Try to be original in choosing your setting. Readers may be turned off if it’s a setting they’re too familiar with, as it may feel like the story has been recycled. Also, keep in mind that a vivid description of your setting will help reader to feel like they are there and this may help to make the story even funnier. For short stories, it’s best to stick with as few setting changes as possible. Aim to work within just one setting, but don’t exceed two.
Most compelling stories have a beginning, middle, and end. Across that timeline there is a source of rising tension, a climax (breaking point of the tension), and an unraveling of tension that leads into the ending. Think about what the source of tension/drama will be, and try to work that tension into the specific setting you’ve chosen for the story. Consider how the source of tension can work with that setting. Perhaps the setting might heighten the tension, for example, or create a comedic situation by way of contrast with the location where the events unfold.
How you depict the characters may depend on their personalities and circumstances within the story. For example, you might depict a bumbling “idiot” character who stumbles into funny situations, or a sarcastic character who thinks he knows it all and realizes that he doesn’t know anything about his own circumstances. Make sure your characters are realistic and believable. A good character should have feelings/opinions and should be capable of reacting to his or her situation in realistic ways on the page. Think about what kinds of characters could make your setting funny, or vice versa. All the elements of your story (setting, plot, and characters) should ideally work together, either by mixing well or by creating funny and unexpected contrasts.
Try keeping a notebook of ideas and inspiration. Write down funny things you see and hear, or any ideas that come to mind. [6] X Expert Source Kendall PayneWriter, Director, & Stand-up Comedian Expert Interview. 3 April 2020. Don’t be afraid to draw on humorous elements of your own life and your friends’ lives. [7] X Expert Source Kendall PayneWriter, Director, & Stand-up Comedian Expert Interview. 3 April 2020. Your funny, short story doesn’t need to be 100% autobiographical, but incorporating bits and pieces of awkward or funny situations from your own life can bring a sense of personality to your work. Keep up on current events. You may not end up writing a story about world news or celebrity gossip, but you may find inspiration or even ways to directly draw plot elements from real events that are culturally relevant.
You wouldn’t tell a political joke to your friends without taking some stance on the matter, so why try to be unbiased in your written humor? Don’t be so abrasive that your humor would alienate people who disagree with you, but make sure that you at least know where you stand on certain issues so that you can find the situational humor in them.
Read funny stories. You can find stories by searching online, or by checking at your local library or bookstore. Watch funny movies and TV shows. Though it’s not the same format as you’re working with, you might still get some inspiration. As you watch and read things that entertain you, try to analyze the humor. Think about why you find certain things funny, consider the ways an author or script writer might have crafted those humorous elements on the page, and look for ways to adapt that style of humor to your own writing.
If you intend to deliver a punchline, make sure it goes at the end of the joke. Otherwise it might confuse readers and leave them wondering what the funny part is supposed to be. [10] X Research source Try putting together a list of two things that go together, then add a third seemingly unrelated thing. This is called the Rule of Threes. [11] X Research source [12] X Expert Source Kendall PayneWriter, Director, & Stand-up Comedian Expert Interview. 3 April 2020. The third thing you list should be where the humor comes from. It may be funny because the third thing doesn’t match the others, or because the third thing highlights some type of truth. As an example, you might say something like, “My doctor thinks I’m losing it. He told me his recommendation is to get more fresh air, get more exercise, and stop calling him at 3:00 AM asking what’s wrong with me. "
Remember that a funny story should still have a functional plot with realistic characters and dialogue. You can’t have a funny story just be joke after joke the whole time. Let the humor stem from the setting, characters, and situations, or some combination of them. If you’re trying to cram too much humor into a story (even a funny story), it can make your writing feel like a corny gimmick.
The beginning of any short story should establish the setting and at least one character. Describe where the action is taking place, but try to make that description relevant. Find ways to draw tension and/or humor from the setting as much as possible. Think about how and when the humorous elements of your story will unfold, and try to at least hint at them from the onset of the story. Remember that a short story’s beginning should set something up, whether it’s tension, a source of humor within the story, or something that will be vital to the story at a later point.
Your story’s middle section will probably be the longest. Make your words count by making things get interesting for one or more characters in this section. Tension should complicate the lives of your most important characters and form the basic arc of your story. [14] X Research source Tension often arises from conflict, usually between the protagonist and another person, himself/herself, nature, technology, society, or God/gods/goddesses. You may want to incorporate humor that’s derived from the tension, or you may choose to deliver humor as a sort of comic relief that accompanies the tension so that it doesn’t get too serious.
Tension should unravel fairly quickly. The humor may stem from this unraveling, or it may accompany it along the way. Aim to be concise with your ending. Remember that while you’re working within the frame of a short, funny story, you may have to trim things down to their essence. Try to keep the story’s ending a paragraph or so at most, and make sure the reader finds some sense of humor and relief by the last sentence.
Think about the way people talk with one another. Read your written dialogue out loud and ask yourself, “Do people actually say things like that?” Good dialogue should push the narrative forward. Avoid being redundant or stating the obvious. Strong dialogue shows a lot about each character’s personality (including how he/she interacts with and treats other people). Don’t bog down your dialogue tags (the actions that accompany spoken lines) with details. For example, instead of saying, “‘What should we do?’ he asked, staring nervously and compulsively at the ground, careful to avoid her eyes,” try something simple like, “What should we do?” he asked without lifting his eyes from the ground. "
You may have grand ideas about a subject for your story. However, you need to remember that when you’re writing a short, funny story, you’re limited on space. Stick to 1 conflict and no more than 2 settings to help keep your story focused and brief. Don’t leave your idea unexplored or unfulfilled. Make sure your story fully analyzes the subject/idea you write about by the ending. You can always trim down nonessential elements and words to make a story shorter. You’ll know that the idea has been fully explored when you’ve said (either directly, or indirectly by depiction) everything you need to say about it. For example, you’d need a lot of space to adequately cover the complexity of human relationships. But you can capture a moment between two people and write about some aspect of friendship (like forgiving your friends for saying/doing hurtful things) within a short, funny story.
Some people prefer to write a longer story and then shave it down. This ensures that the story is complete. Other writers prefer to start small and expand as needed. This can make brevity more easy to work with and save you the stress of deciding what makes the final cut. There’s no right or wrong way to craft a short, funny story, so go with whatever feels more comfortable to you. Whichever approach you take, make sure your story is complete, your ideas and characters are well-developed, and the humor is delivered in a satisfying way.
Give yourself at least a week or 2 between finishing the story and revising it. If possible, try to give yourself a month to really put some distance between you and your story. No matter what you decide, stick with your revision plan! Consider asking a trusted friend or relative to look at the story. Ask him/her to be honest and critical, and emphasize that you want to know what isn’t working and why. Looking at a story with fresh eyes will help you see more errors that you might have missed. When the story is fresh in your head it’s easy to fill in the gaps with what you know, and you may not realize that that information isn’t addressed on the page. Giving yourself some time before revising will also make it easier to cut things out. You may be in love with a scene, but after setting it aside for a few weeks, you might realize that it isn’t as relevant as you thought it was.
By having your original intentions for the story in mind, you’ll know what you had hoped to do with the story and will be able to assess whether you accomplished that goal or not. Think about whether the tone matches your intentions, as well as the overall events of the story.
Confusion may arise from the content of the story (or lack thereof), or it may result from a missing or poorly executed transition. Transitions should bridge one scene to the next, one chapter to the next, and so on. A good transition wraps up the previous scene and gently guides the reader into the new one. An example of a transition between two scenes might be something like, “He watched her walk silently into the night until she faded into darkness. The next morning he kept looking towards the horizon, but he knew she’d be halfway home by then. " You may want to ask a friend to read through your story and look for anything that’s confusing or doesn’t make sense.
Look for spelling errors, grammar/syntax errors, run-on sentences, sentence fragments, punctuation errors, and any weak lines of dialogue. Use the spellcheck function on your computer, or ask a friend with strong editing skills to take a look at your story. Try reading the story out loud. Sometimes hearing a mistake out loud can help you catch it better than just reading it silently on the page.
