Ted Audio Collective. You're listening to how to be a better human. I'm your host Chris Duffy.

I tend to approach the world through a framework of humor and laughter.

That may not be surprising considering I am a comedian by trade, but I really do believe in the power of laughter and of being

willing to see the absurd and hilarious even when things feel tragic or intense.

Today's guest Noir Alcedere wrote a book that I have been thinking about so much since I finished reading it.

It's called Animal Joy, a book of laughter and resuscitation.

And this book, Animal Joy, it put into words so many ideas that I really believe in but hadn't ever been able to

articulate in words before. Noir herself is fascinating. Her work connects some

worlds that I think many people would be surprised to find sitting together, poetry, psychoanalysis, and clowning.

So here is a clip where noir explains how she sees the interconnections between all three of those worlds. When I was in clown school, the instructor kept referring to moments when the audience laughed as poetic.

What was interesting to me about laughter in the context of clowning is that

people didn't laugh because something was humorous, they laughed because it was true. It was human. It

resonated with their own humanity. And that movement inside of the audience members,

of their bodies, is similar to what I value most in poetry,

which is when you feel moved.

In fact, I would say I would define what is poetry

by what makes you feel moved.

It doesn't have to be on paper.

It doesn't have to look like a poem.

It doesn't have to look like a poem it doesn't have to sound like poetry

or be called poetry in the formal generic sense of what poetry is I think it's

defined by its effect and what happens when someone feels moved is what

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