'Here's the weavery looming up': Verbal humour in a woman with high-functioning autism

A case study of Grace, a 29-year-old woman with high-functioning autism, is presented. Grace is unusual for a person with autism in that she produces a great deal of humorous and creative word play. She is also unusual in tha t she writes and then audio-records letters' to her family, and produces co pious cartoon-like drawings which she annotates, with the result that multi ple examples of her humour are available in permanent form. We present exam ples of Graces use of puns, jokes, neologisms, portmanteau words, irreveren t humour, irony, sarcasm and word play based on her obsessional interests. The examples are used to illustrate the forms and content of Grace's humour , and are discussed in relation to current theories of autism and of normal humour.