Wit vs. humor: Ya either got it or ya don't

[thatcrazycajun]

Humor in general ranges from the puerile and juvenile ("He said 'boob'...heh-heh, heh-heh") to the cheap and easy (see most of the puns slung around here) to the viscerally funny ("But 'Football to the Groin' has a football to the groin!"). But true wit—humor derived from high erudition and intelligence, often spontaneously and at short notice, and just as often involving inspired wordplay—is far more rare.

The Brits seem to have a genetic source of it; so many of the greatest exemplars have come from the British Isles. Examples abound, from the late David Niven's famous comment on the streaker upstaging him at the Academy Awards ("The saddest part of all this is that the biggest laugh that man will ever get is for stripping on national television and showing off his shortcomings") to the legendary battles between Winston Churchill and his longtime nemesis Lady Astor (Astor: "Winston, if you were my husband, I should poison your tea." Churchill: "Madam, if I were your husband, I should drink it!") to the human bon mot factory that was Oscar Wilde (Customs agent at a U.S. port: "Anything to declare?" Wilde: "Only my genius!").

But our country, being born from theirs, has also had its share of wits. There was almost the entire membership of the legendary Algonquin Round Table, Groucho Marx ("I would never join the kind of club that would have me as a member") and Dr. Benjamin Franklin ("We must all hang together, or we shall assuredly all hang separately") and the folksier, but no less pungent, style of the late Will Rogers ("I don't belong to any organized political party...I'm a Democrat"). Then there was the NYC theater critic writing of an actress whose emotional range "ran the gamut from A to B" and, when writing a review that was mostly positive but picked a few nits, was accused by the producer of "praising with faint 'damn's."

Got any samples of wit on that level to share?

Comments

[gingicat]

Beautiful woman (actress? dancer? can't recall) to George Bernard Shaw: Mr. Shaw, we should get married and have a child, with my beauty and your brains.
GBS: But my dear lady, what if it were the other way around?

[scifantasy.livejournal.com]

Hm. According to my research, the "poison your tea" line has been traced to a 1900 newspaper, and merely often accredited to Churchill and Astor.

I suspect my favorite, "Sir, you are drunk."/"And you, madam, are ugly. But in the morning, I shall be sober." is likewise not really Winston...

[stevemb.livejournal.com]

Supposedly, Charles II responded to his brother's worries about his cavalier attitude toward personal security with "Oh, really, James; no one in England would kill me to make you king."

[starmalachite.livejournal.com]

At nearly the same moment in history, an anti-Catholic mob attacked a carriage they believed belonged to Charles' mistress, the Duchess of Portland. It in fact was that of Nell Gwynn, who dispelled the crowd by poking her head out the window and shouting, "Good people, forbear! I am the *Protestant* whore!

[stevemb.livejournal.com]

And a couple attributed to Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (about a century earlier):

"My cousin Francis [I of France] and I are in complete agreement -- he wants Vienna, and so do I."

"I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse."

[mneme]

George Bernard Shaw: Am reserving two seats for my show. Come bring a friend - if you have one.

Winston Churchill: Impossible to be present for the first one. Will attend the second - if there is one.

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[wouldyoueva.livejournal.com]

My favorite Dorothy Parker quote was when she entertaining a friend while her husband, Alan Campbell, was talking to his mother (in another room), an argument that grew more heated.

Parker kept adding wood to the fireplace, and the room got warmer...and warmer.

Finally, Campbell stormed into Parker's room, and screamed, "It's as hot as hell in here!" Parker looked at him and archly replied "Not for us orphans."

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[(Anonymous)]

As usual, attributed to various people...

John Wilkes

On being told by Lord Sandwich that he would either die on the gallows or of the pox: 'That must depend on whether I embrace your lordship's principles or your mistress.'

My favorite come-back in all of history.

[wouldyoueva.livejournal.com]

I'd put John Waters in that category:

“I thank God I was raised Catholic, so sex will always be dirty.”

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

I wish I could remember who these were, three great comics At an honors dinner, one commented "Just look! Here I am, sitting between the world's greatest comedian (gesturing to his left) and the world's greatest wit (to his right)!"

The guy on his left does a spit take with his coffee, and then he or someone else asks, "Just what is the difference between wit and comedy?"

The guy on the right replies "Wit is dry."