Sweet Madness

A Study of Humor

William Fry

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351487351
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Written for all who are interested in the mechanics of humor, Sweet Madness presents a general discussion and introduction to the roles of paradox, metaphor, and fantasy in humor. The operation of the implicit and the unconscious in humor; the importance of humor to human life; and the development, from childhood on, of the sense of humor are discussed.

The background for this serious study is drawn from such fields as psychiatry, psychology, anthropology, and sociology. William F. Fry, in this work, presents a new theory of the structure of humor based on the sometimes little understood psychological processes experienced by those who use humor or are exposed to humor. It is these relationships with other fields of study that allows for this investigation into the anatomy of humor.

Fry, in this outstanding and erudite volume, takes a giant step in furthering our thinking about humor in transactional terms. Humor and a sense of humor are a vital part of human interactions, and as such, this book has much to contribute to the study of psychology, cultural, communications, and of coursehumor itself.

Part One

Chapter I
A Survey of Humor

A Zen Buddhist monk asked Rynkon Zenji, “How is it that Pindola, who has only one body, moves about the four quarters of the universe accepting alms?”

The Zenji replied, “The moons upon a thousand rivers are the print of only one moon; ten thousand houses over all the land greet the spring at the same time.”

A newly married man requested professional help for a problem of impotence. A fundamental part of his therapy consisted of his being congratulated on the intensity of his admiration for his bride—so intense as to suspend all ordinary response to her presence.

Each of us, from time to time, finds it useful to regard familiar phenomena in a new way. In this volume on humor the reader finds some novel approaches to a subject quite old and very familiar.

Unfortunately, there is no simple agreement as to the time of origin of humor in a person’s life. There is considerable controversy over whether humor¹ develops during infancy or whether it is an adult prerogative. A considerable number of people hold the opinion that humor is not humor except as defined in the adult sense. Others are firmly convinced that children, as well as adults, enjoy humor. It can easily be agreed, however, that those phenomena most closely linked with humor— i.e., smiling and laughter—appear quite early in life. Smiling and laughter appear in the infant's repertoire in certain situations within weeks of the beginning of life. They continue through childhood until they eventually accompany adult humor. From that period on, the association is perpetuated—with certain exceptions— until death.

One hesitates to estimate the frequency of the occurrence of humor. I achieved some recognition of the complexity of this task during the process of the research that contributed many of the ideas presented in this book. As a part of research activity, a I set my self the assignment of discovering the number of smiles and laughs that came to me during the course of an eight-hour period.

The experiment lasted only six of the proposed eight hours. By the end of the sixth hour, it had become obvious to me that certain factors which defied compromise were operating to make valueless any statistical results derived from the procedure. These factors introduced serious distortions into the experimental situation.

I found that I became too self-conscious. I would become aware of an impending smile and prepare to record it. But, in my anticipating it, it would fail to appear. I had entered a different mood. The intention of recording the smile contributed to the moment in such a manner as to alter its nature and puncture the humor.

During the six hours of the experiment, I made several attempts to manipulate this self-awareness so that it would no longer present such an operational difficulty. These attempts were, by and large, unsuccessful. Only by introducing a "playful mood" was I able to diminish the stifling effect of the scientific context. I proposed to record each smile and laugh "playfully," rather than seriously, and found that fewer of the smiles were inhibited. This manipulation was only partly successful. There were many smiles that died unborn.

This experiment re-emphasized to me the intimate nature of humor as it appears in our lives. Humor becomes such an integral part of the ongoing life process² that recording its occurrence forces one to an un natural degree of self-consciousness. The self-consciousness then operates to create a different mood, and humor has gone.

It is impossible to be simply spontaneous and simply thoughtful at the same time. These two states are mutually exclusive. When one is objective, to any extent, about himself and his spontaneous behavior, a state far more complex than the state of simple spontaneity—or simple thoughtfulness, for that matter—is present. Spontaneous behavior is one level of existence. When a person is aware of that behavior, thinks about himself, another level of existence is introduced. He can become aware of his being aware of himself. And so on, to an infinity of abstraction.

Most of us achieve, with practice and maturation, a delicate balancing of spontaneity and self-watchfulness, with the ongoing life process flowing on relatively smoothly. At certain times, however, as in my experiment, this skill is presented with a serious challenge. My experimentation weighted the awareness side and the balance was lost in an excess of self-consciousness.

Humor is familiar to most people both through its early appearance and persistence, and through its intimate occurrence in their lives. It has been a popular subject for speculation throughout recorded history. As one can confirm by reference to various bibliographies of the humor literature—in, for example, The Psychology of Laughter and Comedy, by V. Y. T. Greig, or Argument of Laughter, by D. H. Munro—there are numerous volumes dealing with various sides of the humor problem.

It is a peculiar characteristic of humor that, despite its popularity as a subject for philosophy, there are many fundamental questions about it that remain unanswered. These questions are the subject of the next chapter.

As did the Zen master who spoke of “the print of only one moon” and the “ten thousand houses” greeting the spring, the reader of this book will consider humor in several ways that will perhaps seem rather surprising. We start with phenomena that are quite familiar-present since the early weeks of life and so much a part of that life that it is a strain to be objective about them. We shall then apply several novel concepts, with the expectation that the experience will prove to be gratifying.

The relationship between humor and play is a topic that recommends itself for early consideration as one of the foundations on which to build the structure of our speculation. The relationship between humor and play has specific importance in this book. (Later, I shall develop the argument that humor and play differ from certain other natural experiences in that the contexts of humor and play propose what is called a logical paradox.)

There are various ways in which this speculation could be initiated. Life could be viewed as a collection of items—e.g., an aggregate of minutes. Each item can be thought of as separate and with its own individual characteristics. In this way, life could be considered in terms only of its component parts. Humor on one hand and play on the other would each constitute one of those parts. Or life could be seen as a unitary phenomenon which has no separate items, but rather is an all-encompassing oneness. The significance of the whole would then be so great that to think in terms of items or parts would be an offense against natural history. The presence of these alternatives in conceptualizing presents certain similarities to the experience of looking at a mosaic. Should one attend to the individual bits of the mosaic, or should one focus interest on the over-all picture? How broad or how narrow should one's perception and attention be?

A third possibility involves a concentration upon the relationships that exist between the various component parts of life. Using the analogy of the mosaic, we can attend to the individual bits from the standpoint of their interrelationships rather than from the standpoint of their own characteristics, such as color or shape: “Each red tile is surrounded by four gold tiles, resulting in rows of alternating red and gold tiles.” This attitude affords one the opportunity of being aware of characteristics of the individual bits without focusing so intently as to be blind to a broader picture. The concept of relationships evokes a readiness to accept the possibility of something more than that which is “in the eye.” One could focus on a tile and forget the mosaic, or vice versa. Focusing on relationships, how ever, creates the psychologic atmosphere that reminds one that there must be both parts and wholes in the description of things. It is this method of focusing on relationships that will first be utilized in discussing humor and play.

That there is relationship between humor and play would be contested by few. Visualized graphically, certain phases of relationship constitute areas in which humor and play can be seen to overlap one another. Consider the mosaic analogy again and expand the representation of play and humor from that of individual mosaic tiles to that of larger patterns in the over-all picture. The mosaic picture is life; the pattern of rows of alternating red and gold tiles now represents humor. The concept is further complicated by placing contiguous to this red-and-gold pattern a pattern of rows of alternating blue and gold tiles. The blue-and-gold pattern will represent play. But these two patterns overlap. They are placed so that the red tiles in the last row of red and gold tiles borrow the gold tiles in the first row of blue and gold tiles in order to satisfy the condition "each red tile is surrounded by four gold tiles." The same is true of the blue-and gold pattern, in that the blue tiles of the first row borrow the gold tiles of the last red-and-gold row to produce the result of each blue tile surrounded by four gold ones. As with these mosaic patterns, play and humor may be described as overlapping in several significant areas, sharing phenomena in a way that it becomes a matter of context as to whether the particular gold tile is apportioned to the red-and-gold or to the blue-and-gold.

The research studies from which this book has sprung have demonstrated the existence of a psychological principle that is an overlap for both humor and play In Part Three this principle is considered extensively Briefly, the principle involves the precipitation of a logical paradox indicating humor, and play, as different from certain other phenomena of life—e.g., grief, business, conflict. This type of paradox indicates a particular context for humor and play—as a picture frame indicates a particular context for the art contained within and emphasizes discontinuity of the painting with the wall against which it hangs. Certain other phenomena, such as ritual and hypnotic trance, have similarly been discovered to be characterized by this paradox frame.

A second overlap is smiling and laughter—physiologic accompaniments of both humor and play, and little else (if we disallow such hybrids as the “nervous giggle,” or “laconic smile,” or “bitter laughter”). The presence of the controversy over childhood humor is evidence of this overlap. If children did not smile and laugh during their play (or humor?), one could suggest that children do not participate in humor. Yet, they certainly do smile and laugh. It becomes quite difficult at times to determine whether their laughs punctuate play or indicate the presence of a childish humor. Without a formal understanding of the distinguishing features of humor on one hand and play on the other, one might be tempted to consider that this overlap is without limits and that it involves the entirety of both humor and play—that the two are the same.

Another important overlap of humor and play is found in the “spontaneous-thoughtful” balance that became such a problem during my experiment of counting smiles and laughs. That a balance of spontaneity and thoughtfulness is important, is self-evident. The sad spectacle of schizophrenia (H.S. Sullivan wrote, “schizophrenia represents a failure to control awareness of ordinarily unwitting levels of thought”), in which confusion between the ongoing life process and dreaming, and confusion between the object and the metaphor, intrude themselves, adds testimony to the importance of this balance. Both humor and play are particularly sensitive to any shift in spontaneous-thoughtful equilibrium. Who cannot remember the experience of having the thought of “What am I laughing at?” rudely puncture a laugh as it developed? Or the experience of thinking “I’m too old for this sort of thing” interferes with a few moments of play with a friendly child. A tendency toward predominance of self-awareness may precipitate a runaway. The thoughtfulness may be unintegrated and spontaneity will be temporarily overwhelmed. Or, vice versa. Other matters, such as business or oratory, are more hardy, more resistive to such shifts of proportion. These more resistive items of behavior usually present little challenge to one’s balancing skill. This is not true of play and humor. They are delicate and demand much of the individual’s skill. Play and humor are two activities in which the human organism receives practice in maintaining the equilibrium of spontaneity-thoughtfulness.

The area of interpersonal behavior is a fourth area of overlap for humor and play. Interpersonal relationships are involved in both. It must be admitted that there is little in life that is not interpersonal. We discover, however, that interpersonal behavior is a particularly potent ingredient of these two phenomena. The soundness of this discovery is particularly obvious in the case of play. For humor, the role taken by interpersonal behavior is more obscure. One might tell a joke, for example, apparently without pertinence to the ongoing interpersonal process, apparently out of context. We shall discover, however, that this apparent lack of pertinence is deceptive.

An objection to what is stated above could be found in the instances of playing by oneself and joking with oneself. People do laugh or smile in the absence of others. There is certainly no active interpersonal relationship in such an experience, unless the person could be laughing in response to his being alone—with his being alone as the punch line of an interpersonal joke. It is not necessary, however, to carry the matter to such lengths in order to discredit this apparent objection of playing or joking by oneself. We need only turn to the conventional concept of personality as being composed of multiple personae. With this authority, we understand that a man laughing alone in a room is engaged in intrapsychic "interpersonal" behavior. One portion of his personality is joking with another portion. That this is more than a matter of quibbling by definition is attested by the phenomena of imaginary companions in childhood play and "talking to oneself' and the gross splitting of personality that takes place in various pathologic conditions.

There are, of course, other areas in which humor and play overlap, besides the four presented above. It is beyond the modest aspirations of this book to go further in this particular phase of the examination. Enough has been presented to convince the reader of the soundness of the intuitive impression that relationship does exist between humor and play. Also, in the process of this examination, several topics have been approached which deserve more extensive development in their own right.

I shall review, at this point, some of the major phases of play and humor through which the developing human passes, with comment on smiling and laughter, play, riddles, adult humor, and slapstick. In the case of smiling and laughter, there are some particular difficulties associated with the period of early childhood. As mentioned already, some persons deny that young children ever enjoy humor, and hold that a child laughs a "joyful" rather than a "humorous" laugh or smiles a "warm" rather than a "mirthful" smile. To avoid becoming mired in this controversy, I shall attempt to stay on the firm ground of commenting on actual experiences or contexts in which the smile or laugh occurs, rather than try to ascribe the laugh to a playful mood or a humorous mood, or whatever. (The gold tile of our mosaic is brought to mind.)

Child psychologists instruct us that babies usually start smiling at about two or three months of age. It is interesting to note that this smiling activity occurs somewhat in advance of other important behavior— crawling, talking, controlling sphincter actions. On the other hand, the smile is, of course, preceded in onset by most of the vital biochemical body mechanisms. There are other emotional expressions also—such as rage or excitement—that might precede smiling. Adults are frequently surprised (and perhaps amused) by the sorts of things at which very young children smile or laugh. Infants may be stimulated to response by many things at which adults would find it difficult to laugh or smile. An infant may laugh at colors or shapes, or at types of movement, or at parts of their own bodies. An infant may smile at a sunbeam on the rug or a red ball. My second son was one day left by himself for a few minutes in front of a department store mirror. He was seven months old. Upon my wife’s return to him, she found the baby surrounded by an amused group of people. He was apparently unaware of the crowd and was entertaining himself by looking in the mirror. Each time he looked up to see his mirrored image, he burst into infectious laughter. (A common element in these experiences is the element of discovery—which element some persons have described as a basic element of humor.)

Play soon becomes the setting for many laughs and smiles. Playful acts whereby one cajoles an infant’s smiles are familiar to all—peekaboo, ride-a-cock-horse, drop-the-baby, etc. It is frequently during the process of this play that the baby’s first laugh occurs. When the intensity of the interaction is high enough, a smile may spill over into articulation—and become a laugh. The laugh appears to represent an advance of emotional expression, from response involving facial muscles to that involving respiratory, pectoral, and cervical muscles as well. Paroxysm helps to distinguish laughter from the many other sounds an infant makes. Furthermore, laughter is allied by paroxysm with those other paroxysmal phenomena—hiccough, sobbing, retching, orgasm, cough, and convulsions.

With such humble beginnings as a game of peekaboo, play grows to a great importance in human life. Early, after infancy, the child's emphasis is on self-contained play—in which the child prepares and presents to himself the fantasy he plays. This emphasis usually maintains a maximum between three and five years of age. The child frequently creates imaginary companions to share in his enjoyment. Fantasy and creative imagination begin to exercise a major influence in the child's activities.

Play with other children establishes its supremacy during a later period—four to seven years. It would be a monumental task to determine the number of hours spent each day by children throughout the world playing cowboys and Indians, circus, pirates, house, mother and father, doctor, etc., etc. Fantasy is directed toward the relationships between people. Children take various roles, imagine various situations. The limits are those of human ingenuity. The interpersonal play of this older child is different from its earlier counterpart (peek-a-boo, etc.) and similar to its more contemporary counterpart (self-contained play), in that the child’s own creative imagination is more actively involved. The fantasy is more the child’s own creation and less that extended to him by his playmate. There are many complications in this comparison but, in brief, the child is more personally committed to the fantasy process.

This period also is marked by the onset of an interest in games (as distinct from play). We shall presently discuss games at greater length. Enough to say at this point that the interest in games increases from this period on, whereas the participation in play generally experiences gradual decrease from its maximum during these years.

Riddles—different from humor and play and yet also somewhat of a crossbreed of the two—attract considerable interest during the years five to eight. These riddles may seem primitive to the sophisticated adult— “When is a door not a door?”—but one would do well to remember the valuable tendencies that are given experience by these riddles. Riddles are, in one sense, early experiences of formalization of intellectual behavior. The riddle may be considered to be a parent to the anecdotal joke. Also, the riddle is quite obviously a playing together in the sense that ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction to the Transaction Edition
• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• Bibiography