A Writer's Meeting, Part Four: Knock Knock 2008 (again)

The knock-knock joke is a time-honoured "call and response" exercise.

It is a form of roleplay, with a punster and a recipient of wit. The standard format has five lines:

Punster: Knock Knock! (indicating a door has been struck to gain attention)
Recipient: Who's there? (an inquiry)
Punster: a response, sometimes involving a name (to set up the pun)
Recipient: a repetition of the response followed by who? (a request for clarification)
Punster: the punch line, which typically involves a punnish misusage of the word set up during the response.

However, there now a new trend in Knock Knocking. Following the Knock Knock drought of the early nineties and the shortlived TwiceKnock revamp of 1997, we bring you, the Ding Dong joke:

Punster: Ding, Dong! (indicating a doorbell has been pushed to gain attention)
Recipient: Who's there? (an inquiry)
Punster: a response, sometimes involving a name (to set up the pun)
Recipient: a repetition of the response followed by who? (a request for clarification)
Punster: the punch line, which typically involves a punnish misusage of the word set up during the response.

I think we are all agreed that 2008 is going to be a very good year for Knockers.