Gravity Fails: The Comic Jewish Shaping of Modern America (review)

James Bloom has tackled a fascinating and difficult subject. Jewish humor, particularly American Jewish humor, has received a lot of attention over the years but has continued to escape capture. The topic is simply too complex, too various, and too open to multiple interpretations to nail down. Precisely because the subject is so intriguing, it continues, and will continue, to be studied. Readers can judge each effort in a number of ways: they can evaluate the entertaining manner in which the writer approaches the subject; they can admire the creative and novel qualities of the presentation; and they can be persuaded by an effective analysis. Bloom's treatment accomplishes many of these points: it offers an impressionistic treatment of the subject that is often revelatory, and it complicates the subject by viewing many of the interactions between Jewish humor and American culture in a novel way. Since Jewish American comedians and comic writers live in and breathe the culture of this country, it is appropriate and informative to do so.

Yet the task is formidable. One of the problems Bloom faces is definitional: how do you explain Jewish humor? Does anyone who is a comic and is Jewish produce Jewish humor? Or does the content of the material have to be decidedly Jewish? Bloom tries to get around the problem by using the term "funniness" to describe the humor of the writers and performers he discusses, but he does not effectively define the term, thereby preserving the foggy atmosphere surrounding the subject. At times, his analysis suggests that Jewish humor is outsider humor, though outsider humor may be produced by non-Jews as well. The question immediately arises: are Jewish funny people the only outsiders that are funny? If not, are all outsiders overrepresented in the ranks of humorists? These are admittedly difficult questions, and Bloom does not address them.

While concentrating on Jewish writers (Philip Roth is a particular favorite) and Jewish performers (such as Lenny Bruce and the Marx Brothers), he ranges far and wide using examples from European romanticism and the poems of Yeats. The tendency to include illustrations from different time periods and places contributes to the impressionistic feel of the study, often offering unique judgments and reminding the reader that this treatment is not a linear, chronological essay. Indeed, one of the clever ways Bloom has of turning his vagueness into an asset is his assertion that Jewish funniness resists explanation. This can be seen as evasion or as an understandable acceptance of the difficulty of the subject. Bloom argues that Jewish humor often refuses to elucidate a topic; rather, it parodies analysis and intervenes in its own narrative to make fun of it. Groucho Marx and Woody Allen frequently interrupt themselves to make a joke that reflects upon their behavior. Seinfeld satirizes thoughtfulness and trivializes all human actions.

The comics' self-consciousness in each case serves to call attention to their own failings and, by extension, everyone's. Similarly, Jewish funniness is based on excess: too many words characterize the work of Roth, Allen, and many others. Sexual excess, according to Bloom, is another comic trait seen in abundance in the works of many Jewish humorists. In a chapter titled "The Revolt of the Horny" he discusses sexual zeal, as evidenced in Woody Allen movies and the novels of Erica Jong.

In a circular pathway, Bloom arrives at the view that offensiveness characterizes a lot of Jewish humor, a quality common to outsiders. And who is the eternal outsider but the Jew? By turning lemons into lemonade, Jewish humor insults the establishment and the established customs of the society, declares its independence, and assures its place in the pantheon of funny commentators on American life. No longer are New England or the South the primary regions of American humor; New York City has taken over. Bloom sees the outsider...