...the way I hunt them the old black rascals know the crack of my gun as well as they know a pig's squealing. They grow thin in our parts, it frightens them so, and they do take the noise dreadfully, poor things. That gun of mine is a perfect epidemic among bear: if not watched closely, it will go off as quick on a warm scent as my dog Bowieknife will: and then that dog whew! why the fellow thinks that the world is full of bear, he finds them so easy. It's lucky he don't talk as well as think; for with his natural modesty, if he should suddenly learn how much he is acknowledged to be ahead of all other dogs in the universe, he would be astonished to death in two minutes....
Thomas Bangs Thorpe, The Big Bear of Arkansas
Hyperbole is the most distinctive characteristic of one of the most popular and widely collected types of literary humor, the tall tale or yarn. Such tales frequently are associated with the larger-than-life individuals that populate folktales and folklore, myths and legends:
Many folks seem to think that hyperbole characterizes a particularly "American" form of humor, but in fact tall tales are known the world over:
The exploits recounted in tall tales often are so humorous and fabulous that they attract the interest of filmmakers:
In fact, for folks who collect books-into-film titles, tall tales-into-film might make an interesting subset:
Now it happened that there was a mining camp in Colorado where more than an average number of the miners were bald. An enterprising hair tonic salesman from Kentucky decided to take advantage of this golden opportunity, so he made the trip north. It was a rainy summer evening. The salesman was headed towards the mining camp with four bottles of hair tonic under his arm. As he was crossing one of the trout streams which lead to the Arkansas River, the salesman slipped and dropped two bottles of hair tonic into the water. The bottles broke, and the hair tonic spilled into the stream.
Not too long after this incident, the fishermen along the Arkansas developed a new method for catching trout. They'd head to the bank of the river carrying a red and white barber pole and some scissors. Then they would set up the barber pole and call out: "Get your free shave and a hair cut here". All the trout whose fur had grown too long or who needed their beards trimmed would hop right out of the water and be picked up by the fishermen. It wasn't until the mills began muddying the waters so much that the fish couldn't see the barber poles that the practice died out.
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