The Worst Joke in the World — Background and Themes

The Velvet Kitten as a Relic of Unspoken History

The velvet kitten is the story’s most concrete symbol. It is described as “precious” to Mrs. Champney, yet she cannot explain why to her friends. The narrator notes that she has talked freely about her “heavenly winters in Italy” and her girlhood, but “very, very little about the period to which the velvet kitten belonged.” This asymmetry is deliberate: the reader is given access to her inner life while the other characters are not. The kitten hung in the bedroom of a “shabby, sunny old house in Connecticut” where her children were born. That house is recalled without bitterness, but with a tenderness that makes her “laugh through the tears.” Holding uses the kitten to signal that the story’s emotional center lies not in the present action but in the layered past that Mrs. Champney carries with her.

A Son’s New Severity and a Mother’s Calculation

Later in the excerpts, Mrs. Champney has moved to a suburban town near her son Robert and his wife Molly. She is about to start work at the Needlecraft Shop for eighteen dollars a week. The narrative shifts to her internal calculations: she can live independently, see the baby often, and be a “fairy godmother—with sadly clipped wings.” But the real tension is with Robert. She dreads telling him about her job. She considers taking “a mighty high hand with him from the start,” yet feels “depressed, and tired and—yes, crushed.” When she returns home, Robert meets her at the stairs with a look she has never seen before: “the profound compassion and tenderness of a man.” This moment undercuts her earlier view of him as a “dear and rather clumsy boy.” Holding shows a relationship in flux, where roles are being renegotiated without open conflict.

Bobbetty’s Personality and the Weight of Small Gestures

Mrs. Champney’s grandson Bobbetty, not yet three, is a vivid presence. He sits in his high chair, eating Graham crackers and milk, with a “sidelong glance” that suggests a “thoughtful and alarming gleam.” Mrs. Champney buys him a gray plush animal (she thinks it is a dog, the saleswoman a cat) and removes its pin eyes to prevent injury. Bobbetty receives it with “warm affection” and later, in his crib, chatters about “a wild horsy who stampled on six policemens.” The child’s personality is rendered with affectionate humor, but his presence also sharpens the story’s central dilemma: Mrs. Champney wants to be near him, yet must navigate her son’s authority. The scene of putting Bobbetty to bed—where she feels “quite ashamed” for interrupting his polite conversation—shows her tenderness and her awareness that she is no longer the primary caregiver.

Withheld Confidences and the Reader’s Position

Throughout the excerpts, Holding positions the reader as a confidant who knows more than the other characters. Mrs. Champney’s friends see only her “gayety” and “dainty clothes”; Robert sees a mother he must protect; Molly is a background figure. But the narrator reveals Mrs. Champney’s tears, her suppressed sobs, and her memories. This asymmetry creates a quiet tension: the reader waits for the moment when her inner life will break through the surface. The story’s title, “The Worst Joke in the World,” is never explained in the excerpts, but it hints at a painful irony—perhaps the joke is the gap between how Mrs. Champney is perceived and what she feels. The excerpts end before any resolution, leaving the reader to wonder whether she will tell Robert about her job, and whether the velvet kitten’s story will ever be shared.

Readers should attend to the small objects and gestures that carry emotional weight: the kitten, the plush animal, the broken chair from a memory. Holding’s style rewards patience; the story’s power lies in what is not said. Notice how Mrs. Champney’s voice shifts between the bright tone she uses with others and the private reflections the narrator shares. The excerpts offer a portrait of a woman at a threshold, and the title remains a riddle worth holding in mind.

Mrs. Champney’s velvet kitten, that small keepsake of unspoken duty, reminds me of how The Worst Joke in the World holds its grief in quiet corners. I sometimes shelve it beside The sporting chance — Themes and Context, for both know that chance often wears a tired, familiar face, and family love is rarely loud.