# Is Umberto Eco funny? Canonical: https://zestasy.com/wiki/eco-how-to-travel-with-a-salmon/ Section: Zestasy Wiki > Books & ideas · Updated: 2026-10-14 · Publisher: Zestasy *Zestasy Wiki: our reference answers. Checked for facts and sources; less curated than the magazine.* Very. Behind the professor of semiotics and the author of The Name of the Rose was a brilliant comic essayist, and How to Travel with a Salmon, his collection of satirical pieces on modern life, is the easiest way to discover him. It reads like a series of absurd instruction manuals for everyday irritations, from airline meals to bureaucrats. Umberto Eco (1932-2016) has a serious reputation, and he earned it. He was a medievalist, philosopher and semiotician, professor of semiotics at the University of Bologna from 1975, and the author of *The Name of the Rose* (1980), a historical mystery set in a fourteenth-century monastery, and *Foucault's Pendulum* (1988), [according to Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco). None of that suggests a man who could make you laugh on a train. But he could, and did, for most of his career. ## The comic side Eco's light writing goes back a long way. *Diario minimo* (1963) collected his early comic pieces, including a widely read essay on the television quiz host Mike Bongiorno. From 1985 he also wrote a regular column, *La Bustina di Minerva*, for the magazine *L'Espresso*, and kept it going until January 2016, the same Wikipedia article notes. Short, sharp, observational pieces were his natural habitat as much as long novels. ## How to Travel with a Salmon The best introduction is *Il secondo diario minimo*, published by Bompiani in Milan in 1992 as a sequel to the first *Diario minimo*. A first-edition listing describes it as a collection of forty-one satirical essays written in the late 1980s and early 1990s, [per this bookseller's record](https://www.bookstellyouwhy.com/pages/books/19548/umberto-eco/il-secondo-diario-minimo-1st-edition-1st-printing). The English version, *How to Travel with a Salmon & Other Essays*, translated by William Weaver, came out from Harcourt in October 1994, [as Wikipedia records](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Travel_with_a_Salmon_%26_Other_Essays). The English publisher's description lists the targets: military culture, computer jargon, Westerns, art criticism, librarians, bureaucrats, airline food, poor coffee, aggressive taxi drivers, express mail, gadget watches, fax machines and mobile phones, football fans, academia, and Eco himself, [as this bookshop listing reproduces](https://massivebookshop.com/products/9780156001250). Many of the pieces take the form of mock instructions, a how-to for situations that should never need one. ## What makes it funny - **Deadpan logic.** Eco takes a small, ordinary irritation and follows it with total seriousness to its absurd conclusion. The more rigorous the reasoning, the funnier it gets. - **The scholar on holiday.** He uses the tools of a professor, classification, close reading, footnote-style precision, on things like hotel rooms and in-flight meals. - **He includes himself.** The vanity of intellectuals, his own included, is one of his favourite subjects. - **It has dated charmingly.** Fax machines and early mobile phones now feel like period pieces, which adds a second layer of comedy he never planned. ## Why start here If *The Name of the Rose* has been sitting on your shelf for years, unopened, the essays are the friendly way in. They are short, you can read them in any order, and they show the same playful intelligence that runs through the novels, in bite-sized pieces. They also make an excellent travel book, especially for anyone who has ever fought with a hotel room or an airline meal. And then, perhaps, the novel. You will meet it already knowing that the author has a sense of humour, which changes how you read it. ## FAQ ### Is The Name of the Rose funny too? It has a lot of wit, irony and comic moments, but it is first of all a murder mystery and a novel of ideas. Expect to smile rather than laugh out loud. ### Do I need to know about semiotics to enjoy the essays? Not at all. Eco wears his learning lightly in these pieces, and the jokes land without any theory. ### Are there other Italian writers who are funny like this? Plenty with a playful streak. Italo Calvino is the obvious companion; see [where to start with Calvino](https://zestasy.com/books/where-to-start-with-italo-calvino/), and his game-playing novel [If on a Winter's Night a Traveller](https://zestasy.com/wiki/if-on-a-winters-night/). ### Is How to Travel with a Salmon good to read in Italian? If your Italian is strong, reading the original is a real pleasure. Learners may find it demanding, because comedy depends so much on tone. ## Sources - [Wikipedia: Umberto Eco](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umberto_Eco) - [Wikipedia: How to Travel with a Salmon & Other Essays](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Travel_with_a_Salmon_%26_Other_Essays) - [Books Tell You Why: Il Secondo Diario Minimo, first edition](https://www.bookstellyouwhy.com/pages/books/19548/umberto-eco/il-secondo-diario-minimo-1st-edition-1st-printing) - [Massive Bookshop: How to Travel with a Salmon & Other Essays](https://massivebookshop.com/products/9780156001250) ## Related - [Where should you start with Italo Calvino?](https://zestasy.com/books/where-to-start-with-italo-calvino/) - [What is a personal essay, and where should you start reading them?](https://zestasy.com/wiki/what-is-a-personal-essay/) - [Is If on a Winter's Night a Traveller confusing?](https://zestasy.com/wiki/if-on-a-winters-night/) - [What is Luigi Barzini's The Italians about?](https://zestasy.com/wiki/the-italians-barzini/) - [How do you laugh at yourself without putting yourself down?](https://zestasy.com/wiki/laughing-at-yourself/) - [All Books & ideas answers in the Wiki](https://zestasy.com/wiki/#books)