Book summary

In this incisive work, philosopher Henri Bergson analyzes the sources and functions of laughter in life and literature. He conceives of laughter as a social phenomenon, one most often experienced in public; as such, it must serve a social purpose, namely, the correction of behavior thought to be aberrant. Far from being a moral gesture, though, Bergson exposes the inhumanity lurking behind the laugh, hinting that it may become as mechanical as the behavior it mocks. In characteristically vivid metaphors, Bergson explores the inner workings of comedy by analyzing authors as diverse as Molière and Prudhomme, Dickens and Gogol.

  "Readers of English have had access since 1911 to a tranlation from French reissued by Dover in 2005: LAUGHTER: AN ESSAY ON THE MEANING OF THE COMIC. Its author was French philosopher Henri Bergson (1859 - 1941), already in his 50s by 1911 and internationally renowned. *** At its core, LAUGHTER is less a doctrine than a method. Bergson's thoughts are in perpetual motion, passing through hundreds of examples, citing Shakespeare, Moliere and Immanuel Kant. Henri Bergson lays bare what makes for the humorous and the comical.We readers take away from LAUGHTER a conviction that there are reasons why something, someone or some words make us smile, chortle or guffaw. And, best of all, we ourselves can detect those reasons as well as Henri Bergson. LAUGHTER empowers us to analyze, to probe like a philosopher. *** Bergson argues that we laugh because we are sociable. We are alive. Society is alive. And we sense when something is distorting what is alive, something therefore meant to behave, gesture or talk differently. Something in an animal, in a play, in a situation, in a person's character strikes us as not quite right. *** When something is humorous, it is not acting according to its nature. We perceive a soul being weighted down by its body. A person meant to be spontaneous and elastic at all times is suddenly revealed as a puppet, a robot. Think of the naked Emperor wearing his invisible new clothes. An animal naturally flexible is seen acting like a machine. Cartoons or clown shows present men as mindlessly repetitive as machines. Through our laughter we rebuke distortion; we call men and society back to their true natures. The comic gives us glimpses of what human life is meant to be: in continuous motion, never repeating itself, up to every challenge, responding perfectly. Society should be that way, too: alive, ever evolving, never off balance. *** When we see life barnacled over by a rigid layer ofsomething mechanical that should not be there, we smile, we laugh. By our laughter we pull ourselves and others up short; we rebuke ourselves back into the sociable, alive beings we were meant to be. *** After Bergson's masterpiece, we may never see a good cartoon again without asking why it makes us smile. And we shall discover credible answers. -OOO-"

Add your review of this book >