'He Lessons the Gayety of Life'

I’ll spare you the joke the phlebotomist told me while drawing blood from my arm. Given the circumstance I mustered a polite titter in response. I had already diagnosed him as a member of that blight on humanity, the would-be comedian, the sort of guy – almost always male – who wishes to be thought a funny fellow, a jokester, a real card (“he has to be dealt with” – heh-heh). To make sure you recognize his wit, he helpfully laughs at his own joke. The condition’s etiology remains a mystery but I blame misguided parents who laughed at Junior’s jokes regardless of their witlessness. In her essay “The Mission of Humour” (Americans and Others, 1912), Agnes Repplier left-handedly defends the humorless man: “Charles Lamb said it was no misfortune for a man to have a sulky temper. It was his friends who were unfortunate. And so with the man who has no sense of humour. He gets along very well without it. He is not aware that anything is lacking. He is not mourning his lot. What loss there is,…