Cheer us all up - your favourite funny scene(s) in literature

Yes - poor Adrian

I am very unhappy and have once again turned to great literature for solace. It’s no surprise to me that intellectuals commit suicide, go mad or die from drink. We feel things more than other people. We know the world is rotten and that chins are ruined by spots.

Also the Falklands invasion. The school trip to London. His trip to Russia with Mr Braithwaite. And many years later, Gielgud the Swan. (They can break your arm, you know)

I'd forgotten how much of Adrian Mole is absolute gold... we were lucky to have Sue Townsend, rest her soul! From the True Confessions, Adrian returns from seeking inspiration in the Lakes:
"It was just my luck to have to share a compartment with hyperactive two-year-old twins and their worn-out mother. When the twins weren’t having spectacular tantrums on the floor they were both standing six inches away from me, staringat me with unblinking evil eyes. It used to be my ambition to have a farmhouse full of Hovis-like children. I would imagine looking out of my study window to see them all frolicking amongst the combine harvesters. With Pandora, their mother, saying, ‘Shush!… Daddy is working,’ whereupon the children would blow me kisses with their podgy fingers and run into the stone-flagged kitchen to eat the cakes that Pandora had just taken from the oven. However, since my experience with the mad twins I have decided not to spread my seed. Indeed I may ask my parents if I can have a vasectomy for my eighteenth birthday."

And the A A Gill review of the sausages from the restaurant where Adrian is head chef in The Cappuccino Years cracks me up every time:
"'It looked like a turd, it tasted like a turd, it smelled like a turd, it had the texture of a turd. In fact, thinking about it, it probably was a turd"

So much Wodehouse...

One of my absolute favourite stories is The Delayed Departure of Claude & Eustace. I love this part, and somehow the line 'I expect it will seem a good long time' really makes me laugh.

Anything merrier and brighter than the Twins, when they curveted into the old flat while I was dressing for dinner the next night, I have never struck in my whole puff. I’m only about half a dozen years older than Claude and Eustace, but in some rummy manner they always make me feel as if I were well on in the grandfather class and just waiting for the end. Almost before I realised they were in the place, they had collared the best chairs, pinched a couple of my special cigarettes, poured themselves out a whisky-and-soda apiece, and started to prattle with the gaiety and abandon of two birds who had achieved their life’s ambition instead of having come a most frightful purler and being under sentence of exile.
“Hallo, Bertie, old thing,” said Claude. “Jolly decent of you to put us up.”
“Oh, no,” I said. “Only wish you were staying a good long time.”
“Hear that, Eustace? He wishes we were staying a good long time.”
“I expect it will seem a good long time,” said Eustace, philosophically.

So, so much of Terry Pratchett, but as I’ve reread Witches Abroad most recently:

‘Our Sean read to me in the almanac where there’s all these fearsome wild beasts in foreign parts,’ he whispered. ‘Huge hairy things that leap out on travellers, it said. I’d hate to think what’d happen if they leapt out on mum and Granny.’
Magrat looked up into his big red face.
‘You will see no harm comes to them, won’t you?’ said Jason.
‘Don’t you worry,’ she said, hoping that he needn’t. ‘I’ll do my best.’
Jason nodded. ‘Only it said in the almanac that some of them were nearly extinct anyway,’ he said.

‘By gor’, that’s a bloody enormous cat.’
‘It’s a lion,’ said Granny Weatherwax, looking at the stuffed head over the fireplace.
‘Must’ve hit the wall at a hell of a speed, whatever it was,’ said Nanny Ogg.
‘Someone killed it,’ said Granny Weatherwax, surveying the room.
‘Should think so,’ said Nanny. ‘If I’d seen something like that eatin’ its way through the wall I’d of hit it myself with a poker.’

You always used to say I was wanton, when we was younger,’ said Nanny.
Granny hesitated, caught momentarily off balance. Then she waved a hand irritably.
‘You was, of course,’ she said dismissively. ‘But you never used magic for it, did you?’
‘Din’t have to,’ said Nanny happily. ‘An off-the-shoulder dress did the trick most of the time.’
‘Right off the shoulder and onto the grass, as I recall,’ said Granny.

How about a date?’
‘How old do you think I am?’ said Nanny.
Casanunda considered. ‘All right, then. How about a prune?’

On my phone at the moment, so had to screen grab rather than retype, but here is probably my favourite joke from the Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch.

Arnold Bennett is great all round. I'd add anything from Cold Comfort Farm or Catch 22. Also the first sex scene from Kinflicks - involving a surprise luminous condom in a dark room

When Pooter paints his friends walking stick in Diary of a Nobody and the friend discovers it .

The cricket match in the Pickwick Papers. Really silly.

I love Wodehouse's Psmith. More even than Jeeves. Why oh why did he disappear from Blandings.

Introducing himself

I am Psmith," said the old Etonian reverently. "There is a preliminary P before the name. This, however, is silent. Like the tomb. Compare such words as ptarmigan, psalm, and phthisis.

Jollying Mike along

Mike nodded. A sombre nod. The nod Napoleon might have given if somebody had met him in 1812 and said, "So, you're back from Moscow, eh?"

(Mike and Psmith)

Dabbling in gainful employment

Work,' said Psmith, with simple dignity. 'I am now a member of the staff of this bank. Its interests are my interests. Psmith, the individual, ceases to exist, and there springs into being Psmith, the cog in the wheel of the New Asiatic Bank; Psmith, the link in the bank's chain; Psmith, the Worker. I shall not spare myself,' he proceeded earnestly. 'I shall toil with all the accumulated energy of one who, up till now, has only known what work is like from hearsay. Whose is that form sitting on the steps of the bank in the morning, waiting eagerly for the place to open? It is the form of Psmith, the Worker. Whose is that haggard, drawn face which bends over a ledger long after the other toilers have sped blithely westwards to dine at Lyons' Popular Cafe? It is the face of Psmith, the Worker'

(Psmith in the City)

and pinching umbrellas

Merely practical Socialism. Other people are content to talk about the Redistribution of Property. I go out and do it.

(Leave it to Psmith)

There’s a bit in ‘my family and other animals’ where he describes his sister coming out of the sea in a knitted bathing suit with the dog attacking her that made me laugh and laugh. I was still at school when I read it. Just hilarious.

Author? Author? Did you write these legs?''Yes."'Well, I don't like dem. I don't like 'em at all at all. I could ha' writted better legs meself. Spike Milligan - Puckoon.

My favourite line in Wodehose is "that time in my life when aunt called to aunt like mastadons across a primeaval swamp
I also like:
She fitted into my biggest arm-chair as if it had been built round her by someone who knew they were wearing arm-chairs tight about the hips that season.

Jane and Prudence (Barbara Pym) has lots of amusing passages. I like:
Fabian often imagined a tablet to himself put up in the church, though he never stopped to consider who should put it up or why.

Anthony Trollope is often very funny. My favourite line is in The Last Chronicle of Barset when Mr Crawley says "Peace Woman!" to Mrs Proudie and Bishop Proudie ":leaps to hear the wife of his bosom thus addressed"

My favourite line in Wodehose is "that time in my life when aunt called to aunt like mastadons across a primeaval swamp"

Mapp and Lucia also funny. When Lucia, who was supposed to play Queen Elizabeth in the fete but couldn't because of her husband's death and her friend offers her the role of Raleigh's wife instead. Georgie says "Raleigh's wife! You might as well have offered her "confused noise without"" And Georgie polishing his bibolots - what a rush it all is.

great thread.

Someone on the other thread said Three Men on the Bummel was even better than Three Men on a Boat. I like the narrator playing golf ... (courtesy of Project Gutenberg).

"To escape from this train of reflection, I put a golf-ball in my pocket, and selecting a driver, strolled out into the paddock. A couple of sheep were browsing there, and they followed and took a keen interest in my practice. The one was a kindly, sympathetic old party. I do not think she understood the game; I think it was my doing this innocent thing so early in the morning that appealed to her. At every stroke I made she bleated:

“Go-o-o-d, go-o-o-d ind-e-e-d!”

She seemed as pleased as if she had done it herself.

As for the other one, she was a cantankerous, disagreeable old thing, as discouraging to me as her friend was helpful.

“Ba-a-ad, da-a-a-m ba-a-a-d!” was her comment on almost every stroke. As a matter of fact, some were really excellent strokes; but she did it just to be contradictory, and for the sake of irritating. I could see that.

By a most regrettable accident, one of my swiftest balls struck the good sheep on the nose. And at that the bad sheep laughed—laughed distinctly and undoubtedly, a husky, vulgar laugh; and, while her friend stood glued to the ground, too astonished to move, she changed her note for the first time and bleated:

“Go-o-o-d, ve-e-ry go-o-o-d! Be-e-e-est sho-o-o-ot he-e-e’s ma-a-a-de!”

I would have given half-a-crown if it had been she I had hit instead of the other one. It is ever the good and amiable who suffer in this world."

Anna of the Five Towns was also very good, though it's not a humorous story.
Let me know what you think of the Card, hardly anyone I know has read it. It's marvellous!

@Fyredraca I had better wait for the weekend - can't put a good book down on first reading. I was sold by "Llandudno" in large German capitals, so that mistakes might not arise

Love love love finding a new author ...

@YesToThis oh I hope you like it, it's one of my all time favourites. Strange that nowadays the author is little known.

Thank you @Fyredraca - just bought The Card cheap on Kindle.

I won't spam the thread with William quotes, but a heroic blogger has done a summary review with short quotes for every story - so handy for tracking down favourites. He reminded me that his favourite is one of mine too: William does sound effects for terribly intense amateur drama in William the Good:

“List,” said the heroine, “how the thunder rages in the valley.”
The thunder raged and continued to rage. For some minutes the cast remained silent and motionless – except for facial contortions expressive of horror and despair – waiting for the thunder to abate, but as it showed no signs of stopping they tried to proceed. It was, however, raging so violently that no one could hear a word, so they had to stop again. At last even its maker tired of it and it died away. The play proceeded. Behind the scenes William smiled again to himself. That had been a jolly good bit of thunder. He’d really enjoyed that.”

All indexed at justwilliamsyear.co.uk/bibliography

My favourite scene from The Card by Arnold Bennett.
Ruth and Denry are an engaged couple, she is a bit of a con artist and spends loads of his money on holiday.

Mixed up with papers and sixpenny novels on the bookstall were a number of souvenirs of Llandudno—paper-knives, pens, paper-weights, watch-cases, pen-cases, all in light wood or glass, and ornamented with coloured views of Llandudno, and also the word "Llandudno" in large German capitals, so that mistakes might not arise. Ruth remembered that she had even intended to buy a crystal paper-weight with a view of the Great Orme at the bottom. The bookstall clerk had several crystal paper-weights with views of the pier, the Hotel Majestic, the Esplanade, the Happy Valley, but none with a
view of the Great Orme. He had also paper-knives and watch-cases with a view of the Great Orme. But Ruth wanted a combination of paper-weight and Great Orme, and nothing else would satisfy her. She was like that. The clerk admitted that such a combination existed, but he was sold "out of it." "Couldn't you get one and send it to me?" said Ruth. And Denry saw anew that she was incurable. "Oh yes, miss," said the clerk. "Certainly, miss. To-morrow at latest." And he pulled out a book. "What name?" Ruth looked at Denry, as women do look on such occasions. "Rothschild," said Denry.
It may seem perhaps strange that that single word ended their engagement. But it did. She could not tolerate a rebuke. She walked away, flushing. The bookstall clerk received no order. Several persons in the vicinity dimly perceived that a domestic scene had occurred, in a flash, under their noses, on a platform of a railway station. Nellie was speedily aware that something very serious had happened, for the train took them off without Ruth speaking a syllable to Denry, though Denry raised his hat and was almost effusive. The next afternoon Denry received by post a ring in a box. "I will not submit to insult," ran the brief letter.
"I only said 'Rothschild'! "Denry murmured to himself. "Can't a fellow say 'Rothschild'?" But secretly he was proud of himself.

Not sure why it’s stuck with me but tickled me so much at the time
Where D”you go Bernadette when the “other woman” is typing a letter from a keyboard that has I think the B and the Ps muddled up.