Elephant joke

An elephant joke is a joke cycle, almost always an absurd riddle or conundrum and often a sequence of such, that involves an elephant. Elephant jokes were a fad in the 1960s, with many people constructing large numbers of them according to a set formula. Sometimes they involve parodies or puns.^[1]^[2]^[3]

Examples of elephant jokes are:^[1]^[3]

Q: Why did the elephant paint its toenails red?

A: So it could hide in a cherry tree.

Q: How can you tell that an elephant is in the bathtub with you?

A: By the smell of peanuts on its breath.

Q: Why does an elephant have round flat feet?

A: So that it can walk across lily pads.

Q: Why don't elephants use computers?

A: They're afraid of the mouse!^[4]

^ ^a ^b Ed Cray and Marilyn Eisenberg Herzog (January 1967). "The Absurd Elephant: A Recent Riddle Fad". Western Folklore. 26 (1): 27–36. doi:10.2307/1498485. JSTOR 1498485.
^ Isaac Asimov (1991). "Shaggy Dog". Isaac Asimov's Treasury of Humor: A Lifetime Collection of Favorite Jokes, Anecdotes, and... Houghton Mifflin Books. pp. 59–61. ISBN 978-0-395-57226-9.
^ ^a ^b Elliott Oring (1992). "To Skin an Elephant". Jokes and Their Relations. University Press of Kentucky. pp. 16–28. ISBN 978-0-8131-1774-4.
^ "Elephant's Fear". FunnyJokes.net. 20 July 2023.

[AbsurdElephant-1] Ed Cray and Marilyn Eisenberg Herzog (January 1967). "The Absurd Elephant: A Recent Riddle Fad". Western Folklore. 26 (1): 27–36. doi:10.2307/1498485. JSTOR 1498485.

[Asimov-2] Isaac Asimov (1991). "Shaggy Dog". Isaac Asimov's Treasury of Humor: A Lifetime Collection of Favorite Jokes, Anecdotes, and... Houghton Mifflin Books. pp. 59–61. ISBN 978-0-395-57226-9.

[Oring1-3] Elliott Oring (1992). "To Skin an Elephant". Jokes and Their Relations. University Press of Kentucky. pp. 16–28. ISBN 978-0-8131-1774-4.

[Elephant's_Fear-4] "Elephant's Fear". FunnyJokes.net. 20 July 2023.

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