{"id":64755,"date":"2014-01-10T09:45:59","date_gmt":"2014-01-10T14:45:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=64755"},"modified":"2014-01-10T09:15:26","modified_gmt":"2014-01-10T14:15:26","slug":"comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Comedies Are Too Depressing, and Other News"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_64756\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Sad-clown.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-64756\" class=\"size-large wp-image-64756 \" alt=\"Sad clown\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Sad-clown-821x1024.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"748\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-64756\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chuchin the Clown, via Wikimedia Commons<\/p><\/div>\n<li>Are today\u2019s most prestigious \u201ccomedies\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/www.salon.com\/2014\/01\/09\/why_are_the_golden_globe_comedies_so_depressing\/\" target=\"_blank\">too depressing<\/a>?<\/li>\n<li>The Los Angeles Public Library is soon <a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2014\/01\/09\/los-angeles-library-diplomas_n_4568690.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003&amp;ir=Books\" target=\"_blank\">to offer high school diplomas<\/a>. (You can\u2019t just check them out for a few weeks; you have to work for them.)<\/li>\n<li>More on the curious connection between prose and booze: \u201cWriters in this office used to <i>drink<\/i>,\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/online\/blogs\/books\/2014\/01\/writers-and-rum.html\" target=\"_blank\">said an unnamed <i>New Yorker <\/i>fixture<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>For the discriminating digital reader on a budget, <a href=\"http:\/\/ebookfriendly.com\/free-public-domain-books-sources\/\" target=\"_blank\">a treasure trove of public domain e-books<\/a>.<\/li>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Are today\u2019s most prestigious \u201ccomedies\u201d too depressing? The Los Angeles Public Library is soon to offer high school diplomas. (You can\u2019t just check them out for a few weeks; you have to work for them.) More on the curious connection between prose and booze: \u201cWriters in this office used to drink,\u201d said an unnamed New [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2512],"tags":[412,12514,1328,7148,6053,40],"class_list":["post-64755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-on-the-shelf","tag-comedy","tag-diplomas","tag-drinking","tag-libraries","tag-public-domain","tag-the-new-yorker"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Comedies Are Too Depressing, and Other News by Dan Piepenbring<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"January 10, 2014 \u2013 Are today\u2019s most prestigious \u201ccomedies\u201d too depressing? The Los Angeles Public Library is soon to offer high school diplomas. (You can\u2019t just check them\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Comedies Are Too Depressing, and Other News by Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"January 10, 2014 \u2013 Are today\u2019s most prestigious \u201ccomedies\u201d too depressing? The Los Angeles Public Library is soon to offer high school diplomas. (You can\u2019t just check them\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-01-10T14:45:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-1.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"675\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Dan Piepenbring\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/6b16ca558fc538230f135c3220dfd3c8\"},\"headline\":\"Comedies Are Too Depressing, and Other News\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-01-10T14:45:59+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/\"},\"wordCount\":95,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Sad-clown-821x1024.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"comedy\",\"Diplomas\",\"drinking\",\"libraries\",\"public domain\",\"The New Yorker\"],\"articleSection\":[\"On the Shelf\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/\",\"name\":\"Comedies Are Too Depressing, and Other News by Dan Piepenbring\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/10\/comedies-are-too-depressing-and-other-news\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/Sad-clown-821x1024.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-01-10T14:45:59+00:00\",\"description\":\"January 10, 2014 \u2013 Are today\u2019s most prestigious \u201ccomedies\u201d too depressing? 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