WOMEN AND HUMOUR

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21987, 23 June 1933, Page 15

WOMEN AND HUMOUR

If there is one thing more than another in which women differ from men in their opinions it is a sense of humour. Most men believe that women possess this quality in a very limited degree, while every woman knows that it is the virtue most appreciated but most seldom found in a man (states a writer in a London daily). Yet men are the world’s laughtermakers, and whenever there is a joke men laugh first, longest, and loudest. There are few women who write with the deliberate intention of being funny. Apart from Miss Anita Loos, there are no feminine counterparts of A. P. Her bert, P. J. Wodehouse, or Stephen Lea cock.

Yet it is these facts that strengthen me in my opinion that a “ sense of humour, - as we understand the term to-day, is more highly developed in women than in men; for it has little to do with loud laughter, and those people with merry morning faces are not necessarily thoso blessed with the saving grace. Two men at least support me in this view. Mr Ben Travers has said frankly that “ women have a far keener sense of humour than men,” and adds the enlightening remark that “ that means a woman does not laugh as readily.” Another champion of women in this matter is Mr Herbert Marshall, whose wide experience of British and American audiences has led him to precisely the same conclusion.

Women, he considers, have an appreciation of more subtle situations that may pass a man by but will cause a woman to smile to herself rather than laugh loudly with others. Feminine humour is more intelligent, more highly evolved, and more sophisticated. It is the reverse of the primitive idea of fun which is the sense of superiority induced by the discomfiture of others. And this difference, Mr Marshall thinks, is the outcome of a woman’s greater sense of sympathy. \ Laughter and tears are closely' allied. The greatest comedian in the world is Charlie Chaplin, but in every film he makes there is an underlying motive of sadness. As he picks himself up from any one of a hundred absurd situations one has the feeling that he is ruefully aware of his own stupidity. Harold Lloyd runs him close as a comedian, and displays the same touch of wistfulness. Both illustrate rather the aloofness that is able to see the reverse ,side of a distressing personal situation than a primitive delight in the misfortune of someone else. In this respect a sense of humour and sense of moral balance and sanity are one and the same thing. I wonder how many tragedies have been saved by a sense of comedy. How many people must have given up the idea of putting their heads in gas ovens because, in the midst of overwhelming depression, they have been able to see the absurdity of the situation? A sense of humour in man or woman is both born and made. It is born of imagination and made keen and fine by the sledge-hammer blows of life. It is often the great compensation for a very bad time. The fine flower of humour rarely blooms in extreme youth—the time when life is very real and earnest.

A similar sense of humour is a delightful thing to encounter. It is one of the strong Units of friendship and a great bond between two people. Each nationality lias its own brand of humour. Germany is the home of fantasy, America is the factory of wisecracks: American humour is slick, sharp, and sophisticated, Mr Marshall told me that, with all his wide experience of the United States, he had not yet learned what to say, but he had got as far as learning what not to say. “Where humour is ■ oncerned,” lie said, “ they do indeed speak another language.” The French have a pretty wit The English are the masters of the difficult art of nonsense.

The best things in life are love, courage, and fun, and all the world over there are men and women who find life pleasant because at their birth a fairy-godmother bestowed the rich gift of fun, without which .courage is grim rather than gallant, and love an intense emotion rather than the sweet flower of contentment.