Infiltration statt Konfrontation: Weibliche Komik in Sylvia Townsend Warners Lolly Willowes

Abstract

With reference to the theoretical controversy about gender-specific humour this essay intends to explore the various expressions of female humour in Sylvia Townsend Warners novel Lolly Willowes. On the understanding that the established studies of humour have traditionally been studies of male humour (without being de-fined as such) and so have either disregarded or belittled female humour, this essay illustrates how the subversive tendencies of female comedy have worked out comical effects different from those of male writings, and consequently require different standards of criticism. In Lolly Willowes, a novel which continuously oscillates between realism and the imaginary, the obscure laughter accordingly manifests itself as ‘giggling’ and therefore (in the terms of Plessner) marks an indefinable ‘space between.’ The reader’s comic sensations, stimulated by this muted laughter, originate less from the traditional effects of comedy such as burlesque comparisons, or the comical effects of the unexpected, but much rather from a thrilling and tickling awareness of insecurity