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Accounting for humour (wide 47kb image with 18kb image map)   Written by Tom P2 (10/31/2008 5:57 a.m.)
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Here it is, as threatened/promised when we were choosing what to focus on. A tally of the 152 humourous bits in Persuasion, per chapter, and per character where the humour belongs mainly to one character. Multi-pronged skewerings (e.g. of Sir Walter and Elizabeth together, Mrs Clay and Mr Elliot together, etc) are credited to the narrator.

Map of humour in Persuasion

The solid dots are laughs with the character. The "@" signs are laughs at the character. Hold your mouse pointer over them to see the piece of the text each one refers to.

I was pleasantly surprised to see Anne come out on top. My previous impression of her as a rather solemn character must have been unduly influenced by her humour drought in chapters 1-9.

Honourable mentions go to Admiral Croft, Mrs Smith, and Mr Shepherd for bringing a lot of humour in only a few appearances.

There's no accounting for taste, so I won't go into detail about why I counted certain things as humour and left out certain others. I'll just assert that they're all even funnier than this:

Q: What did Captain Wentworth say when he trod on a thistle?
A: You pierce my sole. I am half agony; have to hop.


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