The farmer and mechanic., 1911-08-29
AMERICAN HUMOR
There Is Nothing Crnelcr Than the
Fun of BarbarianS

(William Dean HowellS. in Harper's.)
We are sensible. or we seem to be
sensible, Of a luH in American humoT,
if we may SO phrase it, in which we
may fifty look about us and challenge
the elements as to their intentions con-
corning it. Sometimes, we will con-
fess, we have been afraid that Amer
lean humor had possibly overdone it
self There was moment, baleful or
hopeful as the reader may decide,
when, just before the lapse OF faith.
it appeared as if we almost expected
to be saved by humor. This may have
been an illusion, but it was strong
enough to prompt the most serious
inquiry into the nature Of humor.- and
it's place in the spiritual order of
things. Clearly, one could not con-
ceive Of an angel joking, and properly
speaking could there be any such
thing joking in heaven. By that
time hell was about being disposed
of by popular vote, or by a consensus
OF newspapers, rather, and 1T was only
Of heaven that one could think in the
connection. Was there not something
essentially cruel in humor? Did not
it, in it's last analysis rest upon the
derision of some human infirmity, or
defOrmity. or imbecillty. and couid
such things be matter of mirth with
the heavenly host or any OF it? The
arch-fiend, before he was blotted out
with his followers by the newspapers
and the newer criticism, might have
subtly or coarsely found those ObliQui-
ties funny; Satan might, Beeizebub
might. Mammon himself might; but
could Michael or Gabriel, or Ithuriel,
before they too paled in the blaze or
journalistic investigation In the
general substitution of hum OF for faith
as saving agency one had TO ask
ones self these piercing questions.
Their consideration brought to light
several facts concerning the nature OF
hurnor which one had to subject to the
severest scrutiny. At first it appeared
as if the broader humor was the
kindlier, was, in fact, not at all cruel,
since it involved its object in sort
of confes Of the general human
weakness and pitied while it laughed,
and invited it's object to laugh with 1t.
But this inference scarcely bore ek-
animation. There is nothing c.ueler
than the fun of barbarians or Of boys,
and in the emergency from barbarism
and boyhood into civiliZa ton and ma
turity humor kept too much Of both.
The Joking in RabelaiS is not only
filthy it is atrOciOuS; and when you
come to the humaner humor Of Ger
vantes, it is still SO abominably u1-
feeling that it is doubtful whether Don
Ouixote has not died the death be-
cause the fun Of the book was mostly
so brutal that mankind could no longer
bear rather than because the books
! of chivalry which it burlesqued were
no longer known to readers and the
burlesque was unintelligible. Much OF
| the humor in Shakespeare is cruel. SO
| cruel that Mark Twain used TO say
| that when it did not bore him 1t OF
| Tended him past endurance. Consider
| what an awful thing the mocking or
Malvolio was, how heartless the jokes
| put upon Falstaff The one great
English humorist who never had credit
| for the high moral quality OF his
! humor was Swift. VINO really seldom
| hurt but to heal, but who got hlmseT
! permanently imagined cynical say.
| age by a humorist who ought to have
| been kinder to him and truer. He
came nearest being the purely and en-
| tirely humorous humOrlst we are re-
| curing from the future as success Or
| to Mark Twain, and he was the most
eminent predecessor of Mark IVAN
in the conscienced humor we must al
ways associate with that great pseu-
| donym.
THE SMALL COLIikGE VERSUS
u,IJU- UNIVERSITY