Redeeming Laughter, 2nd Edition

11 Interlude: The Eternal Return of Folly

It is time to take another look at Lady Folly, whose demise has often been announced. Anton Zijderveld, one of the very few sociologists to pay sustained attention to the phenomenon of the comic, quotes a French poem dating from around 1513, which denies the demise. Freely translated: “You tell me that Lady Folly is dead? By my faith, you lie. Never has she been as great, and as powerful, as she is now!”¹ But Zijderveld too thought that she had died, only a couple of centuries later. One can state with some confidence that he was mistaken as well. He could, of course, show how particular social roles, like that of the court jester, came to disappear. But folly itself returns again and again, in ever-new ...