As the author of comic novels myself, I can say without hesitation that Howard Jacobson, my brilliant British colleague (Coming From Behind, The Mighty Walzer) has it exactly right. "That's the great test, if you're going to be a great comic writer, not a humorist, you've got to take it into the throat of grief. Can you make laughter and seriousness so close that they are the same thing? There's nothing more wonderful than when the comedy's got horror in it, got blood in it. And the seriousness is at all times aware of its own preposterousness. What's it for, this seriousness? Everything is loss, is nothing, in the end."