Finishing Tales of Juha

Truthfully, I did not laugh while reading the last sections of Tales of Juha as much as I did during the previous sections. The final selections spanned the following chapters: Juha the Butt, Boastfulness and False Pride, A Witty Rogue, Cowardice, Justice and Generosity, and Critic of Despotism. I enjoyed the reading and found several of the anecdotes to be funny but very few to be laugh out loud funny. I’m always a little disappointed in the readings if I am not laughing out loud. While this entirely restricts many types of humor, I just want to laugh! So instead of bearing down on the ones I didn’t laugh at, I wanted to point out a couple that I did.

                One of the first stories involved Juha visiting a village where he had heard the people are very miserly. To his great joy, a man gives him a bowl of milk. Juha warmly thanks the man for the milk. But in return, the man begins to point out the flaws in his happiness. To begin, he says he only gave it to Juha because a rat fell in it. Juha grew angry and threw down the bowl. The man yells to be careful—his daughter uses it to “piddle in.” I didn’t find the rat particularly funny, but I couldn’t help but laugh out loud at the phrasing “piddle in” and the fact she uses the same bowl he drank out of to “piddle in.” When I read this part out to a friend, he didn’t start laughing until the end either. I think the cognitive shift (the unexpected word phrasing) and the schadenfreude (thank goodness that wasn’t me!) pulls this joke together.

                Another laugh out loud anecdote comes from the Cowardice section. Here, Juha’s neighbor comments on hearing a quarrel from Juha’s house. Juha assured him that he did hear a fight between him and his wife. His wife hit his cloak which then tumbled down the stairs. His neighbor, still confused, asks how a cloak could make so much noise. On the sassy side, Juha tells his neighbor not to be so fussy about the details-- he was inside the cloak! I liked Juha’s feisty response to a simple question. Even though this section was deemed “Cowardice,” Juha made light of the situation. The joke creates a humorous visual of the neighbor’s first interpretations to what actually occurred. To clarify, I don’t find abuse funny or as something that should happen. I laughed because of the surface content of the joke.

                Overall, I enjoyed the Tales of Juha. I was surprised at how many of the types of jokes in Classic Arab folk humor translate to our generation, especially as Americans. The book exceeded my expectations and has been one of my favorites that we have covered this semester.