Types of verbal humor

1. Types of verbal humor
By Ana Paula Lopes

2. RIDDLES
•When is a door not a door?
•When it's ajar (a jar).
•
•What's black and white and red (read) all over?
•A newspaper.
•
•What's brown and sounds like a bell?
•Dung.
•
•What's brown and sticky?
•A stick.

3. RIDDLES
•Why is six afraid of seven?
•Because seven ate (eight) nine.
•
•What is yours but your friend uses more than you do?
•Your name.
•
•There were two cats, 1 2 3 cat and un deux trois cat,
they had a swimming race from England to France.
Who won?
•1 2 3 Cat because Un deux trois quatre cinq (un deux
trois cat sank)

4. ANECDOTES
•Cary Grant is said to have been reluctant to
reveal his age to the public, having played the
youthful lover for more years than would have
been appropriate. One day, while he was sorting
out some business with his agent, a telegram
arrived from a journalist who was desperate to
learn how old the actor was. It read: HOW OLD
CARY GRANT? Grant, who happened to open it
himself, immediately cabled back: OLD CARY
GRANT FINE. HOW YOU?

5. ANECDOTES
•Another anecdote is the tale of Harry
Smirvnock. Mr. Smirvnock was going to a club
when a cop sirened him to stop along the side.
He stopped, but the cop car didn't. Instead,
the cop car continued along the highway. The
cop later realized that the Toyota Camry that
was expected to stop along the side of the
road was actually another different car. "Thats
how many damn toyata's there are. Jesus."
the cop said.

6. ANECDOTES
•The violinist Dave Swarbrick was amused one
day to find his obituary printed in the
Telegraph. Apprised of the mistake, the paper
printed the following retraction: "Mr
Swarbrick, who was reported dead in
yesterday's Daily Telegraph, is recovering
well."

7. LIMERICKS
The limerick packs laughs anatomical
In space that is quite economical,
But the good ones I've seen
So seldom are clean,
And the clean ones so seldom are comical.

8. LIMERICKS
There was a young man from Japan
Whose limericks never would scan.
When asked why this was,
He replied "It's because
I always try to fit as many syllables into the last
line as ever possibly I can.

9. BLOOPERS
“Smoking kills. If you’re killed, you’ve lost a very
important part of your life.”
Brooke Shields, during an interview to become spokesperson for
federal anti-smoking campaign.

10. BLOOPERS
Question: If you could live forever, would you
and why?
Answer: “I would not live forever, because we
should not live forever, because if we were
supposed to live forever, then we would live
forever, but we cannot live forever, which is
why I would not live forever,”
Miss Alabama’s Heather Whitestone in the 1994 Miss USA contest, who was
later selected as Miss America 1995.

11. BLOOPERS
“Whenever I watch TV and see those poor
starving kids all over the world, I can’t help
but cry. I mean I’d love to be skinny like that,
but not with all those flies and death and
stuff.”
Mariah Carey

12. PUNS
•"Thanks for the brake", a sign on the back of
buses in the Denver
Regional Transportation District and in certain
cities in British Columbia (Such as Victoria and
Nanaimo)
•(Brake: pun on "break")
•
•K-9, a designation for military dogs or police dogs
•(A play on "canine", patterned after other
military codes such as G-2.)

13. PUNS
•"Funny bone" is the popular name for a sensitive
exposed nerve located where it joins at the
elbow.
•(Robert Hendrickson believes the name is due to
an intentional or accidental confusion between
"humerus" and "humorous".
[
•
•"There is nothing punny about bad puns." —
original source unknown.
•(Punny: play on "funny", in the idiomatic phrase
"There is nothing funny about…".)

14. PUNS
•"The pun is mightier than the word." —
original source unknown
•(Pun and word: plays on "pen" and "sword", in
the saying "The pen is mightier than the sword
".)
•"A pun is its own reword." — Dance Drier,
British comedian
•(Reword: pun on "reward", from the saying "
Virtue is its own reward".)

15. PUNS
•"Hanging is too good for a man who makes
puns; he should be drawn and quoted." —
Fred Allen
•(Quoted: pun on "quartered", an old form of
capital punishment.)
•"Immanuel doesn't pun; he Kant." —
Oscar Wilde
•(Kant: play on "can't", in the name of
philosopher Immanuel Kant)

16. JOKES
•A barber, a bald man and an absent minded
professor take a journey together. They have
to camp overnight, so decide to take turns
watching the luggage. When it's the barber's
turn, he gets bored, so amuses himself by
shaving the head of the professor. When the
professor is woken up for his shift, he feels his
head, and says "How stupid is that barber?
He's woken up the bald man instead of me.