Cruelty and laughter : forgotten comic literature and the unsentimental eighteenth century /
Dickie, Simon.
Chicago, Ill. ; London : University of Chicago Press,
2011.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Introduction: The unsentimental Eighteenth Century, 1740-70 -- Jestbooks and the indifference to reform -- Nasty jokes, polite women -- How to be a wit -- Cripples, hunchbacks, and the limits of sympathy -- Epigrams and literary freaks -- Dancing cripples -- Everyday laughter: evidence -- Damaged lives: experience -- Body determinism -- Delights of privilege -- Laughing at the lower orders -- Caveats from social history -- High jinks and violent freedoms -- Lovelace at the haberdasher -- Joseph Andrews and the great laughter debate -- Narrative from a high horse -- Fielding's anatomy of laughter -- The problem with parsons -- Adams and the enemies of fun -- Rape jokes and the law -- Laughter and disbelief -- Functions of an assault -- Accusations, remedies, and local justice -- Humors of the Old Bailey -- In conclusion: the forgotten best sellers of early English fiction -- Ramble novels and slum realism -- Reading for the filler -- Unsentimental readers and literary history.
English wit and humor
Cruelty in literature.