Babe, I Don’t Know How to Write a Joke: Caitlin Kunkel on Learning to Write Funny

Kelton crossed 78,000 words this week and has officially retired the word-count goal in favor of structural editing, while Krisserin wrapped a craft essay for her IAIA mentor and is bracing for a stack of looming MFA deadlines. Both hosts admit the season is already busy — school fundraiser season, novel revisions, and the general chaos of trying to write while parenting — but they're feeling good. Then comedy writer and teacher Caitlin Kunkel joins to talk about her new book, Inside Jokes: A Comedy and Creativity Guide for All Writers, co-written with Elissa Bassist. Caitlin breaks down comedy as a learnable, technical skill: how to spot a "confident idiot," why beginning writers bury their best joke in the middle of a sentence, and how "benign violation theory" explains why some jokes land and others don't. She traces her own path from drama-school seriousness to satire at The Second City, talks about baking comedy into a story's premise (Kevin Wilson's Nothing to See Here, Hilary Leichter's Temporary), and digs into how humor differs across generations, platforms, and audiences. The conversation ranges from Patricia Lockwood's physical comedy to the ethics of joking about self-harm to why farts are, categorically, funny. Krisserin and Kelton close out with their goals for the week — five chapters of edits for Kelton, 2,500 words and another craft essay for Krisserin — plus a listener book recommendation to add to the TBR pile.