Flatulence humor
Encyclopedia
Joke
A joke is a phrase or a paragraph with a humorous twist. It can be in many different forms, such as a question or short story. To achieve this end, jokes may employ irony, sarcasm, word play and other devices...
, practical joke device
Practical joke device
A practical joke device is a manufactured prop or toy intended to confuse, frighten, or amuse individuals as a prank. Often, these objects are harmless facsimiles of disgusting or terrifying objects, such as vomit or spilled nail polish...
, or other humor related to flatulence
Flatulence
Flatulence is the expulsion through the rectum of a mixture of gases that are byproducts of the digestion process of mammals and other animals. The medical term for the mixture of gases is flatus, informally known as a fart, or simply gas...
.
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. Two important early texts are the 5th century BC plays The KnightsThe Knights
The Knights was the fourth play written by Aristophanes, the master of an ancient form of drama known as Old Comedy. The play is a satire on the social and political life of classical Athens during the Peloponnesian War and in this respect it is typical of all the dramatist's early plays...
and The Clouds
The Clouds
The Clouds is a comedy written by the celebrated playwright Aristophanes lampooning intellectual fashions in classical Athens. It was originally produced at the City Dionysia in 423 BC and it was not well received, coming last of the three plays competing at the festival that year. It was revised...
, both by Aristophanes
Aristophanes
Aristophanes , son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete...
, which contain numerous "fart" jokes. Another example from classical times appeared in Apocolocyntosis or The Pumpkinification of Claudius
Claudius
Claudius , was Roman Emperor from 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, he was the son of Drusus and Antonia Minor. He was born at Lugdunum in Gaul and was the first Roman Emperor to be born outside Italy...
, a satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
attributed to Seneca
Seneca the Younger
Lucius Annaeus Seneca was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero...
on the late Roman emperor:
He later explains he got to the afterlife with a quote from Homer
Homer
In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...
:
Archeologist Warwick Ball
Warwick Ball
Warwick Ball is an Australian born Near Eastern archeologist.In the past 30 years, Ball has mainly excavated in Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan.Ball was formerly director of excavations at The British School of Archaeology in Iraq....
asserts that the Roman Emperor
Roman Emperor
The Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period . The Romans had no single term for the office although at any given time, a given title was associated with the emperor...
Elagabulus played practical jokes on his guests, employing a whoopee cushion
Whoopee cushion
A whoopee cushion, also known as a poo-poo cushion and Razzberry Cushion, is a practical joke device, used in a form of flatulence humor, which produces a noise resembling a raspberry or human flatulence. It is made from two sheets of rubber that are glued together at the edges...
-like device at dinner parties.
In the translated version of Penguin's 1001 Arabian Nights
The Book of One Thousand and One Nights
One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories and folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age...
Tales, a story entitled "The Historic Fart" tells of a man that flees his country from the sheer embarrassment of farting at his wedding
Wedding
A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...
, only to return ten years later to discover that his fart had become so famous, that people used the anniversary of its occurrence to date other events. Upon learning this he exclaimed, "Verily, my fart has become a date! I shall be remembered forever!"
One of the most celebrated incidents of flatulence humor in early English literature
English literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
is in The Miller's Tale by Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...
which dates from the 14th century. The character Nicholas sticks his buttocks out of a window at night and humiliates his rival Absolom by farting in his face. But Absolom gets revenge by thrusting a red-hot plough blade between Nicholas's cheeks ("ammyd the ers")
François Rabelais
François Rabelais
François Rabelais was a major French Renaissance writer, doctor, Renaissance humanist, monk and Greek scholar. He has historically been regarded as a writer of fantasy, satire, the grotesque, bawdy jokes and songs...
' tales of Gargantua and Pantagruel
Gargantua and Pantagruel
The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel is a connected series of five novels written in the 16th century by François Rabelais. It is the story of two giants, a father and his son and their adventures, written in an amusing, extravagant, satirical vein...
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."
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin
Dr. Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat...
, in his open letter "To the Royal Academy of Farting", satirically proposes that converting farts into a more agreeable form through science should be a milestone goal of the Royal Academy.
In Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...
's 1601
1601 (Mark Twain)
[Date: 1601.] Conversation, as it was the Social Fireside, in the Time of the Tudors. or simply 1601 is the title of a humorous risque work by Mark Twain, first published anonymously in 1880, and finally acknowledged by the author in 1906....
, 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:
The Queen inquires as to the source, and receives various replies. Lady Alice says
In the 1940s a clandestine record called "The Crepitation Contest" was produced, allegedly by Canadian Broadcast Corporation staff (narration by sportscaster Sidney S. Brown, who identifies himself in the closing seconds of the original unedited recording, and "sound effects" by his producer, Jules Lipton). The recording is in the manner of a seemingly real radio broadcast of a live sporting event, complete with pre-game interviews of the contestants (the “champion”, Lord Windesmear and the challenger, Paul Boomer), detailed descriptions of all aspects of the competition as it unfolds, including the rules and traditions associated with the sport, play-by-play reporting, and crowd sounds reacting to the drama. The listener also hears a game official on the field as he announces scores attributed to the flatulence sounds emitted by each contestant in the competition.
Australian comedy musician Kevin Bloody Wilson
Kevin Bloody Wilson
Kevin Bloody Wilson is a comedy singer/songwriter who uses his heavy Australian accent/style with great success...
released his song Mick the Master Farter on his 1984 album Return of the Yobbo. The song contains references to his schoolfriend Mick's uncanny ability to fart, and how it solved various situations, e.g. helping his team win a school rugby league match, playing the trombone at a Kamahl
Kamahl
Kamahl is the stage name of Kandiah Kamalesvaran , an Australian singer and recording artist, perhaps best known for "The Elephant Song", and his repertoire of popular music.-Early life:...
concert when the trombone player did not show up, and winning the America's Cup yacht race.
First Chorus from the song:
"Mick, me mate the master farter
Brought the art back into farting with his custom-tailored farts
Mick, me mate the master farter
Broke new ground with breaking wind, with his double-jointed arse.
The bawdy rugby song "Twas On The Good Ship Venus" includes a verse about a flatulent first-mate:-
The first-mate's name was Carter
By Christ he was a farter
When the wind didn't blow and the ship wouldn't go
They got Carter the Farter to start 'er"
The assigning of blame
The sourcing of a fart involves a ritual of assignment that sometimes takes the form of a rhyming game. These are frequently used to discourage others from mentioning the fart or to turn the embarrassment of farting into a pleasurable subject matter. The trick is to pin the blame on someone else, often by means of deception, or using a back and forth rhyming game that includes phrases such as the following.- Rhyming phrases:
- He/She who observed it served it.
- He/She who detected it, ejected it.
- Whoever rhymed it crimed it.
- Whoever spoke last set off the blast.
- Whoever smelt it, dealt it.
- Whoever denied it supplied it.
- The next person who speaks is the person who reeks.
- The smeller's the feller.
- He/She who inculpated promulgated.
- The one who said the verse just made the atmosphere worse.
- The one that made the song made a pong.
- Whoever's poking fun is the smoking gun
- He/She who accuses blew the fuses.
- The next person to speak is the one who stinks.
- Whoever said the rhyme did the crime.
- He/She who refuted it, tooted it.
- He/She who pointed the finger pulled the finger.
- He/She who articulated it, particulated it.
- He/She who deduced it produced it.
- She who sniffed it biffed it.
- The slanderer made the gland error.
- He/She who eulogized it aerosolized it.
- Whoever makes the smoke makes the joke.
- Other phrases:
- A fox smells his own hole first.
- Who cut the cheese?
- Barking spiders.
- Who stepped on a frog?
- Mouse on a motorcycle.
- Get out and walk Donald.
- The first chicken that cackles, laid the egg.
- Somebody's baking brownies.
- He/She who blew the whistle blew the flute.
- Who sat on a duck?
- Who shot a bunny?
- Ok... who did it?
- Who floated the air biscuit?
- The one who complains first is the one who farted.
- It's just that asshole behind me.
- who let fluffy off the lead?
- A hit dog hollers.
- Speak up Brown, you're through !
- Speak up sweet lips !
- Better an empty house than a sick tenant !
- Two sniffs of that and you're a glutton !
- Good arse !
- Ah ! The voice of an angry turd !
Fart humor & information books
There are dozens of books about fart history, fart jokes, and fart culture. One of them (see Farts A Spotter's Guide, below) even has its own electronic fart machine with 10 fart recordings. Walter the Farting Dog is a children's book that reached No. 1 on the New York Times's Best-Seller list. Who Cut the Cheese? is probably the most comprehensive history of flatulence in literature, humor, religion, films, et al.- 1990 Fart Proudly: Writings of Benjamin Franklin You Never Read in School (Enthea Press) edited by Carl Japikse, ISBN 89804-801-X
- 1994 Oh, Vulgar Wind: A Sympathetic Overview of the Common Fart (Culture Concepts, Toronto) by Munroe Scott, ISBN 921472-47-1
- 1998 Tailwinds: The Lore and Language of Fizzles, Farts and Toots (Michael O'Marra Books Ltd) by Peter Furze
- 1999 Who Cut the Cheese? A Cultural History of the Fart (Ten Speed Press) by Jim DawsonJim DawsonJim Dawson is a Hollywood, California-based author and self-proclaimed "fartologist" who has written three books about farting, including the best-selling 'Who Cut the Cheese?'-Biography:...
, ISBN 781580 080118 - 2001 Walter the Farting Dog (Frog Ltd) by William KotzwinkleWilliam KotzwinkleWilliam Kotzwinkle is an American novelist, children's writer, and screenwriter. He was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He has won the World Fantasy Award for Best Novel for Doctor Rat in 1977, and has also won the National Magazine Award for fiction. Kotzwinkle wrote the novelization of the...
and Glenn MurrayGlenn MurrayGlenn Murray is an English footballer who plays for Crystal Palace as a striker. Prior to joining Crystal Palace in June 2011, Murray has previously played for Brighton, Carlisle, Rochdale, Stockport, Barrow, Workington Reds and Wilmington Hammerheads.-Early career:Born in Maryport, Cumbria, after...
; illustrated by Audrey Colman, ISBN 781583 940532 - 2006 Blame It on the Dog: A Modern History of the Fart (Ten Speed Press) by Jim DawsonJim DawsonJim Dawson is a Hollywood, California-based author and self-proclaimed "fartologist" who has written three books about farting, including the best-selling 'Who Cut the Cheese?'-Biography:...
, ISBN 781580 087513 - 2008 Farts: A Spotter's Guide (Chronicle Books) by Crai S. Bower; illustrated by Travis Millard, ISBN 780811 866095