ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the relationship of comedians to political processes, in Britain and the United States, over the last fifty or sixty years. It is primarily concerned to interpret the actions that comedians have taken in the realm of politics, or in relation to politicians, although it also tries, where appropriate, to relate their professional work-their comedy material, routines and suchlike-to the political life of their respective societies. But I want, if possible, to tie any political analysis of individual comic texts to the time and place in which these texts occurred: clearly comedy is conditioned by, reflects and, perhaps, seeks to challenge particular sets of political circumstance. Necessarily, I will have more to say about comedy and politics in the United States; this is because, as I will argue, American political culture has been more populist than British political culture, and for longer, and this has made for a greater and more sustained involvement of comedians in US politics. Ultimately, though, the same processes will be seen to be at work in both societies, trends well established in the United States as long ago as the 1940s and 1950s having become perceptible in Britain by the 1980s.
