Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain

I have enjoyed everything that I’ve read by Mark Twain whether it be essays, short stories, or novels. Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn were pure genius and I loved reading them.  As a result, I was really looking forward to this anthology of Twain quotes. I began searching through the pages and highlighting the passages that really resonated with me for one reason or another. I figured that I would probably highlight around 10 and easily be able to narrow it down to 5 for our assignment. Yah, I ended up highlighting 30+. Twain’s wit and wisdom covered such a broad range of topics and really gave me a feel for who he was as a person. We all know that Twain was a brilliant satirist, full of wit and wisdom, and we have all heard stories about him being a cranky drunk. But, this anthology proved that he was much deeper than that. One of the things that I like most about Twain is his bluntness. I am amazed at how he can say in one sentence what other writers wouldn’t be able to say in less than three pages.

The two passages in the Wit category helped me better understand what Wit actually is. I had used the term frequently throughout the class to describe the kind of humor I liked and to describe works such as Tales of Juha and parts of 50 Funniest American Writers. However, if you had told me to define wit, or put it on a vocab quiz, I probably wouldn’t have been able to define it. Twain states that, “Wit is the sudden marriage of ideas which, before their union, were not perceived to have any relation.” While I completely agree with this passage, I believe that it is the second passage that really sets Twain’s wit apart from others. “Wit, by itself, is of little account. It becomes of moment only when grounded on wisdom.” It is the necessity to have both wit and wisdom that makes Twain so great. Oftentimes, I consider things like good comebacks witty just because they’re spur of the moment and flow without time for contemplation. While most of Twain’s one-liners, if not all, were spur of the moment, it is clear that he always had a great understanding of his subject matter and there was always substance behind his reasoning.

I have only had the chance to read a few of Twain’s essay but some of the excerpts in this anthology reminded of just how genius he was. His social commentary was always spot on and looking back over 100 years, many of the things he criticized are still issues that we struggle with today. In 1895, he wrote that “no civilization can be perfect until exact equality between man and woman is included.” I find it amazing that he wrote something over 115 years ago that has now become such a prevalent issue in our society. After reading some of the more offensive and degrading stories about women in Tales of Juha, I’m sure this quote was quite a welcomed shift for most  of the class.

Tales of Juha Part III

Up until part three of Tales of Juha I found all of the humor quite relatable and surprisingly, I really wasn’t getting caught up in any cultural barriers. For some reason, I felt as though cultural barriers were present in much of the third section. This section was full of stories about donkeys, corrupt judges who openly take bribes, and tyrannical leaders. Not exactly the easiest topics to relate to. That’s not to say that none of the stories were funny or enjoyable, but I found a majority of them much harder to relate to everyday American life than the stories in the previous two sections.

I don’t think the presence of cultural barriers makes the stories any less entertaining, in fact, I found myself more actively reading because I was constantly trying to figure out what was going on and relate it to my everyday life. However, the cultural barriers did keep a majority of the stories from being truly funny. Not many of these stories resonated with me at all and I just wasn’t able to relate with them. This inability to relate is what I believe kept me from finding many of these stories the belly laugh type of funny that was present in the first two sections. If anything, many of these stories were a “haha I have a feeling that was supposed to be funny but have no idea what you mean but I’m going to laugh anyways so that I don’t feel awkward/courtesy laugh” kind of way. One of the sections that I had particularly high hopes for and that I was quite disappointed by was “Boastfulness and False Pride.” I was imagining what an American version of this section might include and since America is full of boastfulness and false pride, the possibilities were endless.  Not to ridicule these stories, I found most of them at least entertaining, but the section was definitely not filled to the brim with belly laughs like I was expecting. Maybe this was because Arabic culture isn’t consumed by false pride and boastfulness like American culture is? Since my conversation partner is from Saudi Arabia, this is definitely something I intend to ask him about in one of our meetings this week.

The one story that I did find extremely funny and relatable in the False Pride section was the one where Juha’s friend told him he was going to interrupt him with a nice “ahem” every time that he caught him exaggerating. I found this story relatable because I have a good friend who everyone knows is a huge exaggerator. After we all got to know him well, a few of us in the group began calling him out every time that we caught him exaggerating. It got to the point where he couldn’t get through the first few sentences of a story without getting interrupted. I also found the story where Juha’s friend interjects with the true story before Juha can even begin exaggerating funny and relatable for many of the same reasons.

In many of the blogs so far and in class, people have associated relatable with funny and I couldn’t agree more. Tales of Juha has really made me think about relatability in regards to humor.  I had never really thought of the correlation before, but the more I think about it, the more I feel that being relatable is a requirement for something to be funny. We find comedians funny who discuss things that we can relate to, we find crazy pet videos funny because we all either have pets or know people who do and we can relate to these situations, and we find America’s Funniest Home Videos funny because we have all had things like that happen to us or they are realistic enough that we could see them happening to us.

This is why humor rarely transcends cultural boundaries. Cultures are so different that it is nearly impossible for people from different cultures to be able to relate to each other and their daily activities. Because of such extreme cultural differences, it is shocking that Tales of Juha is able to transcend cultural boundaries (at least for the first two sections) as well as it does. 

Tales of Juha Part 2

Well, not surprisingly chapters 2 and 3 went along much like the first. I was left admiring Juha’s quick witted comebacks even though in these sections they were increasingly harsh and critical. Once again, all of the stories were extremely relatable, giving them a much more personal feel. As expected, I generally loved all of the short 3-4 liners such as the one on page 45 about his wife’s lack of brains. Next, came probably the two most relatable pieces in the novel so far. The first is on page 46 and is the one about relationship baggage and how at night there’s 4 people in the couple’s bed, the husband, the wife, the husband’s late wife, and the wife’s late husband. Now, the deceased part is hopefully well beyond our years, but who can’t relate to past relationship baggage ruining a current relationship? Everyone has experienced it in one way or another. While thinking about this story, I came to realization that I think this is what makes Juha such a relatable and enjoyable character at least in my perspective. Juha has been in virtually every situation you can think of, the good, the bad, the awkward, and the terrible. I think that this is his most endearing characteristic because it allows everyone, regardless of their background, to find something about Juha that they can relate to.

On to the next story which is on page 48. This is probably the piece that I have most agreed with and been able to relate to so far. It is the one about the father and the son and their donkey. When the father is riding the donkey and the son is walking people think the father is being rude to the son. When the son is on the donkey and the father is walking people think the son is being rude to the father. When they both ride the donkey people think they are treating the donkey poorly. When they both walk, people think they are stupid for not riding the donkey. And finally, when the two decide to carry the donkey, people think they are being imbeciles. Obviously, the moral of the story is that you can never please anyone which is very applicable to everyday life and an internal conflict that many of us face daily.

Another story that I really enjoyed was the one where Juha sold his entire house besides one nail. I felt that this story was a particularly good example of Juha embodying the trickster figure. Also, it gave me a good belly-laugh.

Next, came chapter 4, which for me, provided quite the cognitive shift. Admittedly, I skipped the title page for the chapter so I was not expecting for the stories to shift from Juha being all knowing and full of wit to naïve and stupid. Even though it’s a completely different kind of humor, self-depreciating on the part of Juha if you will, I still thoroughly enjoyed this section. My favorites were the ones about the pigeons flying out of his hands, his wife asking for the matches on his left, the miscounting of the donkeys, and the proclamation that his daughter was six months pregnant. I feel like it is due to the precedent set in previous chapters that these stories include cognitive shifts. Throughout the first three chapters, Juha is the wittiest character I have ever read about and seems to 99% of the time get the upper hand. Obviously, that trend does not continue in chapter four but for some reason, time after time I expected that it would hence the continual cognitive shifts.  I can't think of the word, but in this section, he clearly encompasses the  naive and lacking-in-common-sense character who is generally the brunt of most comedies. No offense to Juha, but in chapter 4 he slowly but surely began to remind me of current figures in pop culture who have made a living off of being mind-numbingly stupid (Snooki to be specific).

Tales of Juha Part 1

When I looked at the assignment sheet and saw that Tales of Juha was next and that we would be reading basically the entire book, I thought to myself “come on. WE just got done with Hokum which I thought was going to be hilarious but wasn’t and now we’re reading Arab Folk Humor?! There’s no way that this is going to be funny or even enjoyable.”

Low and behold, finally something truly humorous! And full of endless cognitive shifts! I expected Tales of Juha to be similar to Hokum but that is far from the case. The first section of Tales of Juha far exceeded my expectations. I love dry and witty humor so I was entertained throughout the entire section. And it wasn’t just entertaining, it was enjoyable. Not every story/joke ended with a chuckle, even though many of them did, but there was not a single story that had me bored while there were a few that had me cracking up. I find it very interesting that I didn’t find African American humor to be very funny but that so far I have found Arab Folk Humor hilarious. I figured that the differences in culture would be much more prevalent in the Arab Folk Humor and would prevent me from enjoying the stories.

However, even though Arab culture was prevalent throughout the first section, it was very relatable. As they said in the introduction, “there are certain comic personalities that cross the boundaries with ease and weave their way into a different culture. I think Juha is one such personality.” While reading this in the introduction, I was extremely skeptical. I found it hard to believe that you could translate Arab folk humor for different cultures and have Juha still be a comic character. Clearly, I was wrong.

I find the fact that it was possible for Juha to weave his way into our culture and still be a comic personality. I’m sure Juha is an even funnier character to Arabs but the fact that he is funny to us also really amazes me. It was also very interesting that although there were many aspects of Arab culture in the Tales of Juha, they didn’t prevent people who aren’t familiar with the culture from enjoying the stories. Even though donkeys were mentioned in the stories numerous times and I’ve never owned a donkey, I still found the stories quite humorous. Also, a few of the stories discussed having multiple wives which has never been a part of American culture (to my knowledge) and I was still able to find the stories funny.

I don’t want to say that the stories were dumbed down because that would be inaccurate but there was definitely a sense of universal understanding present in Tales of Juha that wasn’t present in any of our previous novels. Even in 50 Funniest American Writers, some of the stories were way over my head. I think it is a true testament to the genius of Juha that people are able to find the character funny across very different cultures and I don’t think I’ve ever had a chance to examine a character who has been so successful at this. Usually, when people try to translate things that were successful in other cultures into American culture, the movie, novel, song or whatever it may be flops.

 I also feel that it is a testament to the changing times of American culture that a book of Arab Folk Humor is even published let alone widely read. People might and still do (just as I did) have their own individual prejudices, but as a whole, I feel like at least on the outside, America has become much more accepting of other cultures. Like I said, I was very skeptical at first, but I am now truly amazed that “the humor [of Juha] transcends national and cultural boundaries to achieve a university that is instantly recognizable and accessible today.”

5th Meeting with Khalifa

Yesterday, I met with Khalifa for the fifth time. We again met for dinner. Our conversation started out very casual as usual. We talked about our weeks and he was amazed by the amount of tests and papers that I have due next week. He’s still working on getting his move to California approved and is getting more excited by the day. His cousin went to school in California and has told him amazing things. However, he’s also feeling a lot of pressure from his family to finish school and get back to Saudi Arabia because they need his help. His education is taking a lot longer than it took his brother so some of the family is getting rather impatient. From what I could tell, it seemed as though family pressure in Saudi Arabia is even more prevalent than in the US.

Next, the election came up and I’m sure he could immediately tell that it was something that I didn’t want to talk about. However, we did have a brief discussion about a few of his observations. He had seen that heat map and was amazed that a large portion of the map was red with the occasional blue pocket yet Obama had 51% of the vote. I know the middle of the US is spread out a lot more than the east and west coasts but it still amazes me how the small amount of blue on that map makes up over half of the American population. I really had no explanation or way to explain it but told him that he will experience first-hand the mass population of certain areas of the US when he moves to California.

Once our conversation began winding down, he shocked me and once again started to open up about his life back home. It started when he offered me a cigarette and I politely declined. This apparently reminded him of a time when his brother caught him smoking and trashed the rest of the pack. Having done this numerous times to my younger brother, I was very familiar with the situation. He said that since his brother is 14 years older than him, his brother has pretty much been a father figure to him throughout his life. His brother is one the main people pressuring Khalifa to get his education and get good grades in America as quickly as possible so that he can get back to Saudi Arabia. Apparently, Khalifa was admittedly quite the trouble maker in his grade school days back in Saudi Arabia. He started skipping class in third grade, hated school, did very minimal homework, and really had no interest in learning. However, with lots of encouragement from his family, he has really started to turn his education around. He’s making huge progress in the IEP program and is actually looking forward to his next educational adventure. He also revealed that his brother went to school in California and said amazing things about it which is one of the reasons that he is so excited to move there. He wants to follow in his brothers footsteps by moving to California and getting good grades and really impressing his family. I have to say, his dedication to his family was pretty impressive. You could tell, that his family is very close knit and that they always look out for each other. In the me first society we live in today, I feel like America is slowly losing the close knit family environment and it was refreshing to hear that this isn’t the case across the world (even though oftentimes we think that only thing that effect America matter). I’m excited to meet with Khalifa again and to hopefully learn more about his family where he came from. After 5 meetings, he’s really opened up and our meetings continue to get increasingly personal and interesting.

The Lesson and Dark Prophecy

The beginning of “The Lesson” made me laugh more than any story in Hokum has so far. Obviously, as the story progressed toward the lesson provided at the end, it got less and less funny and more and more serious. But, I found the first couple pages leading up to them entering the store pretty funny. I don’t know if it was just me, but until they entered the store and were getting weird looks, I wasn’t giving much consideration to the fact that the kids in the story were African American. Maybe this is why I found the beginning so funny, since I wasn’t considering race or any of the racial undertones, and was strictly focusing on the content at face value, I wasn’t confronted with the issue of African Americans being treated unfairly. Until they entered the store, I was just picturing a group of kids rebelling against authority and having a good time making fun of each other and beating each other up and I thought it was quite humorous. I think this confirms what I’ve thought about a large portion of the stories in Hokum; if you ignore the time period and the racial differences and forget the races of the characters and just read the stories naively and at face value, some of these stories really are funny. However, knowing how poorly and unjustly African Americans were treated, and understanding and analyzing the racial undertones, it is clear that nobody with any sense of heart would find these stories funny at least in the ha ha belly laugh sense of the word. Some of them might draw periodic laughter through incongruities, quick witted jokes, or the occasional name calling but overall, none of these stories have provided belly laughs. Almost every story ends with either an implied or spoken commentary on society just like “The Lesson” did and there is nothing funny about these commentaries. An African American child pondering how American can be considered a democracy when their family was never given a chance is not funny. At all. To me, these stories have been more eye opening than funny.

Before, I mentioned that none of the stories that we have read so far in Hokum have really provoked a belly laugh. Well, that was until I read “Dark Prophecy: I Sing of Shine.” From about the 7^th line on, I laughed hysterically all the way through this poem. Some people might see it as a little or extremely obscene but I thought it was extremely funny. It was so blunt and straightforward and the exact opposite of what I was expecting. Basically nothing we have read so far has the African American winning and I believe that this is another reason why it was so funny. It is never funny or enjoyable seeing a bully win. But everyone loves the underdog. If Shine had taken any of the white peoples’ propositions, I believe that the poem would no longer be funny. One of the reasons it stayed funny throughout was because Shine kept winning and turning down the white people in the most blunt and humorous of ways. By the end of the poem, once I finished laughing, I wanted to stand up and cheer for Shine. You’re left with a sense that justice was served for the first time in any of these stories. There are definitely racial undertones rich white people definitely take the brunt of every joke but deservedly so. Nobody ever gave Shine a reason to want to save them. They offer him money among other things but if he stays and saves them, he will die and the money will be worthless. The setting is on the Titanic, the gaudiest ship of them all, where greed ran rampant and likely for the first time in their lives, money wasn’t going to save them. I feel like we don’t feel sorry for the white people because there is an overwhelming feeling that they deserved it. It was about time Shine or any other African American for that matter caught a break. If this was a white person ignoring the pleas for help of African Americans, this story wouldn’t be funny because that happened every day. That was what was expected during these times. However, the cognitive shift of the African American finally winning and reaching safety makes this by far the funniest and most uplifting story we have read in Hokum.

Khalifa #4

On Thursday, I met with Khalifa for the fourth time. This time we met at Red Cactus. Food in Saudi Arabia is extremely spicy so Mexican food has been some of his favorite food while in America. First, we discussed Halloween. On Halloween night, he went downtown and was not impressed by the turnout. I assured him that this was just because it was a Wednesday and that downtown the previous weekend was full of people celebrating Halloween and that I was sure people would be doing the same this coming weekend. Needless to say, Halloween had not impressed him thus far. But, he did seem to think it was a really cool concept. ?They have a holiday moderately similar to Halloween in Saudi Arabia where everyone celebrates and decorates their cars green and white, the colors of their flag. So instead of dressing up themselves, they just dress up their cars.

There was a TV on in the restaurant that was talking about the election so we began to talk about politics and the upcoming election. He knew a lot more about the election than I expected which I think speaks to the fact that campaigning has become such a big part of the election process that you can’t get away from it. He was very impressed by Obama’s public speaking abilities and also knew Obama by name but only knew Romney as “that other one that starts with an R.” I jokingly assured him that not knowing Romney’s name is ok because all people in Texas need to know is that his name isn’t Obama and he gets the vote. It turns out that this was something that he was very curious about to begin with. His exact question was “why do people in Texas hate Obama so much?” I have always found talking politics with people to be rather awkward, especially with people that I don’t know very well (which is likely why I initially took to humor, as an attempt to ease the awkwardness of the conversation). For the first time, I think I felt more awkward during our conversation than he did. It was very hard for me to explain why certain states as a whole associate with certain morals and ideals especially because the two states he was specifically asking about were Texas and California (where he is moving second semester). I basically explained that when it comes to politics Texas and California are polar opposites. Texas is about as conservative as you can get while California is about a liberal as you can get. I apologized for not having a better answer and thought that he would change the subject but he kept asking more questions. He said he doesn’t really know why but he is convinced that Obama will win the election by a large margin. Immediately after stating this, he asked me who I was voting for. Once again, extremely awkward. I was also shocked with how forward his questions were because usually he asks questions very carefully; trying his best to not say anything that might offend me or that might not make sense.

Thankfully, he switched the topic off of party politics and stated the one thing that he has encountered in America so far that he hates; see the homeless not taken care off. He feels that it is something that our government needs to fix. He says that his government pays for you until you find a job but once you have a job they don’t pay you anymore. I told him that our government also gives out unemployment checks for a certain amount of time after you lose your job but he felt that this approach wasn’t good enough. He said that this is America, people should be here living the American dream, we’re the most powerful country in the world; there is no reason for us to leave our own people homeless. His thought process was definitely very interesting and thought provoking and it was also rather shocking because I figured that Saudi Arabia would have a much greater number of homeless people than the US.

Somehow, we then got onto the topic of his difficulties with math and PowerPoint. He has found that in America, you just learn to get better grades and then forget it all because you’re never going to need it for your job. It’s sad to admit but I feel like this is a mindset that most American’s, including myself, have fallen into. In our results based society, all you need is results and it doesn’t matter how you get there. Cramming for tests is a weekly occurrence and regardless of if we end up getting an A or a B, if you gave us the same test a week later without warning, I guarantee a majority of people wouldn’t do better than a C. It’s really interesting how a fresh perspective can give such accurate criticisms on our society. Not that he doesn’t love it here, he does. But some of his points of view have been extremely thought provoking.