Anglopolis: Wit

Understanding English humour can be tough and some forms of humour are tougher than others. There’s the entirely non-verbal comedy of Mr. Bean, played by British actor Rowan Atkinson, at the easy end of the scale. Then come satirical shows like Spitting Image; even if you miss some of the verbal humour, the puppets are still pretty funny. But what if the humour depends entirely on witty language to get a laugh? Here’s a quick guide to some of the English language’s wittiest figures.

Jane Austen (1775-1817)

Writer Jane Austen created six novels full of witty social commentary about English middle-class society in the early 1800s. This was the world that Austen herself lived in and she uses witty observations to satirise the hypocrisy that she sees around her. The characters talk a lot about correct behaviour and politeness but Austen shows that, under the surface, her characters are often the opposite of polite. For example, in her novel Pride and Prejudice, one character asks: “For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours and laugh at them in our turn?”

Austen was witty in her personal life as well as in her fiction, as her letters show. This line appears in a letter from Jane to her sister Cassandra in 1798: “I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.”

Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)

Oscar Wilde was an Irish playwright, novelist and poet, known for his wit and his flamboyant lifestyle. Victorian audiences loved his plays for their witty one-liners, like this one, for example, from one of the characters in Lady Windermere’s Fan: “I can resist everything except temptation”.

Wilde was an active homosexual, which was illegal at the time, and in 1895 he was put on trial after having an affair with a young aristocrat called Lord Alfred Douglas. Despite Wilde’s witty performance during his defence in court, he was convicted and received a two-year jail sentence with hard labour. His health never recovered from the sentence and he died soon after. Even as he lay dying, Wilde didn’t stop being witty; his last words were: “My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us has to go.”

P. G. Wodehouse (1881-1975)

P. G. Wodehouse was a prolific writer of comic fiction. He’s probably best known for his comic novels set in the late 1920s about Bertie Wooster, a stupid but ever-optimistic aristocrat, and Jeeves, the valet who works for him. The characters were played in the TV adaptation Jeeves and Wooster by Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie. Through the Jeeves and Wooster books, Wodehouse uses wit to satirise the English class system. Although Jeeves has an inferior social position to Wooster, he is far more intelligent than him. The conversation below is typical of Wodehouse wit. Jeeves says to his master: “Travel is highly educational, sir.” But Wooster replies: “I can’t do with any more education. I was full up years ago.” On another occasion, Wooster complains to Jeeves about his love life with the memorable line: “The voice of love seemed to call but it was a wrong number.”

Groucho Marx (1890-1977)

The American comedian Julius Henry Marx (better known as Groucho Marx) grew up in Manhattan, the son of Jewish immigrants. He had a solo career in radio, TV and theatre but also made several films together with his brothers Chico and Harpo (the Marx Brothers). His distinctive humorous look of glasses, large nose, moustache and cigar has lived on in the so-called “Groucho glasses”. But he had plenty of verbal wit too and some of his lines have become popular quotations, for example: “Please accept my resignation. I don’t want to belong to any club that will accept me as a member,” and “I’ve had a perfectly wonderful evening, but this wasn’t it.” 

Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)

Poet and critic Dorothy Parker was well known for her sharp wit. In fact, her wit was so sharp that it often caused offence and even got her fired. She once said: “The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue.” Like Groucho Marx, Parker was Jewish and from New York. Like Jane Austen, she satirised the quirks and hypocrisy of the society around her. Parker started her writing career as a theatre critic for the magazine Vanity Fair —it was a job she got when P. G. Wodehouse went on holiday. As well as writing, Parker campaigned for social justice and once travelled to Spain as part of an anti-Francoist group. Before she died, she suggested the epitaph for her grave should be: “Mind my ashes.”