: Re: How can I write humor as character trait? I have a character that likes to make humor, puns and jokes. Humor should work here as a character trait; something really peculiar to this particular

@Goswami879

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The question is are you writing a point of view character? If it's point of view then you have to be funny. It's the same way as you would struggle to write a millinery tactician POV character if you did not know anything about military tactics. You just can't sell a character's thoughts to the reader if you don't have a good understanding of the subject matter he is thinking about. Humor is no different.

If you are not writing a POV character then everything is much easier. Arthur Conan Doyle did not have to be as smart as Sherlock Holmes because the POV character was Watson. In the same way you don't have to be funny if other characters are hearing the jokes.
This reminds me a lot of a character in one of my works that talked too much. I did not bore the reader with text to make them pick up on that trait. Instead the POV character said things like "He said something about his dog. I tuned out after the second sentence. His lips continued to flap for the next fifteen minutes"

You can do a very similar thing for your writing. "Someone brought up the President and Bob had to tell a joke. I rolled my eyes before he even got to the punchline." Simple characterization of Bob and the speaker, and no humor had to be written.

You could claim that you can use the same technique with POV. "I told a joke, but no one laughed" but I don't think that works well. With a POV character this seems to quickly take you from immersive writing, to descriptive writing, and that is never a good thing.

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