In comedy and laughter there is letting go of the realities of life; there is present a relaxation from the persistent concentration on the problems which life sets before us; there is relief from the seriousness, irksomeness, and grinding demanded by the authoritative, despotic decrees of the autocracy of the external environment; there is liberation from the limiting, controlling, regulating social surroundings. We spin and weave airy webs out of severe, inflexible realities, and destroy them like soap bubbles, like gossamer and cobweb, with a smile and a laugh. We take liberties with stern realities, circumvent them, transcend them, play with them, and laugh at them. As in a dream, or, rather in a day reverie, we are no longer at the mercy of the external world. We spin the yarn or web of lie as fancy and caprice please. In this respect the play of the comic and the life of dream and reverie are alike. -Boris Sidis
