„A friend came to visit James Joyce one day and found the great man sprawled across his writing desk in a posture of utter despair. ‚James, what’s wrong?‘ the friend asked. ‚Is it the work?‘ Joyce indicated assent without even raising his head to look at his friend. Of course it was the work; isn’t it always? ‚How many words did you get today?‘ the friend pursued. Joyce (still in despair, still sprawled facedown on his desk): ‚Seven.‘ Seven? But James… that’s good, at least for you.‘ Yes,‘ Joyce said, finally looking up. ‚I suppose it is… but I don’t know what order they go in!’“(Stephen King ?)
Joke 2
A surly English overseer is standing at the entrance to a construction site in London. It’s a filthy wet day. He sees approaching him a shabby figure, with a clay pipe clenched in mouth and a battered raincoat, and scowlingly thinks, another effing Mick on the scrounge. The Irishman shambles up to him and asks if there’s any casual job going. „You don’t look to me ,“ says the supervisor, „as if you know the difference between a girder and a joist.“ „I do too,“ says the Irishman indignantly, „The first of them wrote Faust and the second one wrote Ulysses.“ (Christopher Hitchens, Love, Poverty and War)
***
Thomas Pynchon walks into a bar. „Hey! that’s the famous author Thomas Pynchon!“ cries a patron. (The joke is twofold, Pynchon is a known recluse and wouldn’t dare chance a visit to a bar, and also would not likely be recognized.)“ (nn)
***
Jean-Paul Sartre is sitting at a café, revising his draft of Being and Nothingness. The waitress comes out and asks him if he would like to order. „Yes madame, I would like a cup of coffee, please, with no cream.“ The waitress hurries back inside, and just as quickly comes back out and says to Sartre „I’m so very sorry monsieur, but we seem to be out of cream. Would you like it with no milk instead?“ (posted by The Esteemed Doctor Bunsen Honeydrew)
Joke 1
„Charles Dickens: Please, Sir, I’d like a martini.
Bartender: Sure thing. Olive or twist?
___________
James Joyce: I’ll take a Guinness.
Bartender: So Charles Dickens was in here yesterday.
James Joyce: (drinks)
Bartender: And he asked for a martini and I said,
“Olive or twist?”
James Joyce: (drinks)
Bartender: You see, it’s funny because he wrote a book called “Oliver Twist.”
James Joyce: What a shitty joke.
___________
Ernest Hemingway: Gin.
Bartender: So Charles Dickens was in here two days ago.
Ernest Hemingway: Joyce already told me that story. F*ck off.
__________
Mark Twain: Give me a brandy.
Bartender: So Charles Dickens came in the other day and ordered a martini.
Mark Twain: Did he take an olive or twist? Ha ha ha!
Bartender: (tearful) You did that on purpose, didn’t you?
___________
Virginia Woolf: I’ll take your second-best cognac and
unadulterated experience.
Bartender: We don’t have that. This is a bar.
Virginia Woolf: Patriarchy! (drowns herself)“
(Annie Evett „Literary Jokes“)