Flatulence humor
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[edit] History of flatulence humor
Although it is likely that flatulence humor has long been considered funny in cultures that consider the public passing of gas impolite, such jokes are rarely recorded. An important early text is the 5th century BC play The Knights by Aristophanes which has numerous fart jokes. Another example from classical times appeared in Apocolocyntosis or The Pumpkinification of Claudius, a satire attributed to Seneca on the late Roman emperor:
- At once he bubbled up the ghost, and there was an end to that shadow of a life.…The last words he was heard to speak in this world were these. When he had made a great noise with that end of him which talked easiest, he cried out, "Oh dear, oh dear! I think I have made a mess of myself."
He later explains he got to the afterlife with a quote from Homer:
- "Breezes wafted me from Ilion unto the Ciconian land."
In the translated version of Penguin's 1001 Arabian Nights Tales, a story entitled "The Historic Fart" tells of a man that flees his country from the sheer embarrassment of farting at his wedding.
One of the most celebrated incidences of flatulence humor in early English literature is in The Miller's Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer which dates from the 14th Century. The character Nicholas hangs his buttocks out of a window and farts in the face of his rival Absolom. Absolom then sears Nicholas's bum with a red-hot poker ("Nicholas quickly raised the window and thrust his arse far out...At this Nicholas let fly a fart with a noise as great as a clap of thunder, so that Absolom was almost overcome by the force of it. But he was ready with his hot iron and smote Nicholas in the middle of his arse."). (Lines 690–707)
François Rabelais' tales of Gargantua and Pantagruel are laden with acts of flatulence. In Chapter XXVII of the second book, the giant, Pantagruel, releases a fart that "made the earth shake for twenty-nine miles around, and the foul air he blew out created more than fifty-three thousand tiny men, dwarves and creatures of weird shapes, and then he emitted a fat wet fart that turned into just as many tiny stooping women."[1]
Benjamin Franklin, in his open letter "To the Royal Academy of *****", satirically proposes that converting farts into a more agreeable form through science should be a milestone goal of the Royal Academy. http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=470
In Mark Twain's 1601, properly named [ Date: 1601.] Conversation, as it was the Social Fireside, in the Time of the Tudors, a cupbearer at Court who's a Diarist reports:
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- In ye heat of ye talk it befel yt one did breake wind, yielding an exceding mightie and distresfull stink, whereat all did laugh full sore.
- The Queen inquires as to the source, and receives various replies. Lady Alice says
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- "Good your grace, an' I had room for such a thundergust within mine ancient bowels, 'tis not in reason I coulde discharge ye same and live to thank God for yt He did choose handmaid so humble whereby to shew his power. Nay, 'tis not I yt have broughte forth this rich o'ermastering fog, this fragrant gloom, so pray you seeke ye further."[2].
Flatulence humor and the lighting of farts also appears in cinema:
- Farting featured heavily in one scene of Blazing Saddles. This caused some controversy in the United States: when it was run as a television movie of the week by ABC the farting sounds were overdubbed with sounds from the surrounding horses, so the scene had cowboys sitting around a campfire standing up and leaning over for no apparent reason (Dawson, 1999, p. 125).
- "I fart in your general direction" is a popular phrase from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
- The lighting of flatulence is a plot device in the movie, South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut and flatulence in general is featured prominently in many South Park episodes, noteably "Spontaneous Combustion".
[edit] Whoopee cushion
A whoopee cushion, also known as a poo-poo cushion and Razzberry Cushion, is a practical joke device that produces a noise resembling a raspberry or human flatulence. It is made from two sheets of rubber that are glued together at the edges. There is a small opening with a flap at one end for air to enter and leave the cushion.
To use it, one must first inflate it with air and then place it on a chair. An unsuspecting victim sits on the whoopee cushion, forcing the air out of the opening which causes the flap to vibrate and produce its distinctive sound.
The item was invented around 1940 by the Jem Rubber Co. of Toronto, Canada by employees who were experimenting with scrap sheets of rubber. The owner of the company approached Samuel Adams, the inventor of numerous practical jokes and owner of S.S. Adams Co., with the newly invented item. Adams said that the item was "too vulgar" and would never sell. Fortunately for Jem Rubber, other companies were approached and the product quickly proved to be a success.
In the 1990s, a new era of technology opened as self-inflating whoopee cushions and remote-controlled whoopee cushions were introduced.
[edit] Fart alarm
A fart alarm (also called a fart detector) is a device that claims to sound an alarm upon detecting flatulence. In reality, it goes off whenever someone pushes the button or walks by.
The fart alarm very closely resembles a smoke detector but when activated (by button or motion sensor), the fart alarm bursts into life shouting its warning with light flashing and sirens wailing.
The battery-operated fart alarm employs a motion sensor so that, when a person walks by, a red light starts flashing and its siren sounds and a recorded voice loudly proclaims, "Fart detected! Fart detected! Warning perimeter violation! Do not come any closer! You have entered a no farting zone!! Evacuate, Evacuate!"
The fart alarm is intended to create an embarrassing situation for the victim and can be used anywhere: at home, office, school, bathrooms, in a car or mobile home or any other place one may have the nerve to place it.
[edit] Fart extinguisher
A fart extinguisher is a novelty device that purports to be able to extinguish the foul odor of flatulence by masking it.
Intended to mimic a fire extinguisher in design, they sometimes release an air freshener and are most often given as gag gifts.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ François Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel. W.W. Norton & Co. 1990, p.214
- ^ 1601 by Mark Twain
