A bit pretentious sounding, through use of (name of person who created idea)+ -ian, -ism, and strange vocab like "bathetic".. that and it is basically a plagiarism of John Allen Paulos's "Mathematics and Humor"Despite that it is still a well written, clever and challenging book on a subject that is hard to write about.very insightful and well worth the effort.

one could say it is admirable to undertake a bit of a philosophical run at humor. in the end, there's not much new to think about here. it's pretty clear that good master simon and i share attitudes towards humor, but the reassurance wasn't necessarily worth the hundred pages or so. there are a couple moments of concision (a rarity for anyone admittedly engrossed in philosophy) that are nice, potentially useful for a future statement or something. i guess i don't want to dog it, but really, your...

This wasn't as great as I thought it would be, but there are a few little epiphanies scattered throughout its pages. It's a fairly conventional philosophical rumination on humor; not an exercise in heavy-lifting by any stretch.

Critchley's analysis of humor is mostly in error, though it points toward the true theory of humor that I presented in 2011, having begun to develop it in 2008. How does he point in the right direction? While he focuses on the fictional notion of objects or animals bestowed with humanity, this happens to be a key image of diminutive self-deception of superiority. Rather than for the reasons Critchley gives, we find the animal-as-human funny for the simpler reason that it represents a kind of sma...

2.5

Wish this guy was even somewhat readable.

Mizah üzerine felsefe kitabı, okumasının çok zor olduğunu söyleyenlere hak vermekle birlikte, yavaş ve sakin bir şekilde okuyarak anlatılanları kavrayabilirsiniz. Yine de belirli bir felsefe bilgisine sahip olmak bu kitaptan daha çok şey almanızı sağlayabilir. Okurken keyif aldığım bir kitap oldu, mizaha olan ilgim sayesinde diyelim.

A good but not great introduction to a difficult subject. It starts out heavy on examples of what humor is instead of any theory of why it is, and ends up with a bit too much Freud. Mr. Critchley is a little narrow in his focus (the book's only 111 pages), but does well enough to inspire further reading.

کتاب تحقیقی است درباره‌ی لطیفه، طنز و خنده. ه نظرم برای کسی که می‌خواهد در زمینه‌ی طنز تحقیق کند و یا اطلاعات تخصصی‌تری به دست بیارود خوب است اما ممکن است برای مخاطب عام جذاب نباشد.خواندنش برایم جالب بود هرچند که به نظرم ترجمه‌اش می‌توانست بهتر باشد. معادل برخی از اصطلاحات را هم می‌شد در پانویس آورد. مثلا در اینجا «طنز» را معادل humour گرفته است در صورتی که در کتاب‌های دیگری که خوانده‌ام این واژه را بیشتر به «شوخی» ترجمه کرده‌اند و «طنز» را معادل satire گرفته‌‌اند.

Laughter at oneself is better than laughter at others. Get ridiculous, wiser, wittier and comforting.

I enjoyed Critchley's writing, though found elements self-contradictory; his morally-righteous attempt to eliminate targeted subjects in humour completely goes against his need for one to take on the roles of the absurd and the subordinate in the case of expectation subversion, and societal introspection, respectively. Otherwise, an enjoyable read. He makes the digestion of comedy theory quite easy in this light-hearted, but thoroughly researched work.

"A joke explained is a joke misunderstood." 2Credits Morreall with three theories: superiority, relief, and incongruity. 2"Both brevity and speed are the soul of wit." 6"It is this link to the body that was the reason for the Christian condemnation of laughter in the early Middle Ages, its careful codification in the later middle Ages, before the explosion of laughter in the early Renaissance, in the work of Rabelais and Erasmus." 9"A true joke, a comedian's joke, suddenly and explosively lets u...

This is not an easy book. English is not my first language but I read it and understand it pretty well... But this is high-level scholar English that mixed up my mind and my neurons... Even trying to translate it to my mother language was, sometimes, very hard to understand.The exploration of humor and its origins is always interesting, there are a few chapters that talk about it and gave me a lot of information, there is clearly enough investigation on the matter to write about this. But the fa...

A good introduction to humor studies, but spends perhaps a bit too much of its short span (only around 110 pages) talking about Freud and not developing many of the other fascinating ideas it introduces.

From antiquity to modernity, drawing on the work of a vast array of authors, e.g., Jonathan Swift, Laurence Sterne, Anthony Earl of Shaftsbury ("liberty loves humour"), Henri Bergson (the mechanization of humans), Beckett (risus purus), and Freud (the mellowing of the superego). This book turns the comical insight out to reveal delectable insights about what we find funny, e.g., feelings of superiority, "hydraulic" psychological relief, the felt incongruity of what we know or expect and what act...

Definitely one of the best books on humour I've read. It's clear, short, concise, funny and readable. Author makes really good summary of the main theories on humour, adding his own critical thoughts on the in a witty way. Loved it!

Felsefeye giden yolun da başarısızlıktan geçtiğini savunan Critchley, Mizah Üzerine adlı kitabında mizahı egonun kendisini gülünç bulmasıyla harekete geçen bir anti-depresan olarak nitelendirir. Mizaha farklı bir yönden bakmanızı sağlayacak, akıcı bir felsefe kitabı olan Mizah Üzerine çalışmasını Monokl Öneriyor!

ContentThis is a fine read for what it sets out to do. Lately I've discovered the intentional fallacy, the idea that a work or thing is not adequately judged on the basis of what it does on an absolute basis but on the basis of what it intends to do, making its success a function of its aim, not its success. This fallacy underscores the importance in criticism to weigh a work apart from what the author intended, what resulted from that intention, or what I would have done given the project. The