intervene vs joke

intervene

verb
  • To say (something) in the middle of a conversation or discussion between other people, or to respond to a situation involving other people. 

  • To become involved in a situation, so as to alter or prevent an action. 

  • To occur, fall, or come between, points of time, or events. 

  • To come between, or to be between, persons or things. 

  • In a suit to which one has not been made a party, to put forward a defense of one's interest in the subject matter. 

  • To occur or act as an obstacle or delay. 

joke

verb
  • To do or say something for amusement rather than seriously. 

  • To dupe in a friendly manner for amusement; to mess with, play with. 

noun
  • An amusing story. 

  • The root cause or main issue, especially an unexpected one 

  • A laughably worthless thing or person; a sham. 

  • Something that is far easier or far less challenging than expected. 

  • Something said or done for amusement, not in seriousness. 

How often have the words intervene and joke occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )