In the vast and varied theatre of human personality, among jesters and raconteurs, among those who, with the mere lift of an eyebrow or the precise pause in a sentence, can draw forth the elation of laughter from the sternest lips, there exists a peculiar figure—one of whom we must now, with due solemnity and reluctant candour, speak. He is not wicked, nor unkind. He is neither villain nor fool. And yet, he bears a most tragic affliction: he is, to put it plainly, not in the least bit funny.

Let us, for the sake of accuracy and intellectual fairness, define our terms. To lack humour is not necessarily to be humourless in the sense of being grave or serious; many a brooding poet or stern clergyman has, from time to time, caused a room to erupt in joy with a dry aside or an unexpected quip. The man to whom we refer is one whose very attempts at levity fall upon the ears of his listeners like damp cloth upon a fire. He is the one whose anecdote ends not in laughter but in silence, punctuated perhaps by a cough, a shuffling of feet, or the polite murder of “Ah, I see…”—those four dreadful words that signify the death of merriment.

This man, the unamusing man, is not a man without words. Nay, he is often full of them. He may be gregarious in company, emboldened by the false belief that he possesses a spark of comedic genius. Yet all the while, his words wander about in search of that elusive magic—timing, delivery, nuance—but find only the barren deserts of missed pauses, overwrought puns, and the endless tragedy of the “You had to be there” punchline.

Perhaps he labours under the misapprehension that volume equals humour, that the louder he speaks, the funnier his point becomes. Or perhaps he relies upon mimicry, adopting accents, impressions, and physical gestures with all the grace of a damp marionette. Alas, though his intentions be noble, his executions are invariably clumsy, and instead of laughter, he inspires only a collective yearning for merciful silence.

Worse still is the unamusing man who fancies himself a wit. It is one thing to lack humour and know it, to recede gracefully into the shadows of conversation, content to observe and appreciate the hilarity of others. But it is quite another thing to proclaim oneself a comedian, to strut about in social gatherings with the air of a modern-day Wilde, oblivious to the yawns he inspires and the desperate glances cast towards the nearest exit.

And yet, dear reader, we must approach this figure not with scorn, but with sympathy. For what is comedy, if not the most delicate of arts? To make others laugh is to momentarily lift them from the burdens of their day, to gift them a reprieve from mundanity. It is, in essence, a form of alchemy. And like all alchemical pursuits, it is fraught with failure.

The unamusing man has, in all likelihood, tried his best. He has observed the jesters, the stand-up performers, the television comedies, and he has yearned—deeply, earnestly—to replicate that joy in others. But alas, the divine spark eludes him. His jokes are but shadows of the real thing—facsimiles at best, travesties at worst.

Yet we must not mock him. For mockery, though perhaps deserved in the moment, would only add cruelty to his already considerable burden. Instead, we must gently steer the conversation away from his “funny story,” gracefully change the subject when he begins a joke with “Have you heard the one about…”, and most of all, remember that he is human—tragically, excruciatingly human.

In closing, let us be grateful for the genuinely amusing among us, those rare creatures who wield humour as a surgeon wields a scalpel or a poet his pen. And let us also have patience for the others—the well-meaning, the laughless, the ones whose jokes die quietly in the drawing room air.

For is there not something almost noble in the attempt, however doomed, to bring joy?

Even if they are, unequivocally and irrevocably, not funny.