[UK] Simon Critchley: *Hello, Humor*, translated by Liu Dongxin and Feng Tao, Guangxi Normal University Press, May 2007, 18 yuan
The author’s opening words say, “To try to write a philosophy of humor is an impudent and arrogant act, and that act itself has become a joke.”
Laughter requires the movement of a person’s whole body and countless nerves; “humor,” along with the making of humor and theories about humor, also engages nearly all of human capacities and forms of knowledge.
Humor is the interweaving of sensibility and reason, a mixture of impulse, desire, silence, and reflection, the convergence of literature, poetry, and philosophy. Theoretical discussions of humor are a topic for many philosophers, psychologists, anthropologists, and writers; indeed, one might even say that “humor” is implicit within all these fields as the most fundamental attitude or the ultimate pursuit.
Humor is the most basic state of human existence, and also a supreme state that philosophy can strive toward. Humor is sometimes akin to art, able to transcend eras and cultures; but it is often also akin to poetry, and difficult to translate.
Pascal said that man’s greatness lies in his awareness of his own misery—that sentence itself is also a kind of humor. One can add this to it: human beings can not only know their own misery, but, in the face of misery, can somehow still amuse and mock themselves.
I believe that the best philosophical system will not only be permeated by humor, but will itself be a humor.
July 25, 2007
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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