The Official Polish Joke Book, by Larry Wilde.
The latest e-book release in The Larry Wilde Joke Book Series by Laugh.com!
If you are Polish and find it difficult to laugh at yourself or if you have become angry, there is one way to have a laugh and lessen your anger. Follow these instructions carefully: (1) Every time you see the word “Polish” (or any slang meaning same) substitute one of the following words:
Jewish, Irish, Chinese, German, British, Icelandic, Brazilian, Canadian, Filipino, Hungarian, Egyptian, Russian, Australian, Norwegian, African, Korean, Gypsy, Afghanistanian, etc.
See how easy it is to be funny!
Ethnic jokes have been around since Biblical times. Humor historians claim that man has always poked fun at some race or religious group. It just happens that today many of these barbed jests are directed toward Americans of Polish descent.
Through the years, in the United States, other victims have been Jews, Negroes, Germans, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and the Irish. Not to overlook the Swedes around Minneapolis, Finns near Fitchburg, Massachusetts, and the original Americans, the foot, pony, and cliff Indians.
Dating back to the days of vaudeville, Polish-Americans around Buffalo, Detroit and Milwaukee suffered humiliating cracks about themselves. (Little knowing that one day Polish jokes would become a national craze.)
The wisecrack is a traditional form of the American jest. The core of its effectiveness comes from somebody being the butt of the joke, for it is always easier to laugh when someone else is being ridiculed.
And yet isn’t that the greatness of America? That we live in a land where telling any kind of joke is permitted? That our right to free speech enables us to poke fun at even the most sacred elements of our social and cultural value system?
Psychiatrists contend that the higher the intelligence the greater the sense of humor. And therein lies the key. The ability to laugh at oneself.
Of course, when one is a member of a minority and the object of the barb, one must have a super king-sized funny bone. Remember, it’s all in fun.
On the following pages you will find the best-or the worst, depending on your sensibilities and sense of humor-of the Polish and Italian jokes currently making the rounds throughout the United States.
Collected and compiled by Larry Wilde, author of over 50 joke books that have sold more than twelve million copies.
See why The New York Times has dubbed him; “America’s Best Selling Humorist”.
Originally published in 1973 and unavailable to the internet until now, The Official Polish Joke Book, by Larry Wilde!
