Laughter An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic

Henri Bergson

Language:

English

Status:

Complete work

Authorship:

Written by the author

Condition of the text:

Clean text

Extent:

~41,100 words · 195 passages

sundry examples, why the principal theories, to which they have given rise, appear to him inadequate. To quote only a few, one may mention those based on contrast, exaggeration, and degradation. The book has been highly successful in France, where it is in its seventh edition. It has been translated into Russian, Polish, and Swedish. German and Hungarian translations are under preparation. Its success is due partly to the novelty of the explanation offered of the comic, and partly also to the fact that the author incidentally discusses questions of still greater interest and importance. Thus, one of the best known and most frequently quoted passages of the book is that portion of the last chapter in which the author outlines a general theory of art. C. B. F. R. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE COMIC IN GENERAL--THE COMIC ELEMENT IN FORMS AND MOVEMENTS--EXPANSIVE FORCE OF THE COMIC CHAPTER II THE COMIC ELEMENT IN SITUATIONS AND THE COMIC ELEMENT IN WORDS CHAPTER III THE COMIC IN CHARACTER CHAPTER I THE COMIC IN GENERAL--THE COMIC ELEMENT IN FORMS AND MOVEMENTS--EXPANSIVE FORCE OF THE COMIC. What does laughter mean? What is the basal element in the laughable? What common ground can we find between the grimace of a merry-andrew, a play upon words, an equivocal situation in a burlesque and a scene of high comedy? What method of distillation will yield us invariably the same essence from which so many different products borrow either their being that when he dips his pen into the inkstand he draws it out all covered with mud, when he fancies he is sitting down on a solid chair he finds himself sprawling on the floor, in a word his actions are all topsy-turvy or mere beating the air, while in every case the effect is invariably one of momentum. Habit has given the impulse: what was wanted was to check the movement or deflect it. He did nothing of the sort, but continued like a machine in the same straight line. The victim, then, of a practical jo

Read the full work →