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Language and Literature
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The distribution of humour in literary texts is not random: a statistical analysis

Marcella Corduas

Università di Napoli Federico , Italy, marcella.corduas{at}unina.it

Salvatore Attardo

Texas A & M University - Commerce, USA, sattardo{at}gmail.com

Alyson Eggleston

Purdue University, USA, ageggles{at}purdue.edu

The article presents statistical evidence for the claim that the distribution of humor in Oscar Wilde's Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Douglas Adams's The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy is not random and differs significantly between both texts. Using the methodology of the General Theory of Verbal Humor, all the instances of humour in both texts were identified and recorded. The distance between each instance was then calculated and subjected to analysis. The statistical model used to prove the hypotheses is explained in some detail and some hypotheses to explain the findings are presented. The significance of the finding that the distribution of humour in long texts is not random is found to lie in having introduced a new fact in need of explanation through literary theories.

Key Words: Adams • Douglas • General Theory of Verbal Humor • statistics • time series • Wilde • Oscar

Language and Literature, Vol. 17, No. 3, 253-270 (2008)
DOI: 10.1177/0963947008092505
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