# funniest sentence in literature, IMO **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 9, 2007, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946 "2007-08-09T02:02:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/21 "2007-08-09T14:23:28Z")
Dinsdale: > [@](#): > > Maybe not that hysterical, Don’t downplay it; it’s ten minutes since I read this post of yours and I’m still chuckling. ---
**Author:** ![Meurglys](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/258eb7/32.png) [@Meurglys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meurglys)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/22 "2007-08-09T14:37:17Z")
Probably my favourite **Steve Aylett** line is from _Bigot Hall_: > [@](#): > > The most amusing thing about a pantomime horse is the necessity of having to shoot it twice. (for Americans and others who may not have come across one: a pantomime horse is two people dressed up in a horse costume in pantomimes and other comedy stage productions… ) ---
**Author:** ![Bobotheoptimist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/919ad9/32.png) [@Bobotheoptimist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bobotheoptimist)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/23 "2007-08-09T14:37:34Z")
I slogged through several of the Ender Wiggins books just because of - > [@](#): > > Ender knew the unspoken rules of manly warfare, even though he was only six. It was forbidden to strike the opponent who lay helpless on the ground, only an animal would do that. > > So Ender walked to Stilson’s supine body and kicked him… ---
**Author:** ![hotflungwok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/edb3f5/32.png) [@hotflungwok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hotflungwok)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/24 "2007-08-09T15:03:41Z")
Terry Pratchett, _Men at Arms_ > [@](#): > > There were such things as dwarf gods. Dwarfs were not naturally a religious species, but in a world where pit props could crack without warning and pockets of fire damp could suddenly explode they’d seen the need for gods as the sort of supernatural equivalent of a hard hat. Besides, when you hit your thumb with an eight-pound hammer, it’s nice to be able to blaspheme. It takes a very special and strong-minded kind of atheist to jump up and down with their hand clasped under their other armpit and shout, ‘Oh, random-fluctuations-in-the-space-time-continuum!’ or ‘Aaargh, primitive-and-outmoded-concept on a crutch!’ Still my all time favorite quote. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/25 "2007-08-09T15:09:08Z")
There are tons of funny lines from _Good Omens_, but the one that always sticks in my mind is this one (particularly the end of it): “…No,” she reiterated, pointing at the Adversary, Destroyer of Kings, Angel of the Bottomless Pit, Great Beast that is called Dragon, Prince of This World, Father of Lies, Spawn of Satan, and Lord of Darkness, “this one’s definitely yours. From the top of his head to the tips of his hoofywoofies–which he hasn’t got,” she added hastily. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/26 "2007-08-09T15:09:33Z")
[QUOTE=cmkeller] “The ugly yellow somethings hung in the air in precisely the way that bricks don’t.” “The machine produced a liquid that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.” - Douglas Adams, _The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy_ [/QUOTE] Precisely the two I came in to mention! I’d say that at least once a week those pop back up from the depths of my subconscious, and for over 20 years they’ve been making me giggle every single time. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/27 "2007-08-09T15:24:38Z")
“If you ask me,” said Salvor Hardin, _“the galaxy is going to pot!”_ – From _Foundation_ by Isaac Asimov (quote from memory). ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Ryle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8dc957/32.png) [@Mark\_Ryle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Ryle)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/28 "2007-08-09T16:19:30Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] This passage comes from a work of nonfiction, so perhaps it doesn’t qualify as literature. [G. K. Chesterton’s _What is Wrong with the World_] [/QUOTE] Anything by Chesterton qualifies, in my experience. I am not familiar with this book, but I am with his wit. The passage you quote is wonderful. This building block of his argument struck me: > [@](#): > > We all feel angry with an irreligious priesthood; but some of us would go mad with disgust at a really religious one. I wouldn’t, by the way, my ideal milieu is 16th Century Geneva. But Chesterton builds his very serious argument using humor effectively, hilariously even – you mentioned you laughed for days, **ITR champion** , whenever it came to mind – making us more amenable later to whatever conclusions he might draw. ---
**Author:** ![NailBunny](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecae2f/32.png) [@NailBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NailBunny)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/29 "2007-08-09T18:31:20Z")
I remember sneakily reading _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_ for the first time during History in high school, and encountering the passage where Hunter explains that the seasoned drug user is used to encountering images like his dead grandmother climbing up his leg with a knife in her teeth (paraphrasing, of course). This struck me as _hilarious_ and I had to leave the classroom to get myself under control. I also recall “Look, two women fucking a polar bear!” “Don’t tell me things like that!” having a similar effect. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/30 "2007-08-09T20:28:23Z")
[QUOTE=cmkeller] Douglas Adams, _The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy_ [/QUOTE] So much to be mined therein. My personal fave is a pair which pops up unbidden in my mind from time to time, from _Life, The Universe and Everything_. Arthur Dent sees an enormous (and deeply unflattering) statue of himself, depicted with many arms and legs, each visiting some kind of destruction on some creature or other, except one arm which was doing something unclear. Eventually, though… _He glanced up again, and realized that the arm that had puzzled him was represented as wantonly calling into existence a bowl of doomed petunias. This was not a concept which leapt easily to the eye._ This is a reference to an earlier scene from two books earlier in the series (and a couple of months earlier in my reading life), where a nuclear missile was miraculously (or, more accurately, Very Improbably) transformed into a bowl of petunias: _Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the Universe than we do now._ That seeming complete non-sequitur, written in a dry, almost academic tone, had me chuckling the first time. The fact that it was not, in fact, a complete non-sequitur in the end was somehow even funnier. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/31 "2007-08-09T20:39:43Z")
[QUOTE=NailBunny] I remember sneakily reading _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_ for the first time during History in high school, and encountering the passage where Hunter explains that the seasoned drug user is used to encountering images like his dead grandmother climbing up his leg with a knife in her teeth (paraphrasing, of course). This struck me as _hilarious_ and I had to leave the classroom to get myself under control. [/QUOTE] “We can’t stop here! This is bat country!” [Okay, that’s two sentences.] ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/32 "2007-08-09T22:23:03Z")
[QUOTE=NailBunny] I remember sneakily reading _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_ for the first time during History in high school, and encountering the passage where Hunter explains that the seasoned drug user is used to encountering images like his dead grandmother climbing up his leg with a knife in her teeth (paraphrasing, of course). This struck me as _hilarious_ and I had to leave the classroom to get myself under control. I also recall “Look, two women fucking a polar bear!” “Don’t tell me things like that!” having a similar effect. [/QUOTE] Also from _F&LILV:_ “Journalism is not a profession or a trade. It is a cheap catchall for fuckoffs and misfits, a false doorway to the backside of life, a filthy, piss-ridden little hole nailed off by the building inspector but just deep enough for a wino to curl up from the sidewalk and masturbate like a chimp in a zoo-cage.” ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Ryle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8dc957/32.png) [@Mark\_Ryle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Ryle)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/33 "2007-08-09T22:29:23Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] “We can’t stop here! This is bat country!”[Okay, that’s two sentences.] [/QUOTE] That’s Ok. Mine, the OP, is two sentences. I read _Fear and Loathing_ last winter for the first time, and I hadn’t seen the movie, if there is one. The line you quote, and that whole scene, did make me laugh out loud. I have since found out it is one of the most well-known lines in the book, printed on t-shirts, etc. I thought it was funny because of the long build-up it gets during the car trip. ---
**Author:** ![Aholibah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Aholibah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aholibah)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/34 "2007-08-09T22:43:03Z")
Funny, I came in specifically to commend one of Wodehouse’s sentences. It’s from one of his Blandings Castle saga – I’m not even going to attempt to give the context, because my feeling about this sentence is that it is utterly, absolutely, perfectly hysterical in its own right: “The dreamy peer was no poltroon.” For some reason, that combination of six words of no more than two syllables each just tickles me every time I think of it. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/35 "2007-08-09T23:32:12Z")
[QUOTE=Tapiotar] Most of the sentences in any of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books is funny, and some are true, too. The only one I remember off the top of my head, however, is “Getting an education was a bit like a communicable sexual disease. It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs, and then you had the urge to pass it on.” From Soul Music, in which Death quits and his daughter must take over the job. [/QUOTE] That’s from _The Hogfather_, in which Death has to take over for Santa Claus. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/36 "2007-08-09T23:43:38Z")
[QUOTE=ITR champion] This passage comes from a work of nonfiction, so perhaps it doesn’t qualify as literature. But when I first read it, I was giggling for days.\* [/QUOTE] If we’re doing nonfiction, this is a passage that is so funny that I had to memorize it even though I can never get all the way through it without becoming incoherent from laughter. From _Miss Manners’ Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior_: > [@](#): > > \*Dear Miss Manners: > > This may sound silly, but I’m serious. When someone suffers a particularly embarrassing accident in front of you and many others, what is the socially appropriate response? My husband and I got into an argument about this. We recently visited Boston, and while we were there, we attended a large party where everyone was elegantly dressed. At the party, a lady in a low-cut gown tripped, stumbled, lurched across a table, falling face first into a bowl of guacamole dip, and in the process “popped out” of her top. After an initial stunned silence, practically everyone in the room burst out laughing, even though it was obvious that the lady was terribly embarrassed. Then the hostess rushed over to help her and ushered her upstairs. > > After we left the party, I criticized my husband for laughing and told him I thought it was very bad manners. But he said that it was not impolite for people to laugh at something like that as long as they meant no harm and didn’t “overdo” it. I said it was inconsiderate of the person’s feelings to laugh at all. He said it’s the social custom. Could you settle the argument?\* > > Gentle Reader: > > What do you mean “something like that”? Miss Manners doubts that there is anything in the world like an elegantly dressed Bostonian lurching across the room and diving face first into a bowl of guacamole dip while simultaneously disengaging her bodice from her bosom. Therefore, Miss Manners has a wee bit of trouble preparing a general rule for dealing with this eventuality. Nor, if she were your husband, would she attempt to justify a reaction on grounds other than direct cause and effect. > > One might try to ignore a less spectacular accident. If, say, it were avocado dip, rather than guacamole, and the lady had merely trailed her sleeve in it, one could pretend not to have noticed. To pretend not to notice a perfomance such as you have described – even if it were humanly possible – would be to suggest that the lady did it all the time and her friends have gotten used to it. It is far better to comfort her later by telling stories of your own about hilariously embarrassing accidents you have survived. ---
**Author:** ![neutron\_star](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/51bf81/32.png) [@neutron\_star](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neutron_star)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/37 "2007-08-09T23:54:15Z")
[QUOTE=Mark Ryle, bolding=me] That’s Ok. Mine, the OP, is two sentences. I read _Fear and Loathing_ last winter for the first time, and I hadn’t seen the movie, **if there is one.** [/QUOTE] Whoah. Is that a whoosh? [The movie](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120669/) starred Johnny Depp, plus a half-dozen other A-list celebrities, and spawned a huge cult following of sometimes annoying people who never shut up about it. It was pretty good, though I have to admit I haven’t read the book. My favorite quote, possibly the most famous from the movie (and I’m pretty sure it’s in the book): “We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a saltshaker half-full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, laughers, screamers… Also, a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether, and two dozen amyls. Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can.” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2007, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/38 "2007-08-09T23:56:37Z")
[QUOTE=neutron star] Whoah. Is that a whoosh? [The movie](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120669/) starred Johnny Depp, plus a half-dozen other A-list celebrities, and spawned a huge cult following of sometimes annoying people who never shut up about it. It was pretty good, though I have to admit I haven’t read the book. My favorite quote, possibly the most famous from the movie (and I’m pretty sure it’s in the book): “We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a saltshaker half-full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, laughers, screamers… Also, a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of beer, a pint of raw ether, and two dozen amyls. Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get into locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can.” [/QUOTE] From memory: “As your lawyer, I advise you to take two hits of this acid; I’ll take five.” As for HST film adaptations, don’t forget (the actually rather forgettable) [_Where the Buffalo Roam,_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Where_The_Buffalo_Roam) starring Bill Murray as Hunter. ---
**Author:** ![Rysto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecccb3/32.png) [@Rysto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rysto)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/39 "2007-08-10T00:08:34Z")
My favourite bit of dialogue by Pratchett comes from _The Color of Magic_ when Rincewind meets Death: I WAS SURPRISED THAT YOU JOUSTLED ME, RINCEWIND, FOR I HAVE AN APPOINTMENT WITH THEE THIS VERY NIGHT. “Oh no, not–” OF COURSE, WHAT’S SO BLOODY VEXING ABOUT THE WHOLE BUSINESS IS THAT I WAS EXPECTING TO MEET THEE IN PSEPHOPOLIS. “But that’s five hundred miles away!” YOU DON’T HAVE TO TELL ME. THE WHOLE SYSTEM’S GOT SCREWED UP AGAIN, I CAN SEE THAT. LOOK, THERE’S NO CHANCE OF YOU–? Rincewind backed away, hands spread protectively in front of him. “Not a chance!” I COULD LEND YOU A VERY FAST HORSE. “No!” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2007, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946/40 "2007-08-10T00:24:03Z")
[QUOTE=Rysto] My favourite bit of dialogue by Pratchett comes from _The Color of Magic_ when Rincewind meets Death: I WAS SURPRISED THAT YOU JOUSTLED ME, RINCEWIND, FOR I HAVE AN APPOINTMENT WITH THEE THIS VERY NIGHT. “Oh no, not–” OF COURSE, WHAT’S SO BLOODY VEXING ABOUT THE WHOLE BUSINESS IS THAT I WAS EXPECTING TO MEET THEE IN PSEPHOPOLIS. “But that’s five hundred miles away!” YOU DON’T HAVE TO TELL ME. THE WHOLE SYSTEM’S GOT SCREWED UP AGAIN, I CAN SEE THAT. LOOK, THERE’S NO CHANCE OF YOU–? Rincewind backed away, hands spread protectively in front of him. “Not a chance!” I COULD LEND YOU A VERY FAST HORSE. “No!” [/QUOTE] That’s actually a parody of an old story I read in T.H. White’s _The Sword in the Stone_ (and probably much older than that): A merchant of Jerusalem was walking in the bazaar one day and was surprised to see Death; what’s more, Death seemed equally surprised to see him. The merchant hurried off and sought out a wise man to explain the omen. He was told, “It means Death has come here for you.” The merchant decided to flee before the appointment. He hired a fast horse and rode hard all night until he reached Damascus, a feat no one had ever managed before. The next day he was walking in the bazaar and Death plucked his sleeve and said, “I have come for you.” The merchant, astonished, cried, “But I saw you in Jerusalem just yesterday!” Death replied, “And I was quite surprised to see you there, for I was told to seek you here, today, in Damascus.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funniest-sentence-in-literature-imo/414946.md?page=3)