Earlier this century — hah! — I created a master’s thesis on how newspaper humor columns have changed. In figuring out how to tackle this, how to quantify the research to make it as solid as possible, I hit a problem: Not all humor writers are alike. Some seem to write with the intent of making readers laugh and others use humor to make points. This is social science so I needn’t worry that the continuum between these poles is thick fuzzy yarn, not shimmeringly clear fishing line. The ends overlap, they’re subjective. Columnists are not necessarily accurately self-evaluatory — hey, does that sound scholarly — and their editors and syndicate distributors aren’t, either. Also, editors must justify their decisions, and syndicates say all their writers are witty.<\/p>\n
When I looked closely at the nation’s top columnists of 1980 and and 2000, two of the biggest, Art Buchwald and Molly Ivins, best represented the extremes. Yeah, they’re both on the liberal or Democratic end of the political spectrum, but in reading Art he consistently aimed for the punch line, tackling whoever was in power and had messed up. Art told stories, tales he essentially invented. Molly always was analytical, often in a “here he goes again,” but with colorful language and with one-liner comic’s wit, be it Ford or Carter. A Southern, specifically Texan, style of hyperbole was her specialty.<\/p>\n
Twenty-five years ago (oh, that hurts), I worked in the Dallas area, and Austin- or New York-based Molly then called the late Dallas Times Herald<\/em> home. I heard her speak a time or two to the local chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. That was a different experience than her writing. It was different than her occasional broadcast work. That woman cussed in extraordinary ways. It could have been funny to hear an obviously classy, obviously brilliant, mature woman cuss like a sailor.<\/p>\n It wasn’t like that. This was an intellectual writer in total control of language, who used the profane with such alacrity she could have been instead citing French postmodernists in a dissection of the Reagan administration. Instead she glibly referred to the barnyard, or maybe it was the stockyard, being Texas.<\/p>\n Molly, 20 years younger than Art, died at the end of January, and Art days earlier. -30-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Earlier this century — hah! — I created a master’s thesis on how newspaper humor columns have changed. In figuring out how to tackle this, how to quantify the research to make it as solid as possible, I hit a problem: Not all humor writers are alike. Some seem to write with the intent of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[29],"class_list":["post-267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-course-of-words","tag-columnist"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":327,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/06\/dave-barry-but-seriously\/","url_meta":{"origin":267,"position":0},"title":"Dave Barry, But Seriously","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 22, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"PHILADELPHIA -- Amazing speakers addressed the opening morning of the 31st annual conference of the National Conference of Christians and Columnists, er, National Conference for Columnists and Justice, er, National Society of Newspaper Columnists. Time, and the potential for flagging interest (mine or readers?), prevents a full transcription of today's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Philadelphia Phreedom"","block_context":{"text":"Philadelphia Phreedom","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/philadelphia-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"With endless good humor, Dave poses with everyone.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/06\/daveben.JPG?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":366,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/10\/alas-richard\/","url_meta":{"origin":267,"position":1},"title":"Alas, Richard","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"October 19, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2007 Ben S. Pollock Humorist Richard Allin died Thursday in Little Rock. He was 77. The following is why he's important. It's from the acknowledgments page of my journalism master's thesis, spring 2003. At the family breakfast table in Fort Smith, 30 to 35 years ago, Dad laughing would\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Course of Words"","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1408,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/06\/hunting-and-gathering-information\/","url_meta":{"origin":267,"position":2},"title":"Hunting and Gathering … Information","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 26, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"VENTURA, Calif. -- The annual conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists convened in the morning, hewing closely to the announced theme of \"Survive and Thrive.\" Yes, we heard tips; the fate of newspapers may be out of our control, but columnists both staff and freelance theoretically have a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Few Bullets More"","block_context":{"text":"Few Bullets More","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/ventura-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2898,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2011\/07\/paneling-for-the-benchley-den\/","url_meta":{"origin":267,"position":3},"title":"Paneling for the Benchley Den","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 1, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"This column also was published in the July 2011 newsletter of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. Once again, an NSNC columnist conference astounded its audience with information and fun. The June 23-26 session in Detroit catered to would-be and published book writers, gave fresh tips to free-lancers (and in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "I'm Your Vehicle, Detroit"","block_context":{"text":"I'm Your Vehicle, Detroit","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/detroit-2011\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":93,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2005\/06\/couple-columnists-hit-a-bar\/","url_meta":{"origin":267,"position":4},"title":"Couple columnists hit a bar","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 24, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Two columnists walk into a bar Copyright 2005 Ben S. Pollock Friday, June 24, 2005: A temptation is to write rather complete articles from the notes I took at the just-completed conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, meeting in Grapevine, to the northeast of Fort Worth and northwest\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Grapevine Lines"","block_context":{"text":"Grapevine Lines","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/grapevine-2005\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":35,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2003\/12\/humor-put-to-pasture\/","url_meta":{"origin":267,"position":5},"title":"Humor, put to pasture","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"December 26, 2003","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2003 Ben S. Pollock Friday, Dec. 26, 2003. Consider the retirement this month of Arkansas Democrat-Gazette humor columnists Richard Allin and Charles Allbright. It's fair and appropriate and honest (as in honest opinion, NOT truth and NOT fact) to point out the positives in the involuntary departure. I believe\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Course of Words"","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=267"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1498,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267\/revisions\/1498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}