Bruce Dessau
Bruce Dessau is a comedy journalist and arts critic, and the chief comedy critic of London’s Evening Standard newspaper. He is the editor of the comedy website Beyond The Joke, co-editor of The Best British Stand-up and Comedy Routines, and author of Beyond a Joke: Inside the Dark World of Stand-Up Comedy (2011) and The Bluffer’s Guide to Stand-Up Comedy (2014). He has also written celebrity biographies of comedians, such as Rowan Atkinson, and beyond, such as George Michael.
Oldest joke
According to research led by Dr Paul McDonald, senior lecturer at the University of Wolverhampton’s School of Humanities, Languages and Social Sciences, the oldest example of recorded humour dates back to at least 1900 BCE and is a Sumerian proverb warning new husbands about their flatulent brides: "Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap." The joke, which follows a structure, was found on tablets from the Old Babylonian period but may date back as far as 2300 BCE.