TEXT B Humour is probably the
hardest commodity to export. Jokes that make one country laugh out loud are
likely to leave another nation confused and silent. But humour can also be very
revealing, if not always funny. After all, jokes are often just another way of
expressing anxieties, fears and even prejudices. In Britain, one
of the most enduring types of humour is satire. This is the art of making fun of
people in positions of power--politicians, celebrities and even royalty--in
order to draw attention to their faults. While satire is not
uniquely British, it does have a special appeal in Britain, and one of the best
examples of this is the success of the satirical magazine Private Eye. This
magazine has been poking fun at "the great and the good" in British public life
for the last 35 years, and its victims admit to reading it and laughing with
it. One of the magazine’s former contributors, Auberon Waugh,
believes the "Eye" is successful because it repeats the best jokes over and over
again. "You go back and make the same jokes with a new twist every time, so you
are, by the end, talking a private language, and I think readers like that." He
goes on to say that "Americans come to London and claim to enjoy Private Eye,
yet they can’t understand a word of it." But it is not only
Americans who have difficulties understanding the "Eye". Its esoteric sense of
humour and sometimes oblique references to British news mean that only those
people who closely follow the news benefit from the jokes. This is why the
magazine has practically no buyers overseas even though each issue sells 180,000
copies in Britain. The editor of the "Eye", Ian Hislop, explains
how they choose their targets. "Anybody who--in the words of a very old English
satirist--is guilty of vice, folly or humbug. That’s them." The Royal Family is
always a favourite target. One cartoon strip called "Liz" portrayed them as a
rough, working class family from northern England. Over the
years Private Eye has paid the price for criticising the powerful and has been
successfully sued several times. Ian Hislop says there are still "ten or 12"
libel writs outstanding. But some say the magazine is not as cutting or even as
funny as it used to be. They say it is too incestuous, featuring too much gossip
about journalists and not enough hard-hitting satire. So are Ian Hislop and his
gang in danger of becoming part of the establishment they claim to
expose Which of the following makes it difficult for foreigners to understand Private Eye
A.Making the same jokes with different words. B.Writing jokes in a regional dialect of English. C.Fooling the powerful. D.Referring to the local news of Britain.