Humor In Fantasy
Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 8:15AM Recently my friend Allen Varney (whose website you should check out; there’s a link to it on my Links page) was kind enough to read one of my short stories (now actually referred to as “Chapter One of my novel,” or sometimes as “Shirley”) and give some some thoughtful constructive criticism about it. (Thanx, Allen!) One of the suggestions he made, and I think it’s a good one, was to put a little more humor in one character’s dialogue. I’d been thinking about that myself, because as what was a series of short stories evolved into a novel, I developed both of the main characters’ personalities more (in my head, at least, if not on paper). The one he referred to has slowly but surely taken on a slightly more humorous tone, here and there. “Updating” the earlier material to conform with how the characters turned out is, methinks, a Wise Idea.
The whole process has gotten me thinking a bit more about humor in Fantasy. The truth is that, generally speaking, I don’t like it. It often ruins the immersion for me, not to mention the feelings of majesty and wonder that I want Fantasy to evoke. After all, no one in The Lord Of The Rings tells jokes and pulls pranks. Conan doesn’t use bad puns when defeating his foes. Kelson of Gwynedd won’t respond to his enemies with wisecracks.
Thus, overtly “humorous” Fantasy isn’t something I care for. For example, I’ve read a couple of Craig Shaw Gardner’s novels and just don’t enjoy them at all. I love John Morressy’s Fantasy in general, but don’t care for his humorous “Kedrigern” stories. Based on extensive descriptions I’ve heard from friends I haven’t even bothered to read Terry Pratchett. There’s definitely a place in this literary world for Death playing rock ’n’ roll guitar, but that place isn’t on my bookshelves.
It doesn’t help that there are so many Fantasy parodies and other cruel attempts to mock the genre and those who love it out there. From the 2011 movie Your Highness to the late and utterly unlamented TV show Wizards And Warriors, and no doubt beyond, Hollywood seems to think the main purpose of Fantasy is to serve as a target for stupid jokes and other such crap. Every time I see a lot of humor in Fantasy, even well-done humor, I tend to think of those movies and TV shows and wince.
Now, that’s not to say I don’t like whimsy and wit in Fantasy. Those I definitely enjoy. After all, one of my favorite Fantasy authors is Jack Vance, and a lot of his work just drips with that sort of thing, often combined with gentle satire or a sort of absurdism. And Morressy’s “Conhoon of the Three Gifts” stories are a delight — clever and amusing without descending into the more overt humor of the Kedrigern tales.
Nor, for that matter, do I have this problem with Science Fiction, modern-day action-adventure, Pulp, or any other genre. Humor feels more “natural” in them. In fact, done properly, it’s often one of the best things about such stories.
But all this doesn’t mean there’s not some room for humor in Fantasy, be it my Fantasy stories or someone else’s. I just don’t want it to dominate the narrative, or more importantly weaken the narrative. I want to write serious Fantasy stories that evoke the same emotions in my readers that the works of Tolkien and Vance do in me. Humor employed wrongly or too frequently will totally wreck that.
So that leads to the question of how to employ humor properly... and honestly I’m not sure there’s a universal answer for that. I think it’s something each author has to work through for himself, based on the sort of story he wants to tell. For me it’s going to mean treading veeerrrry carefully. A little humor here and there to lighten the tone between more serious or tense scenes might work just fine. But what I want to beware is falling into extended periods of Whedon-esque or Sorkin-esque dialogue. I love that sort of thing in the right place and time, but I don’t think a Fantasy story tends to fit the bill. Even if it did, I’d be afraid that it would lead to cries of “Hey, let’s go watch some Sports Night” or “I just got Firefly on Blu-Ray!” — neither of which are the sort of responses I want my stories to create.
In short, I’m going to have to tread mighty carefully. I’ve already got some humorous byplay in later chapters that I think highlights the characters well without detracting from the overall story/mood. I’ll use those as my guideline to try to weave the same sort of thing into earlier chapters... and if it doesn’t quite work at least I’ll hopefully give a reader or two a few laughs. ;)
Reader Comments (3)
Hi Steve,
If you're missing , you're missing a lot. Humor is difficult to be properly done in any genre, but when it's as good as Pratchett or Monty Phyton it's fantastic.
Please do yourself a favor and read Guards! Guards! from Discworld, you'll thank me when you're done.
Best.
Honestly, Steve, I withdraw my suggestion. Humor may be something to "employ properly," but thinking about it in those terms is disastrous. If you're tightening up inside, pondering the optimal ratio of Majestic Fantasy to Added Humor Ingredient, it's all just going to feel forced.
Humor is an attitude. It includes the author's awareness of absurd elements in the story's characters, relationships, and situations, and the courage to note them and forge ahead regardless. It enlists the reader as your ally -- "yes, we both understand this situation" -- and punctures undue auctorial pretension. If your Grand Tolkienesque Rapture can't survive a few wisecracks from self-aware characters, then it probably doesn't deserve to. Kenneth Grahame created one of the most rapturously beautiful passages in English literatue in "Piper at the Gates of Dawn," Chapter 7 of The Wind in the Willows, and he did it with talking rats and a mole.
But if that viewpoint doesn't arise naturally, it's pointless to analyze exactly how much of it you can get away with including. That's just deadly.
Steve, for some well done humor in fantasy without it breaking you away from the story I would suggest reading "The Lies of Locke Lamora" and its sequel "Red Seas Under Red Skies". They are written by a new author named Scott Lynch.