How to Write a Humor Novel

So I can turn my mind to what I've been trying to do the whole time--take notes on a writing book by Donald Maass. Maass is one of The Agents in the writing business, so I grabbed his book from the library without looking at it.

It's called Writing the Breakout Novel and the focus is on pushing your craft to the limits. The man's been in da biz for a longo timeo, and he's talking about the kinds of books that turn writers' careers around, or propel them to the next level of their careers.

I see a lot of truth in what he sees, and its applicability across--

suckadoodling when better

[ - fuck - the sick cat is back, burrowing under her blanket. :-( Poor little popinjay. Maybe I shouldn't have fed her supper, though it was her good food. Perhaps I'll fast her the rest of the night. ] [Update: She calmed down again about 20 minutes later.] [Update: She keeps having mini flares. But she seems to know to run--like lightning--straight to her blanky. And go to sleep.]

Aaaaas I was saying. So far I agree with a lot of what he says, across literatures and genres, except--and this is the problem I've been running into for years--except for humorous fiction. Some of the best humor books (and movies) are missing one of the qualities that is usually necessary for A Great Book: heavy deep meaning.

Like... okay there's a wee bit of meaning in a Georgette Heyer novel. The Grand Sophy taught me how to be crafty, but to good purpose. Freddie takes responsibility for the first time in his life because of his love for Kitty; Alverstoke acts unselfishly for the first time in his life because of his love for Frederica. But that just makes them well-constructed romances. There aren't any Grand Themes. They're just funny. Because when Kitty drags Freddie to see the Elgin Marbles...

he thinks they've been fleeced because:
"They've got no heads! ...They haven't any arms either!" (Cotillion)

Maass writes: "Something about the premise of such stories [of breakout novels] grabs me, hollows my stomach and makes me look hard at my life."

Nothing about the premise of a Heyer novel makes me look hard at my life. Even less so a Bertie Wooster story by PG Wodehouse. But I'll tell you... lines like these make my life worth living:

'Yes, sir,' said Jeeves in a low, cold voice, as if he had been bitten in the leg by a personal friend.

I turned to Aunt Agatha, whose demeanour was now rather like that of one who, picking daisies on the railway, has just caught the down express in the small of the back.

The Right Hon. was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and had forgotten to say `When!'

She fitted into my biggest armchair as if it had been built round her by someone who knew they were wearing armchairs tight about the hips that season.

Unseen, in the background, Fate was quietly slipping the lead into the boxing-glove.

I could see that, if not actually disgruntled, he was far from being gruntled.

We exchanged a meaning glance. Or, rather, two meaning glances, I giving him one and he giving me the other.

And don't get me start on Louise Rennison who kick-started the revival of teen novels, and who I sincerely hope will stand the Test of Time. Sure Georgia grows and discovers that love is better when you actually have something in common with the boy, but...

Mum just brought Bibbs into bed with me. She was asleep, still clutching her swimming goggles and snorkel. She was also clutching our Lord Jesus, or Sandra, as he is now called in his Barbie frock and makeup. (Startled by His Furry Shorts)

Yes. That is the genius. And then there's the genius of Damon Runyon, whose language I fell in love with while watching Guys and Dolls, and it's as great on paper as it is on the big screen:

Only a rank sucker will think of taking two peeks at Dave the Dude's doll, because while Dave may stand for the first peek, figuring it is a mistake, it is a sure thing he will get sored up at the second peek, and Dave the Dude is certainly not a man to have sored up at you. ("Romance in the Roaring Forties")

And even if a book is satire, like Cold Comfort Farm (there's no butter in hell!!) or Three Men in a Boat, who among us understands what was being satirized? The worst examples of the literature they made fun of have disappeared, and yet the books are still funny. Such as this passage about their dog:
  
When I meet a cat, I say, "Poor Pussy!" and stop down and tickle the side of its head; and the cat sticks up its tail in a rigid, cast-iron manner, arches its back, and wipes its nose up against my trousers; and all is gentleness and peace. When Montmorency meets a cat, the whole street knows about it; and there is enough bad language wasted in ten seconds to last an ordinarily respectable man all his life, with care.  [Three Men in a Boat, To say nothing of the dog. The rest of the passage, on fox terriers, is hilarious.]

Just as Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy will always be funny, even when we perfect space travel and meet aliens.

One of the things Ford Prefect had always found hardest to understand about humans eas their habit of continually stating and repeating the very very obvious, as in "It's a nice day", or "You're very tall" or "Oh dear you seem to have fallen down a thirty-foot well, are you all right?" 

All this can be summed up by the Preston Sturges' movie Sullivan's Travels, which I just saw for the first time. It's about a popular filmmaker who wants to make an Important Serious movie.


He hits the road pretending to be a homeless man and ends up, eventually, having an authentic "poverty & desperation experience" where he suddenly realizes the value of movies for pure entertainment.

Georgette Heyer had to have realized the same thing, as the only fan letter she kept was from a woman who'd been kept in a Romanian prison:

In 1948, a year before my arrest, I had read – and reveled in – Friday’s Child, and as I have a very retentive memory I was able to tell it to my cell-mates, practically verbatim…Truly, your characters managed to awaken smiles, even when hearts were heavy, stomachs empty and the future dark indeed! ... During the 12 years I spent in prison I didn’t see a written page. My memory however, could not be sealed up and thanks to it and to you, my fellow-sufferers begged, again and again, to hear “What Kitten Did Next”.*

 So what's my bigger point? My bigger point is that no one's written How to Write the Comic Novel. And they need to, because there are some crucial differences that set them apart. And when you're reading all these "how to" books, but you're trying to write a comedy, the how to write novels books just mess with your head.

The rules for writing "great novels" apply pretty well to, say, Jennifer Crusie's romantic comedies because she writes heavy-deep. She does have themes, she does go for the heart. But that is not the intention of all comic novels, and nor should it be.

There is some comedy that is not meant to make you look hard at your life. Some days your life is living in a Romanian prison. Just as the original screwball comedies weren't meant to make you think about your life in the soup line and your quest for work and your worry about feeding your children. There's a time and place for looking hard at your life, and there's a time and place for laughing because Our Lord and Savior is now called Sandra.

There are other elements missing from the Comic Novel How To, but this will do for now. "That'll do Pig. That'll do."

PS: Writing this gave me a breakthrough for my book!
______
*Kitten is the nickname for Hero in Friday's Child. Not to be mixed up with Kitty in Cotillion. Though they're both pretty daft.