What's so funny about death?

Teddy - the bear with 9 lives!

Actually, it's a little difficult to find anything really funny about death - okay, let's be honest -  it's very challenging. Death and dying are serious events, especially when you find yourself in the unfortunate, and undesirable midst of them.

However, there's one type of comedy that embraces these topics - black humour. One online dictionary  describes it as, "a form of humor that regards human suffering as absurd rather than pitiable, or that considers human existence as ironic and pointless but somehow comic." It also says that black humour originated in 1965 -1970. 

Hmmm... although the term " black humour" may have been coined in the mid 60's, finding something to laugh about death has surely been around since the beginning of walking apes, or whenever.... Humour  is a universal coping strategy for insanely horrible situations.

There are a number of websites with black humour and death jokes.  However, I heard my favourite death joke a few years ago from the Scandanavian American keynote speaker at a Dealing with Grief conference here in Calgary. Here's the Wikipedia version:

Ole went to the doctor for a physical. After Ole was dressed the doctor came in and said "I am sorry Ole, but you are very sick and have only a few weeks to live".

Ole went home with a heavy heart to tell Lena the news. After Ole told Lena he sat in his easy chair and Lena went to the kitchen. Soon a heavenly aroma came from the kitchen. Lena was making his favorite cookies! "Lena must really love me" he thought. Ole went into the kitchen and started to take a cookie. Lena slapped his hand away and said "Get avay! Dese cookies aren't for you, der for da funeral!"

Did you laugh? Yes, no, were you offended?

In my quest to find some respectful, appropriate ways to bring some comic relief to my tweets about death, I spent a couple of fun hours in a Twitter humour class this morning. I'm looking forward to practicing what I learned - I apologize NOW for any and all  offense I may cause!


In the meantime, what death jokes, or humourous death stories, true or fiction, have made you laugh right aloud? I'd love to hear them.

Warmly
Wendy
Party planner for Calgary's Death Cafes