11 January 2010

Humor: Sarcasm

By Isabel Roman

I recently tried to write a humorous story--100,000 words of ghostly, sexy humor. I plotted the story out, I broke it all down, I even wrote little snippets of humor. And then managed 750 words, scrapped the entire thing, rethought my premise, and went back to doing what I do best. Angst.

But it did teach me something. I'm more the sarcasm type than the sitcom type. On the other hand, I did realize something about sarcasm and my sarcasm. Too much is really annoying! I stopped watching Fringe because Peter Bishop's (Joshua Jackson) constant and inappropriate sarcasm grated on my very last nerve. I enjoy sarcasm as much as the next woman (probably more so), but his went above and beyond the need for it, was often used in unsuitable places and times, and was more rude than anything.

I wanted more examples of sarcasm in books and movies, but got sidetracked with this site, thereby proving that there really are too many websites out there!

How to Have a Sarcastic Sense of Humor
When you have a sarcastic sense of humor, people can find you a real curiosity.

It can be hard for some people to tell when you are really joking. You rarely
say exactly what you mean, and there's an edge to sarcastic humor that few
people can truly appreciate. Your straight-faced delivery and dry cynicism will
either leave everyone laughing or have them wondering what they missed.
With this step-by-step guide you, too, can be sarcastic.

And then there's the site "Movies on the Theme of Sarcasm." I kid you not. There's nothing there, the page is blank, but somewhere someone thought this would make a good heading.

CENTER FOR ADVANCED SARCASM...I just really love the title. The posts are eh, but the title of the blog is hysterical!

So we're all sarcastic. We all enjoy a one liner, or a Buffy quip, or one of those looks. But in the end, it's probably best to limit what you put in, it really does get old after a while.