Neil Ross presented the history of Canadian Humour to the West Toronto Junction Historical Society on 5-February-2009
TORONTO, ONTARIO - Few things are held more dearly in the Canadian psyche than the distinct Canadian sense of humour. Yet, few people seem to know how it developed. Neil Ross tried to rectify this with his presentation "Nation of Irony Mongers: Roots of the Canadian Sense of Humour", made in front of the West Toronto Junction Historical Society last Thursday as a preview of a series of two-minute radio features that will be airing on the CBC in the coming weeks.
I was pleased to find Ross start with native humour. He pointed out that most First Nations and other native peoples in Canada had much of their humour based on the trickster, often the coyote, but sometimes embodied in other animals, most notably the raven on the west coast. The notion of the trickster made its way into European-Canadian humor straight-away, and still lives on to this day even on the Rick Mercer Report.
Many comic devices that have made their way to the rest of the world through the United States actually originated in Canada. Most notably, the "pie in the face" gag originated in Newfoundland; Ross recounted how Doc Kelley originally improvised food dripping off someone's face, and seeing what laughter it brought, followed it up in a subsequent act with the first true pie-in-the-face routine to a riotous response.
This being a local historical society meeting, Ross emphasized local comedians Greg Clark and Jimmy Frise, both of whom lived in the Bâby Point neighbourhood just to the west. An audience member actually knew the exact houses that they lived in, and Clark had apparently moved during his time there. The columnist (Clark) and cartoonist (Frise) duo made the Toronto Star incredibly popular between 1920 and 1947 through a strip named Birdseye Center.
My favorite story about Clark and Frise told by Ross, though, was that they once decided to invoke the trickster heritage and purchased a bench exactly like the park benches in High Park in Toronto. They brought their bench to the park, sat on it, and waited for a police officer that they had an issue with to walk by. They then proceeded to walk off with the bench, prompting the officer to confront them. Only when they were about to be arrested did they pull out their sales receipt from the purchase of the bench.
The first three episodes of the "Nation of Irony Mongers" have been posted to the West Toronto Junction Historical Society web site. They will air during the local morning programs on CBC Radio One; the time locally here in Toronto on 99.1 FM is not yet known, but should start next week during Metro Morning.
3 comments:
Hi,Lance, thank you for your review of Irony Mongers at the Historical Society. I'm glad you like the notion of starting with First Nations humour. As you'll recall each of the three founding cultures starts with some form of comedy, the First Nations with Trickster, the Cosmic Comedian; New France with the first play ever written to be performed in canoes; and the British with General Townshend's scandalous cartoons of General Wolfe before the Battle of Quebec. My colleague Cara Reeves once observed to John Ralston Saul that humour is the glue for the cultural mosaic -- one of the ideas we advance in Irony Mongers -- and he replied "Yes, we're a funny people." How's that for name dropping? I'll have more of the sketches up at wtjhs.ca soon and am contemplating remounting the Irony Mongers show in the Junction in June. Will keep you informed. Thanks again, Neil Ross
I discovered this review while looking for short jokes related to First Nations shape shifters. (I didn't, by the way, find any.)
The story of the park bench reminds me of a similar tale from the University of BC during the 1960s. (I think the year was 1966 or 1967.)
Engineering students had a reputation for being klutzes and Philistines - knew nothing about anything artistic and didn't care. One year, in preparation for Fine Arts Week, a variety of contemporary sculptures were placed around the campus. The artistic value of these works was the subject of considerable discussion. Letter to the editor, "pro" and "con", flowed thick and fast on the pages of the "Ubyssey" student newspaper.
Near the beginning of Fine Arts Week, many of the statues were mutilated or destroyed by unknown assailants. Engineering students were widely held responsible, despite their vehement defense.
Eventually, the Faculty of Applied Science student association owned up. Its members had attacked the statues. Its members had also, a few weeks earlier, clandestinely placed them all. They were, the story goes, slapped together by engineering students from any junk which could be found. Artistic intention was the farthest thing from the creators' mind. The goal of putting egg on the face of the arts community was, on the other hand, a great success.
Brock Lupton
(B. Mus '70)
Basset horn,
Have you e-mailed Darrell Dennis of CBC's ReVision Quest? I've got to think that if anyone can point you to shape shifter jokes, it's him...
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