Farce has always been relegated to the lowest rung of the ladder of dramatic genres. Distinctions between farce and more literary comic forms remain clouded, even in the light of contemporary efforts to rehabilitate this type of comedy. Is farce really nothing more than slapstick-the "putting out of candles, kicking down of tables, falling over joynt-stools," as Thomas Shadwell characterized it in the seventeenth century? Or was his contemporary, Nahum Tate correct when he declared triumphantly that "there are no rules to be prescribed for that sort of wit, no patterns to copy; and 'tis...
Farce has always been relegated to the lowest rung of the ladder of dramatic genres. Distinctions between farce and more literary comic forms remai...
For many students of Japanese culture and visitors to Japan, Japanese humor seems obscure, difficult to find, and perhaps even nonexistent. By bringing together scholarly insights and original research by both Japanese and non-Japanese experts, Jessica Milner Davis bridges the differences between humor in Japan and the West and examines the entire spectrum of Japanese humor, from ancient traditions and surviving rituals of laughter to the norms of joke-telling in ordinary conversation in Japan and America. For anyone interested in Japan and Japanese culture, or the study of humor,...
For many students of Japanese culture and visitors to Japan, Japanese humor seems obscure, difficult to find, and perhaps even nonexistent. By bringin...
