Dissecting the Frog

There is an old quote from E B White which (when paraphrased) maintains that analysing humour is like dissecting a frog: you may understand it better at the end, but the frog dies. The quote was later co-opted by comedians such as Barry Cryer and altered to say that, as well as the frog dying, nobody laughs. Sounds grim, doesn’t it?

However, if we really want to understand how humour works—and if we want to be able to deploy it effectively—it’s helpful to take the time to disassemble a few frogs.

What you will find within these pages is, firstly, a brief overview of a number of different features and techniques that can commonly be found in humour and how they work (and in some cases, work together). After that, we’ll look at different styles of delivering comedy, as well as some common genres and subgenres that use those styles.

Are you ready? Let’s open up some frogs!