Playing the Fool : Subversive Laughter in Troubled Times /
Lerner, Ralph, author.
The role of the fool is to provoke the powerful to question their convictions, preferably while avoiding a beating. Fools accomplish this not by hectoring their audience, but by broaching sensitive topics indirectly, often disguising their message in a joke or a tale. Writers and thinkers throughout history have adopted the fool's approach, and here Ralph Lerner turns to six of them-Thomas More, Francis Bacon, Robert Burton, Pierre Bayle, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Gibbon-to elucidate the strategies these men employed to persuade the heedless, the zealous, and the overly confid
Description based upon print version of record.
The role of the fool is to provoke the powerful to question their convictions, preferably while avoiding a beating. Fools accomplish this not by hectoring their audience, but by broaching sensitive topics indirectly, often disguising their message in a joke or a tale. Writers and thinkers throughout history have adopted the fool's approach, and here Ralph Lerner turns to six of them-Thomas More, Francis Bacon, Robert Burton, Pierre Bayle, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Gibbon-to elucidate the strategies these men employed to persuade the heedless, the zealous, and the overly confid
Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 24. Apr 2020)
More, Thomas, Saint, 1478-1535
Bacon, Francis, 1561-1626
Burton, Robert, 1577-1640
Bayle, Pierre, 1647-1706
Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790
Gibbon, Edward, 1737-1794
Political satire
Fools and jesters
Laughter
Political science