Introduction: Take Bad Something Make Laugh: The Emergence of Humor in the Caribbean Literary Tradition Stiff Words Frighten Poor Folk: Humor, Orality, and Gender in Zora Neale Hurston's Moses, Man of the Mountain Slackness and a Mento Aesthetic: Louise Bennett's Trickster Poetics and Jamaican Women's Explorations of Sexuality The Laughing Corpse: Humorous Performances of Spirituality, Sexuality, and Identity in Aimé Césaire's A Tempest Man Friday Speaks: Calypso Humor and the Reworking of Hierarchy in Derek Walcott's Pantomime Conclusion: Contemporary Literary Crossing and Humor in the Caribbean