Humor Writing: How to Think, Write, Speak, and Be Funnier!
What you'll learn
- Master the techniques professional humorists and comedy writers use to create consistently hilarious material
- Learn how to find humor in nearly any situation
- Discover how to take something that is funny, and stretch it to make it a lot funnier.
- Understand how when you write or present humorous material, subtle things like word choice, word order, and pacing can make a profound difference in whether or not something is funny.
- Learn how to observe comedic masters and learn from what they do.
- Learn how humor can be used in nearly any form of writing or presentation to make it more captivating.
Requirements
- You must be extremely intelligent, or kind of dumb, or somewhere in between.
- You must know how to play nicely in the online classrooms.
- And if you're feeling a little nervous about signing up for a humor writing course, that is a good thing. It means you are curious enough to test your abilities and learn something new. Don't panic! Everything is going to be okay!
- Finally, if you are signing up at a reduced price during the beta-testing phase, please understand that some of the videos are still works in progress and will be improved dramatically within the next month or two. In the meantime, thanks for your patience! The audio portions of the videos are still packed with information!
Description
Contrary to popular belief, a “sense of humor" is not a magical “gift" a few special people are born with. Humor and writing are skills anyone can develop.
In this online workshop, award-winning humorist and bestselling author Dave Fox teaches you how!
Discover the techniques professional comedy writers use to write consistently funny material. You'll learn how to think, write, speak, and be funnier.
Each lesson includes specific writing techniques and exercises to incite maximum laughs. We'll focus on writing humor columns, personal essays, and creative non-fiction, but the skills you learn can be applied to writing genres of all sorts -- fiction and non-fiction -- as well as stand-up and sketch comedy, cartooning, movie scripts, and more.
Full-blown comedy might or might not be your goal. Perhaps you want to take more serious forms of writing — fiction, feature articles, blog posts, travel writing, children's stories, personal memoirs … even office memos, cover letters, or devilishly sexy personal ads — and sprinkle in some giggles. Whatever genres you write in, this class will help you infuse more laughter into your work.
This course is also wildly useful for people who do any kind of public speaking, who want to keep their audiences awake and riveted to what they are saying.
So come join us in this fun and inspiring (and occasionally weird) workshop, and stretch your comedic potential to cackle-inducing new levels!
Some of the topics we'll cover include:
The universal element present in all humor
Proven tricks to create or strengthen your comedy
Giving your jokes maximum impact with the right words and timing
Stretching your punch lines to make them punchier
Streamlining your phrasing so your punch lines don't get swallowed up in flabby verbiage. (Mastering this skill will make a vast improvement in all of your writing.)
Learning from your favorite professional humorists
When and why to throw away your best joke
Publishing your humor
How to not be that annoying guy at the party with the lampshade on his head
What's Included:
Lots of fun and super-informative video lessons.
Links to lots more videos on YouTube that illustrate specific concepts you've learned. (That's right! You can watch "Saturday Night Live" sketches and a clip from the iconic "Soup Nazi" episode of "Seinfeld" ... and call it studying!
A free e-book of humor essays referenced in the videos
A teacher who's a best-selling author, an award-winning humorist, and a professional writing and life coach who loves helping people become hilarious.
I am utterly positive you will not find a humor writing course of this quality anywhere for such a low price! (And if you disagree after checking it out, Udemy offers a 30-day, no-hassle, money-back guarantee.)
So hey! What are you waiting for? Dive in today and start making people laugh so hard, milk will come out of their noses ... even when they're not drinking milk.
"[Dave Fox is] the best writing teacher I have ever had. Talented, funny, approachable, and structured."
– Leslie in Surrey, England
"Dave Fox is an amazing teacher who will give you online feedback as if you were sitting right next to him."
– Joan in Bakersfield, California
Also check out my other courses on Udemy:
Globejotting: How to Write Extraordinary Travel Journals (and still have time to enjoy your trip!)
Travel Writing: Explore the World and Publish Your Stories
Deep Travel: Have Adventures No Guidebook Can Tell You About
The Writing Mind 1: Defeat Writer's Block & Write Confidently
The Writing Mind 2: Overcome Distractions & Get More Written
Who this course is for:
- Writers in all genres -- with the possible exception of obituaries.
- Public speakers, presenters, and anyone who talks to audiences.
- Aspiring stand-up comedians.
- Extremely intelligent llamas
- People who want to be funnier
- (And if you're single, did you know that a sense of humor is one of the things people say they find most attractive? Take this course and you'll be able to write killer online personal ads -- you sexy thing, you!)
Instructor
- 4.6 Instructor Rating
- 3,866 Reviews
- 21,491 Students
- 6 Courses
Dave Fox is on a mission to help people tell scintillating stories. He's a professional travel and humor writer, a writing and humor coach, a chronic storyteller, and the author of two bestselling books. Dave thrives on stepping outside of his cultural comfort zones in search of adventures and misadventures. He also makes really good sandwiches if you ask him nicely.
Originally from the United States, Dave started travel journaling at age seven when his family moved to England for a year. During that time, he developed an obsession with foreign cultures, which eventually morphed into his travel writing career. He also developed a British accent, which eventually morphed back to a mostly-American accent, but he respects your right to spell "humour" with that extra "U" if it makes you happy.
Dave's love for humo(u)r writing evolved in early adulthood when he discovered office memos didn't have to be boring. He fled nine-to-five life in 2001 on a mission to expand beyond office memos, and published his first book of travel-humor essays three years later after winning the Erma Bombeck Writers' Workshop Book Proposal Contest. He has been teaching writing workshops for more than 20 years. He has been making sandwiches even longer.
Dave has worked as a Public Radio news anchor, a tour guide for Rick Steves' Europe, an international cruise ship lecturer, and an iguana groomer. (Okay, not really an iguana groomer. Iguanas get cranky when you try to groom them.) His work has been featured on the History Channel, Channel NewsAsia, and national radio broadcasts in the US and Australia. He has also been an opening speaker for Princess Märtha Louise of Norway. (True story: When the princess told Dave he spoke excellent Norwegian, Dave replied, "Thank you, Your Majesty. So do you.")
For 16 years, Dave guided tours around Europe for Rick Steves' travel company. He has lived in the US, England, Norway, and Turkey and Singapore. He currently lives in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, where he works as the Vietnam correspondent for TTG Asia and freelances for a variety of other publications including the Straits Times of Singapore, and Singapore Airlines' magazine and website. His work has also appeared in books by Rick Steves, Lonely Planet, Travelers' Tales, and the 2014 Moon Guide to Burma.
Dave's own books, Getting Lost: Mishaps of an Accidental Nomad, and Globejotting: How to Write Extraordinary Travel Journals (and still have time to enjoy your trip!), have both been Amazon travel bestsellers. He is currently working on a new book, The Ghosts of Bui Vien Street, about modern life in Ho Chi Minh City.
Dave shares his travel tales, humor essays, and writing advice on his website. (Please see below for the link.) He is available for one-on-one writing and life coaching via Skype, phone, and in person.