COMEDY

FURTHER READINGThe following is a selection of secondary and introductory volumes thatconsider many of the issues dealt with in this book.Carlson, Susan (1991), Women and Comedy: Rewriting the British TheatricalTradition, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Excellent discussionof the role of the comic representations of women in British theatre,including feminist and political theatre of the late twentieth century.Charney, Maurice (1978), Comedy High and Low: An Introduction to theExperience of Comedy, New York: Oxford University Press. A looselyorganized collection of observations about comedy that provides valuableinsight into many aspects of comic effect and technique.Critchley, Simon (2002), On Humour, London: Routledge. An essentialintroduction to the philosophy of humour that considers the place of thebody in comedy, and the ideas of Nietzsche, Bakhtin, and Freud.Double, Oliver (1997), Stand-Up: On Being a Comedian, London: Methuen.Combines an autobiographical account of the author’s experience as astand-up comedian with useful historical analysis of the rise anddevelopment of stand-up from the Victorian music hall to the present day.Gray, Frances (1994), Women and Laughter, Basingstoke: Macmillan. Theleading book on its topic, an invaluable analysis of women in British andAmerican film, television, and stand-up comedy that includes theoreticaldiscussion of the gendered politics of laughter.Jacobson, Howard (1997), Seriously Funny: From the Ridiculous to theSublime, Harmondsworth: Viking. An historically and geographicallyfarreaching analysis of comedy and humour’s social function.Leggatt, Alexander (1998), English Stage Comedy, 1490–1990, New York andLondon: Routledge. A very useful and comprehensive study of comictheatre organized around an analysis of recurring themes.Levin, Harry (1987), Playboys and Killjoys: An Essay on the Theory andPractice of Comedy, New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.