How to Write a Comedy Novel

Video Transcript

"Hi, this is Laura Turner and today I'm going to talk to you about how to write a comedy novel. First of all you need to read other comedy novels and probably the best person to read is Mark Twain. You'll notice that in Mark Twain's comedy novels he always has a premise for the novel that makes it funny. Like for example a Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is a novel about what would happen if a Yankee suddenly ended up in King Arthur's Court. He sort of rides on that premise for the entire novel. So decide what your premise is and what makes it funny. Next, where will you set your novel? Will you set it in the real world? Will you set it in a fantasy world? You know, will you like Mark Twain, sort of bend reality in order to put somebody back in time? And what about this region is funny. Capitalize on what is funny about the place in which you set your novel. Next, how can your characters lend to the comedy of your novel? In a comedy you really should pick the right characters to provide the most mileage for your novel. So for example, the Yankee or the American in King Arthur's Court would provide lots of funny situations, whereas the medieval English teacher in King Arthur's Court might provide fewer possibilities if you see what I mean. So sort of choose your occupations of your characters and your characters themselves very carefully so you can get the most out of them. And finally, my last piece of advice for writing a comedy novel is to think about comedy in general and how it's structured. When something is made funny you laugh at it but then if you're actually reading a novel or watching a film that's a comedy you're going to want the next action to top that action that came before it. So think about how you can structure your novels so that people will continue to read, so that the next, because they know that the next bit is going to be funnier than even the last bit was. So those are just some things to think about when writing a comedy novel."