The Art of Traumedy Writing: Or, How to Make Your Mother Cry at Your Life, and Laugh at Your Death

By Brooke Champagne

Writer Nora Ephron said of the difference between tragedy and comedy: “When you slip on a banana peel, people laugh at you. But when you tell people you slipped on a banana peel, it’s your laugh.” Comedian Norm Macdonald said of dying: “Death is a funny thing. Not funny haha, like a Woody Allen movie, but funny strange, like a Woody Allen marriage.” The character Marie, played by Carrie Fisher in When Harry Met Sally, said of self-awareness: “Everybody thinks they have ...