[On famous Nobel Laureate Niels Bohr][Niels] Bohr's sort of humor, use of parables and stories, tolerance, dependence on family, feelings of indebtedness, obligation, and guilt, and his sense of responsibility for science, community, and, ultimately, humankind in general, are common traits of the Jewish intellectual. So too is a well-fortified atheism. Bohr ended with no religious belief and a dislike of all religions that claimed to base their teachings on revelations.

He was not at all what is called ‘a character’. He was an innocent, affable old man who had somehow preserved his good humor – much more than that, a mysterious and tranquil joy – throughout a life which to all outward observation had been overloaded with misfortune. He had like many another been born in full sunlight and lived to see night fall.

When she was chair of the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2010, Daisy Goodwin wrote a controversial essay lamenting the 'unrelenting grimness' of so many novels and pointing out that 'generally great fiction contains light and shade'---not only misery but joy and humor. 'It is time for publishers to stop treating literary fiction as the novelistic equivalent of cod-liver oil: if it's nasty it must be good for you.

Fang swerved closer to me, big and supremely graceful, like a black panther with wings. Oh, God. I'm so stupid. Forget I just said that. "He needs a Band-Aid," I said. A look passed between me and Fang, full of suppressed humor, relief, understanding,love — Forget I said that too. I don't know what's wrong with me.

There are so many things to talk about between black people, Hispanic people, white people, gay people, men, women, it's all based on fear. We all have fears, this thing that stops us from embracing as we are one. We are never going to be one. People are messed up, but humor lets us see how ignorant we can be.

Thomas, my 15-year-old, is effectively my editor, I've always trusted his voice, more than anybody, on the strip for years. He has one of those ears that's just tuned to the rhythm of humor, so if he says something's not funny, my stomach just hurts because I know he's right, and it's already been drawn.

If we went by the world's definition of who I'm supposed to be because I look weird... 'Well, surely, this guy can't have a productive life, surely, he doesn't have a sense of humor. Surely, he can't love life.' We stereotype people in this world. And so... if the world thinks you're not good enough, it's a lie, you know. Get a second opinion.

We're all screwed up. And the way Christians mess things up is we act like we've got it going on. And if we would just stay in that place of, 'Hey, we're all screwed up and but for the grace of God, none of us have a shot here.' We need to have a sense of humor about it; that's kind of the way I've always faced my comedy.

I am a political human being. I have - that's one of my interests. I studied political science in college. I was actually going to get my Ph.D. in poli-sci. And a lot of my material from early on in my career dealt with politics, so I've always considered myself as somebody who enjoys political humor. So I'm not going to stop.

“The talked about their messed-up, dysfunctional families, carefully respecting boundaries, never probing too deep in any one sitting. And they always ended up laughing. Even when the subject matter was intense or macabre, Henry’s sick and twisted and often politically incorrect sense of humor was infectious…Gloria laughed more in these first weeks at Oxford then she remembered laughing almost anywhere.”