Colin Quinn: Incels, Woke Activists, and Peaking at 14

In this episode, legendary comic Colin Quinn dives into a cult classic that still makes him cry with laughter: John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces.

The novel follows the misadventures of an overweight, pretentious misanthrope still living with his mother in 1960s New Orleans. It’s a book that turns fart jokes into high art. It’s also, somehow, a love story between a fat incel and a woke activist—a seemingly absurd pairing that just may be a prescient solution to our modern polarization problem.

Plus, Colin and Shilo dig into the parallels between great comic writing and great stand-up: Both give language to things audiences half-know but have never quite articulated, making the familiar suddenly, painfully funny.