[f. as prec. + -AL.]
1. Of or belonging to farce; of the nature of farce.
1716. Gay, What d’ye Call it (ed. 3), Pref. They deny the characters to be farcical, because they are actually in nature.
1744. Akenside, Lett. to Dyson, Poems (1845), 276. At Amsterdam I saw a Dutch tragedy, which, tho’ intended to be really distressful, was yet farcical beyond anything in Aristophanes, or the Rehearsal.
1818. Foster, in Life & Corr. (1846), II. 4. All these give, to say the least, a farcical and operatic cast to the whole concern.
1877. Dowden, Shaks. Prim., vi. 65. The Comedy of Errors is Shakspere’s one farcical play.
2. Resembling farce; extremely ludicrous; that is matter only for laughter; absurdly futile.
1739. Cibber, Apol. (1756), I. 63. While Vice, and Farcical Folly, are the most profitable Commodities, why should we wonder that, time out of Mind, the poor Comedian, when real Wit would bear no Price, should deal in what would bring him most ready Money?
1796. Campaigns, 1793–4, I. I. ix. 83. Fine farcical shew and parade.
1821. Edgeworth, Mem., I. 69. My farcical marriage and more farcical divorce.
1865. Carlyle, Fredk. Gt., VI. XVI. iii. 162. Nor is Death a farcical transaction.
Hence Farcically adv., in a farcical manner. Farcicalness, farcical quality.
1765. Langhorne, Letters on the Eloquence of the Pulpit, 51. Images that are farcically low.
1836. T. E. Hook, Gilbert Gurney, I. ii. 54. In this piece of tom-foolery I trace the first fruits of that disposition to treat high and serious subjects farcically, which is engendered and fostered in the society of those who, as my poor mother said in her letter, from which I have already made an extract, are habituated to judge of real events histrionically.
1864. Webster, Farcicalness.
