Earlier this month, the Book Review’s staff critics — Dwight Garner, Alexandra Jacobs and Jennifer Szalai — released a list of 22 novels they have found reliably funny since Joseph Heller’s landmark comic novel “Catch-22” came out in 1961. On this week’s episode, they tell Gilbert Cruz why “Catch-22” was their starting point, and explain a bit about their process: how they think about humor, how they made their choices, what books they left off and what books led to fights along the way. (“American Psycho” turns out to be as contentious now as it was when it was first published.)
“There are only a very few number of books in my lifetime that have made me laugh out loud,” Jacobs says. “And some of them no longer make me laugh out loud, because the thing about humor is it’s like this giant shifting cloud, this shape-shifting thing that changes over the course of our lives and also the life of the culture.”
We would love to hear your thoughts about this episode, and about the Book Review’s podcast in general. You can send them to books@nytimes.com.
Colm Toibin on His Sequel to 'Brooklyn'
Book Club: Dolly Alderton's 'Good Material'
100 Years of Simon & Schuster
Looking Back at 50 Years of Stephen King
Talking to Tana French About Her New Series
Talking ‘Dune’: Book and Movies
Book Club: Let’s Talk About ‘Erasure,’ by Percival Everett
Tommy Orange on His "There There" Sequel
The Rise and Fall of The Village Voice
Let's Talk About 'Demon Copperhead'
4 Early-Year Book Recommendations
'Killers of the Flower Moon': Book and Movie Discussion
Talking the Joys and Rules of Open Marriage
Our Early 2024 Book Preview
Steven Soderbergh on His Year in Reading
Book Club: 'The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store'
How to Tell the Story of a Giant Wildfire
Our Critics' Year in Reading
10 Best Books of 2023
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Ander Louis Podcast
Strong Sense of Place
Scott Sigler Slices: SLAY Season 2
The Count of Monte Cristo
Pride and Prejudice
The Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson Podcast
Slate Books