Humor Piggybacks Imagination: Smack Dab in the Imagination by Dia Calhoun
Without piggybacking itself to imagination’s skips, twists, and leaps, humor would fall flat. (I had way too much fun writing that line.) Kids are experts at both imagination and riding piggyback, so it’s no surprise they excel at humor. I have a keen appreciation of most kinds of humor—from the bad pun to John Stewart (omit slapstick from this list). Something that barely seems funny to another person leaves me laughing so hard I’m gasping for breath. (Talk about endorphin release!) I also have a good imagination, and there is no question that part of me has never grown up. So, this month’s topic about humor and imagination has made me think. Why haven’t I used humor in my novels? I’ve never written a funny book or even a funny character. Yet, I have used humor in poetry when trying to write political poems. (I have one that will be published in an anthology this fall that uses humor to skewer.) Writing political poems is notoriously difficult—too easy to fall into a rant or polemic....
