An employee is leisurely stocking shelves in the supermarket one day when a man with a gun busts in. The criminal shoots the stock boy and then flees the scene. Another employee rushes to the aid of our hero, eager to console him. The stock boy looks up at his friend and meekly says, 'cleanup in aisle 7.'
This joke, related to me by a friend named Phil Correa, is admittedly fairly corny. It does however function as a wonderful example of what is, in my opinion, one of the highest and most noble forms of humor: gallows humor.
The fact that humans handle stress in myriad ways has been well-documented by psychologists for years. Situations of great stress, trauma or even life-threatening danger have occurred in the lives of all of us, and each person faces these moments in different ways. Gallows humor is one of these ways and happens to be my personal favorite.
Part of what makes gallows humor so important is that it's demonstrative of one of the higher traits of an otherwise lowly developed society. Gallows humor almost always deals with an impending death'a moment of grave seriousness. The most cavalier and charming individuals agree that life is just a ride.
There are numerous instructive examples of gallows humor sprinkled throughout history. Whether it were uttered by heroes or scoundrels, these lines represent a temporary transcendence into that state wherein man can laugh even at death.
Benjamin Franklin, one of the founders of this Republic, found himself in a room with extremely argumentative delegates immediately after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Aware of the danger hanging over their heads, thanks to what they had just done, Franklin said to the assembled crowd, 'We must all hang together or surely we shall all hang separately.' Despite the word play, I like this one. The charge of high treason lay ahead of them, yet Benjamin Franklin was still able to crack foxy, as the saying goes.
Tallulah Bankhead, famous actress of Hollywood's golden days, is somewhat notorious in the cannon of cinema history for the drawn-out decline of her career and her substance addictions. You may know her from old 'I Love Lucy' reruns where she played herself. Bankhead, whose last words are reputed to be a demand for more codeine and bourbon, had a definitively cavalier attitude regarding her decline. When asked in her waning days if she was in fact Tallulah Bankhead, she would reply, 'No, darling, I'm what's left of her.'
These are just two examples of a common form of humor. We've all encountered gallows humor before, and often, we've let it slip by without truly appreciating the forces at work. During times when darkness descends upon a person'when a storm rages ahead'and that person greets it with a flippant remark, then he or she is at his or her finest. It is this determination to get on with the fun of living optimistically, even foolishly, even against all better judgment, which makes a life worth living.
Eric Chianese is an English senior. His column appears weekly.
