DAVID ELLIS is emeritus professor of English Literature at the University of Kent. His many previous publications include a tribute to the Wittgensteinian Frank Cioffi, The philosopher in shirt-sleeves (Bloomsbury, 2017), and Blasted with Antiquity: Old Age and the Consolations of Literature which was published by the Lutterworth Press in 2023.

'With flawless erudition and delightful wit and irony, David Ellis conducts his reader through the jungle of definitions of comedy by philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists and writers of literature. He finds all such definitional endeavours flawed and futile. However, accompanying him on his journey we learn everything we could wish to know about what is funny, ridiculous, comic, ironic, ludicrous, witty, or satirical and their roles in private life, personal relationships, and their social, religious and political contexts. This book is a joy to read and very funny.' - Peter Hacker, Emeritus Fellow of St John's College, Oxford'This book casts a sceptical eye over grand theories of comedy, from a perspective that is amused, amusing and deeply human. It presents a convincing and right-headed analysis that argues for rejecting reductive definitions and instead focusing on the specificity and nuance in particular comics texts. It's a cracking read.' - Oliver Double, Reader in Comic and Popular Performance at the University of Kent 'The virtue of this book is that it is light as well as weighty, as at home with music hall comedians as with Molière, and while relishing a good joke does not shy from philosophical seriousness. It is a fraught pleasure from beginning to end.' - Howard Jacobson, author of Seriously Funny: from the Ridiculous to the Sublime

• 1. Opening Salvos2. What makes us laugh?3. Types of laughter4. Noël Carroll and the Incongruity Theory of comedy5. Kant's examples6. Comedy as a social good?7. Outsiders8. Comedy and the individual9. Concluding thoughtsEnd NotesSelect Bibliography