The Role of Humour in Travel Literature
Rosalind Buckton-Tucker
Abstract
Humour has been a common component of travel literature spanning the ages. It may
arise from universally humorous situations, from differences in cultural norms or from simple
linguistic misunderstandings. Research on humour has yielded a number of theoretical
frameworks that will be reviewed and then applied here to analyse the role of humour reflected
in the works of authors representative of the genre. For example, humour may be juxtaposed
with serious events and reflections, perhaps as a form of relief. It may be used as a strategy to
cope with the uncomfortable and even dangerous situations which occur in pioneering travel
(Relief Theory of Humor). Some writers appear to relish the humorous portrayal of the bizarre,
stressing the unpredictable nature of travel and happily ridiculing their own mishaps or mistakes
(Incongruity Theory of Humor). In perceiving and recording the comic in the encounters of the
other with an unfamiliar culture, the travel writer typically displays a spirit of inquiry and
receptiveness to alien experiences and thus renders the journey and the insight gained from it
more accessible to the reader (Superiority Theory of Humor). Thus, humour is a primary
ingredient in much travel literature in order to engage the reader, convey affection for the host
culture and create a positive attitude towards the unknown.
Dialogue is often used as a medium for humour in order to illustrate cultural
idiosyncrasies or miscommunications as directly as possible, while description contains humour
through, for example, choice of vocabulary, exaggeration, understatement or irony. This paper
will look briefly at instances of humour in travel literature through the ages and then examine in
detail the use and the effects of humour in travel literature with reference to the works of selected
20th and 21st century authors of travel literature such as William Dalrymple, Dervla Murphy, Eric
Newby and Tim Mackintosh-Smith.
Key words: Humour, travel literature, cultural differences, the other.
*****
1. Introduction
Travel literature as a genre has risen steadily in popularity with the advent of cultural
globalization, and humour is a frequently recurring ingredient, particularly in modern travel
literature but by no means absent in early examples of the genre. It may arise from universally
humorous situations, from differences in cultural norms or from simple linguistic
misunderstandings. Humour may be juxtaposed with serious events and reflections, perhaps as a
form of relief. It may be used as a strategy to cope with the uncomfortable and even dangerous
situations which occur in pioneering travel. Some writers appear to relish the humorous portrayal
of the bizarre, stressing the unpredictable nature of travel and happily ridiculing their own
mishaps or mistakes. Dialogue is often used as a medium for humour in order to illustrate
cultural idiosyncracies or miscommunications as directly as possible, while description contains
humour through, for example, choice of vocabulary, exaggeration, understatement or irony. In
perceiving and recording the comic in the encounters of the other with an unfamiliar culture, the
The Role of Humour in Travel Literature
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travel writer typically displays a spirit of inquiry and receptiveness to alien experiences, which
renders the journey and the insight gained from it more accessible to the reader. Thus, humour is
a primary ingredient in much travel literature in order to engage the reader, convey affection for
the target culture and create a positive attitude towards the unknown.
What is humour? Writings on humour span several centuries and provide an immense
number of definitions including contributions to its theories by major philosophers such as
Kierkegaard, Kant and Schopenhauer. In one useful clarification, Rod Martin states that “the
psychological process of humor involves a social context, a cognitive appraisal process
comprising the perception of playful incongruity, the emotional response of mirth, and the vocalbehavioral expression of laughter”. The word ‘playful’ is significant, suggesting in relation to
travel literature an almost childlike enthusiasm on both the author’s and the reader’s part for the
absurdities that occur during a journey to discover the unfamiliar.
How can travel literature be defined? Arguing that travel literature is “the most socially
important of all literary genres,” Tim Youngs comments that “travel writing consists of
predominantly factual, first-person prose accounts of travels that have been undertaken by the
author-narrator” and offers the following explanation:
It records our temporal and spatial progress. It throws light on how
we define ourselves and on how we identify others. Its
construction of our sense of ‘me’ and ‘you’, ‘us’ and ‘them’,
operates on individual and national levels and in the realms of
psychology, society and economics. The processes of affiliation
and differentiation at play within it can work to forge alliances,
precipitate crises and provoke wars.
Some works of travel literature are overtly designed to entertain while informing (for example,
certain titles by Bill Bryson, Jonathan Raban and Eric Newby), while others contain more subtle
elements of humour interwoven with the subject-matter. Humour as a literary device provides a
change of mood from the sombre to the light-hearted, just as in life a serious event may be the
subject of jokes as a form of relief from tension.
This paper will examine the use of humour in literature in the light of three theories of
humour: the Relief Theory, the Incongruity Theory and the Superiority Theory, all of which have
been much discussed and revised over the years.
2. The Relief Theory of Humour
The Relief theory can be defined, simply, as relief from tension. D. H. Monro refers to it
as “the feeling of relief that comes from the removal of restraint” (354). Travel, whether at a
simple or more sophisticated level, inevitably contains discomforts, both physical and mental, as
travellers encounter hardships and misunderstandings; description of these differences between
the familiar and the untried is the basis of much travel literature. The writer often chooses to
couch such recollections in humour, describing unpleasant details with a notable absence of self-
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pity (possibly also illustrating his/her ability to cope and to turn the unsavoury or frightening
elements of an experience into a joke.)
Eric Newby, in his classic 1958 account of mountaineering misadventures in
Afghanistan, A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, while providing a wealth of topographical and
historical detail (Robin Hanbury-Tenison describes him as “the most meticulous and reliable of
all anthologists), is clearly writing for laughs. He recalls how he and Hugh Carless, his diplomat
friend who has proposed the trip to Afghanistan, spent a weekend learning the rudiments of rock
climbing in Wales:
Full of boiled egg and crumpet, we clung upside down to the
boulder like bluebottles, while the Doctor shouted encouragement
to us from a safe distance. Occasionally one of us would fall off
and land with a painful thump on the back of his head.
‘YOU MUST NOT FALL OFF. Imagine that there is a thousandfoot drop under you.’
‘I am imagining it but I still can’t stay on’ (SW 37).
We can conclude that, writing after the event, restraint in the form of apprehension has been
removed, enabling the writer to perceive the comic aspect of attempting a mental exercise while
being physically unable to fulfil it. Visualisation cannot prevent loss of power in the fingers.
Dervla Murphy encounters some unpleasant insects in Gilgit in Pakistan while on a
journey with her six-year-old daughter described in her 1977 book Where the Indus is Young:
“About an inch long, excluding a lot of antennae, they are
yellowish-brown and seem, as they move, to be of a rubbery
consistency. They look not unlike a cross between mini-frogs and
maxi-spiders and if I hadn’t observed them before opening my
Punial water I might have mistaken them for a symptom of Central
Asian D.T.s” (31).
We can almost sense the writer’s enjoyment of selecting language (once the insects are out of
sight) to exaggerate the effect for the benefit of the armchair follower of her travels.
3. The Incongruity Theory of Humor
K. A. Neuendorf refers to the “juxtaposition of inconsistent or incongruous elements” as
the criterion for incongruity. Humour occurs when a sense of absurdity is perceived and prompts
mirth as a reaction, perhaps to another’s or one’s own misfortune or lack of foresight.
Incongruity can also be defined as the difference between the anticipation and the reality: a
reversal of the expected event. Newby, in Slowly Down the Ganges (1966), describes how he
“was just about to eat the first paratha when a dirty, sharp-toothed little dog snatched it out of my
hand and ran off into the night” (107), echoing Ibn Battutah many centuries earlier, who reported
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that a hyena “got at my baggage, ripped up a camel-sack…dragged out a small skin of dates and
made off with it” (Mackintosh-Smith, ed., 23).
Linguistic misunderstandings provide humour of the incongruous variety, as in the
following conversation from Mackintosh-Smith’s Travels with a Tangerine (2001):
‘Mr. Mann, what are those pickwickles you’ve been talking
about?’
‘You are English,’ said Mr. Mann, surprised, ‘and are not
knowing pickwickles? They are JCBs, artics, etcetera, etcetera.’
‘”Big vehicles”,’ explained Khamis, who was fluent in English,
Hindi, Urdu and their various mutations. (219)
Humour also lies in the difference between the perceptions of speakers. William Dalrymple
records the following conversation with an Arab boy in Syria in his 1989 book In Xanadu:
‘Henry Fielding,’ said Nizar smacking his lips, ‘is the father of
your English fiction.’
‘What about Chaucer?’
‘I do not know this Chaucer. He is older than Henry Fielding?’
‘Certainly.’
‘And he is good writer?’
‘Very good’
‘I think you wrong. If Chaucer was good writer I would hear his
name on “Kaleidoscope”. All the good writers they are on
“Kaleidoscope”. But never your Mr. Chaucer.’ (46-47)
The humour here lies in the criteria by which each speaker defines a classic work of literature,
particularly as Dalrymple is a university undergraduate at the time. In a similar example, he is
apprehended by the police in Iran and is unable to convince them that he is not a spy until he is
inspired to produce his university library card, only for suspicion to turn to admiration and
subservience ( 146-47). We also see the writer enjoying his authority and creating his own
incongruity when he is asked by an old man in Kashgar how many sheep, donkeys and camels
his “Chairman” owns, and he replies that “’she owns no camels but has very many horses and a
great number of corgi dogs’” (238), knowing that the concept of owning dogs as pets is outside
the experience of his listener.
4. The Superiority Theory of Humor
Superiority in humour occurs when the writer extracts humour from encounters with the
inhabitants of the target culture, describing an incident from a stance of superior knowledge or
cultural security and effectively ‘othering’ the target of the joke. Martin comments that
Some of the social functions of humor can also be quite aggressive,
coercive, and manipulative. Although it is a form of play, humor is
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not necessarily prosocial and benevolent, and indeed a good deal
of humor involves laughing at the behavior and characteristics of
individuals who are perceived to be different in some way and
therefore incongruous.
Neuendorf believes that this type of humour tries “to generate a superiority mechanism in
response to potentially humorous stimuli” which include ““putdown” humor, satire, sarcasm,
self-deprecation, and the display of stupid behaviors.”
Newby describes attempting to buy a Janata stove in India to replace a lost one, with
minutes to complete the transaction before the departure of a train, from a shop proprietor who
“seemed to be in some kind of trance”:
I rushed to the window – nothing in it seemed to have been
disturbed for ages – and seized the Janata. It was rusty and covered
with dust; but this was no time to bother about trifles like these.
“HOW MUCH IS THIS ARTICLE?” I shrieked.
“Hurry, hurry! What is hurry? Only Sahibs hurry,” he droned. He
sounded like a bluebottle. How I hated him at this moment. I could
have murdered him, swatted him; but there was no time (SWG
129).
However, the apparently racist description – reducing the Indian to the status of an insect – is
tempered by Newby’s employment of the stereotype of the impatient Briton and his use of the
word ‘shrieked’, adding a self-deprecating note and somewhat justifying the proprietor’s
remarks. In other ostensibly derogatory examples, a garage mechanic is “a broken-toothed
demon of a man” (SW 59) and customers in a café are “evil-looking men, all of whom seemed to
be smitten with double smallpox” (SW 61).
In both A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush and Slowly Down the Ganges, Newby describes
travelling with his Italian wife Wanda, unashamedly using gender differences and the female’s
perceived emotionalism as a source of humour:
I had a row with Wanda. It was about something so ludicrous
that after it had been going on some minutes neither of us could
remember the reason: but it was no less bitter for that.
“I shall leave you here,” she said. “Boo-hoo!” (SDG 96)
One may ask whether such dialogues, inevitably portraying the Other as a figure of fun, are in
fact acceptable and whether a deeper, more sensitive and accurate portrayal has been sacrificed
for the purpose of raising a laugh. To answer this question, we should remember that travel
literature is, on a primary level, the recording of experience. Amusing and bizarre incidents are
an intrinsic part of travel, and one could argue that the resulting record should ideally convey
immediate impressions, however irrational or objectionable, while the overall value of travel
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writing may lie in the writer’s inclusion of subsequent reflections and conclusions regarding an
encounter, with analysis adding perspective and balance.
We should not forget, as mentioned, that the writer who laughs at the ‘other’ also
frequently tells a joke against him/herself. Another example, also by Newby, is the ending to A
Short Walk in the Hindu Kush in which he describes an encounter with the renowned desert
traveller Wilfred Thesiger, also on a mission in Afghanistan:
‘Let’s turn in,’ he [Thesiger] said.
The ground was like iron with sharp rocks sticking up out of it.
We started to blow up our air-beds. ‘God, you must be a couple of
pansies,’ said Thesiger (248).
‘
It is arguably the spirit in which humour is included that determines whether it is seen as
patronising and offensive or simply an acknowledgment of the foibles of humanity, regardless of
race or culture. The tone of the writing will indicate whether a writer conveys affection or malice
and thus whether the reader is drawn to the humour of the encounter.
However, there is a case for arguing that some travel writing has the potential to cause
misunderstandings and even to perpetuate a colonialist-orientalist mentality (as propounded by
Edward Said in his landmark 1978 work Orientalism). Debbie Lisle asks, “Why, then, are
travelogues still being written in our supposedly ‘enlightened’ age? And why are they still so
popular? If the Empire that sustained travel writing was dismantled with the various
decolonization movements of the twentieth century, why hasn’t travel writing itself
disappeared?” (2) and discusses various answers offered by current travel writers to this
question. It is beyond the scope of this paper to consider these here, but future research as to the
evolution of 21st century travel writing would be an enlightening project.
5. Conclusion
Humour is, as discussed, an integral part of a wide variety of works of travel literature,
both as regards the process of composition and the reactions of the reader. It may not be untrue
to say that the modern reader has come to expect the light relief of passages such as those quoted
above in addition to weightier information on history, geography, sociology and culture, to name
just a few of the areas potentially covered by a work of travel literature. Indeed, they are more
than just humorous additions, serving as cultural indicators in many cases and also ensuring an
accessible and lively work which arouses curiosity in the reader as to the destinations portrayed
and a desire to seek his/her own truths.
Rosalind Buckton-Tucker
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Bibliography
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Lisle, Debbie. The Global Politics of Contemporary Travel Writing. Cambridge: Cambridge
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Mackintosh-Smith, Tim, ed. The Travels of Ibn Battutah. London: Picador, 2003.
_____, Travels with a Tangerine. London: Picador, 2001.
Martin, Rod A. The Psychology of Humor: An Integrative Approach. Boston: Elsevier, 2007.
Monro, D. H. ‘Theories of Humor.’ In Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum, 3rd ed.
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Murphy, Dervla. When the Indus is Young. London: Century, 1989.
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_____, A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush. London: Picador, 1981.
_____, Slowly Down the Ganges. London: Picador, 1983.
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Rosalind Buckton-Tucker is Assistant Professor of English at the American University of
Kuwait. Her main research interests are 20th century British and American Literature, travel
literature and the pedagogy of literature. She has previously taught in Iran, the United Arab
Emirates, Cyprus and Oman.