Despite the claim of many a Borscht Belt comic that he is a practitioner of "the worlds second-oldest professsion," stand-up comedy is a young and distinctly American literary form. It was not until the last decades of the nineteenth century when, enabled by unprecedented prosperity and the right to free expression, that monologists began appearing in American vaudeville halls. Yet even though it has since become an entertainment industry mainstay, stand-up comedy has received precious little scholarly attention.

The Legacy of the Wisecrack: Stand-up Comedy as the Great American Literary...