Reasons to laugh again

Observing humour in everyday life is a comedian’s forte. Jerry Seinfeld and Dave Barry are some of those extraordinary comedians who made this brand of humour win over the slapstick and physical comedy. While Seinfeld ruled the television with his killer wit, Barry still rules the print media. Many popular comedians from George Carlin to Steve Martin have tried their hand at writing humour. Most of them have been successful as well, but none as prolific as Dave Barry.

With over 20 bestsellers, Barry has cast his irreverent glance at every aspect of urban life one can think of. He has effortlessly got into the bad books of many singers with A Book Of Bad Songs and has tried explaining the paradoxical — simple yet complex — psyche of guys in Dave Barry's Complete Guide to Guys. Seinlanguage is the only book Seinfeld has penned but every page of this book resonates his clean and clever wit. 

Though stand up comedians popularised observational humour, there are many writers who have caught on the bandwagon. Recently, Lynne Truss who shot to fame with Eats, Shoots, and Leaves' has come out with a new book, Talk to The Hand, which is strongly touted as humourous. She is witty with words and has quoted from a plethora of interesting books making this an absorbing read. However, the tone of the book is angry and bitter which unfortunately erases the humour in it.

When it comes to Indian writing in English, humour is a rarely touched upon theme. New writers such as Abhijit Badhuri and Nisha Minhas have come out with comical fiction but there are not many dedicatedly humourous tomes coming out of India.

With this backdrop, a recent book by Shefali Tripathi Mehta, What Were They Thinking by Indialog Publications, comes as a surprise with its astute wit and terse writing. A collection of her observations on Indianisms, put forth in a non acerbic  tone makes this book a winner.

It is deja vu when she writes about people ringing the door bell at 10 second intervals before you get around to answering the door. Whether it is the man ahead of you in a long and arduous check-out line leisurely enquiring about his redeemable points or the 24-hour news channels debating on the most inconsequential things, Shefali finds humour in them all.

Every essay ends with an effortless punch line and makes you feel that you can actually smile at most of the annoyances when you look at them differently. The essays are short, unpretentious and are an easy read even for even a non-reader.

Anand Adkoli's Things That Make Me Go Hmmm... is another enjoyable read on observational humour. Traffic, sports, technology — Anand muses on everything from planet male! He is not only witty but a very intelligent observer.

There are many witty bylines in Indian newspapers, many funny writings by Indians that do their rounds on the Internet, and then we have joke books. Attention doled out to pure humour in Indian writing ends pretty much here. For all the literary genius we have, humour writing is not given its due.

We do not have a Kurt Vonnegut or a Terry Pratchett writing satirical humour, nor a Bill Cosby writing pure comedy. When we see every book in the humour section of our library (EasyLib.com) being so extensively read, we can’t help but wonder why this demand is not being met by supply from our writers.