Canadian Humour - Literature

Literature

From the first major work of Canadian humour, Thomas McCulloch’s Letters of Mephibosheth Stepsure (1821-23) in the Halifax weekly Acadian Recorder, Canadian humorous writing has tended more towards prose than poetry. McCulloch's satirical letters have been described by Northrop Frye as "quiet, observant, deeply conservative in a human sense..." McCulloch's satirical persona, the "conventional, old-fashioned, homespun" farmer, is part of a tradition that originates with Addison and Swift. Compared to McCulloch’s dry and understated style, Thomas Chandler Haliburton showed the same conservative social values in the brash, overstated character of Sam Slick, the Yankee Clockmaker. Haliburton’s Sam Slick persona in The Clockmaker (1836), as Arthur Scobie notes in The Canadian Encyclopedia, "proved immensely popular and, ironically, has influenced American humour as much as Canadian."

Folk humour and satire were responses to the domination of 19th-century French Canadian culture by the Catholic Church. Napoléon Aubin satirized Quebec public life in his journals Le Fantasque (1837–45) and Le Castor (1843), and through his theatre troupe, Les Amateurs typographiques, established in 1839. He was imprisoned during that same year for his views. This cosmopolitan tradition is also seen in the journalism of Arthur Buies, editor of La Lanterne canadienne (1868–69), a highly satirical journal of that era.

Light comedy that mocked local customs was typical of 19th-century theatre in Quebec. Examples include Joseph Quesnel's L'Anglomanie, ou le dîner à l'angloise (1803), which criticized the imitation of English customs, and Pierre Petitclair's Une partie de campagne (1865). More serious dramas attacked specific targets: the anonymous Les Comédies du status quo (1834) ridiculed local politics, and Le Défricheteur de langue (1859) by Isodore Mesplats, (pseudonym of Joseph LaRue and Joseph-Charles Taché), mocked Parisian manners. Other examples of theatrical satire were Félix-Gabriel Marchand's comedy, Les faux brillants (1885) and Louvigny de Montigny's Les Boules de neige (1903), which took aim at Montreal's bourgeoisie.

By the early 20th century, the satirical tradition was well developed in English Canada as exemplified in the writing of Stephen Leacock. In Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town (1912), Leacock, renowned for his satirical wit, used tragic irony and astute insight in examining day-to-day, small-town life. The book remains a classic of Canadian literature, and was followed by Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich in 1914. An annual Canadian literary award, the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour, is named in his memory. The award is presented to the year's best work of humorous literature by a Canadian. Donald Jack, three-time winner of the Leacock Medal, wrote a number of comedies for the stage, radio, and television, but is best known for his nine-part series of novels about aviator Bartholomew Bandy.

Following the Révolution tranquille in Quebec, theatrical satire reappeared in 1968 with Michel Tremblay's play Les Belles sœurs, written in Québécois joual. The controversial play picked apart the myth of a stable bourgeois Quebec society with a mix of realistic comedy and allegorical satire. Following Tremblay’s lead, Jean Barbeau exposed Quebec popular culture in La Coupe stainless (1974). Tremblay and Barbeau set the stage for reviews such as Broue (1979), a collective production, which toured English-speaking Canada as Brew (1982).

Humorous fiction in French Canada draws from the oral tradition of folk songs and folktales which were the common coin of humour in the 19th century. Only a few of these folk tales surfaced in writing prior to the 20th century. However, contemporary writers such as Jacques Ferron (Contes du pays incertain, 1962) in Quebec and Antonine Maillet in Acadian New Brunswick (La Sagouine, 1974, and Pélagie-la-Charette, 1979), rely extensively on folk humour and popular culture. Other Quebec writers noted for their humour include Roger Lemelin, Gérard Bessette, Jacques Godbout, Roch Carrier and Yves Beauchemin. Beauchemin's picaresque novel Le Matou (1981) is the all-time best-selling novel in Quebec literature.

The plain talking alter-ego as an instrument of satire continued with Robertson Davies' series of Samuel Marchbanks books (1947–67) and John Metcalf's James Wells in General Ludd (1980). Davies is one of many Canadian writers of "serious" literature who were also renowned for humour in their work. Margaret Atwood, Farley Mowat, Paul Quarrington, Mordecai Richler, Carol Shields, W. O. Mitchell, Pierre Berton, M.A.C. Farrant and Miriam Toews are all acclaimed writers of mainstream literature who have also been acknowledged for using humour and wit in their writing. Many other writers of Canadian humour have been published as newspaper or magazine commentators, including Gary Lautens, Richard J. Needham, Eric Nicol, Joey Slinger, Will Ferguson and Linwood Barclay.

Humour is also central to the work of Canadian children's writers such as Gordon Korman, Dennis Lee and Robert Munsch.