Page:Freud - Wit and its relation to the unconscious.djvu/217



Jest and Wit

Thus the problem of the essential character of wit could almost be explained by means of the jest. We may follow the development of the jest until it reaches its height in the tendency-wit. The jest gives tendency a prior position when it is a question of supplying us with pleasure, and it is content when its utterance does not appear utterly senseless or insipid. But if this utterance is substantial and valuable the jest changes into wit. A thought, which would have been worthy of our interest even when expressed in the most unpretentious form, is now invested in a form which must in itself excite our sense of satisfaction. Such an association we cannot help thinking certainly has not come into existence unintentionally; we must make effort to divine the intention at the bottom of the formation of wit. An incidental observation, made once before, will put us on the right track. We have already remarked that a good witticism gives us, so to speak, a general feeling of satisfaction without our being able to decide offhand which part of the pleasure comes from the witty form and which part from the excellent thought contained in the context (p. 131). We are deceiving ourselves constantly about this division;