia," Afterthoughts, 1931 "Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart." ~William Wordsworth "The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become ...