An Anthologizer's Comments About
Our Comically Gifted Countrypersons

Are Canadians funny? Do Quebecois speak French? Do Albertans feel alienated? Can the country that gave the world William Lyon Mackenzie King (and then kept re-electing him for a third of a century), Meech Lake and William Vander Zalm not be funny?

Which leads us, as both Prufrock and your grade-seven homeroom teacher used to say, to an important question: Why should a north-ern country with a smaller population than the state of California (where some one million Canadians are living, by the way -- "If you're that good...") produce such an astonishing
array of comedic genii?

Canadians? Hockey players, sure. Cold fronts, sans doubt. But humour? Why on earth humour? What makes a witty Atwood, a caustic Richler, a folksy Harron, a satiric Second City, a hip Kids in the Hall, a devastating Aislin and Gable, an intellectual-yet-childlike Wayne and Shuster, a just-plain-uproarious Nicol, or Ritter or Broadfoot?

I have one theory, although I sense that there are others that would be even better: one of the frequent reasons given for the impressive impact of Jews (and later, Blacks, Catholics, gays, women, and others not part of the White Protestant Male Power System) upon American comedy is that they were (at least back at the turn of the century when the Jews were pouring in to the lower east side of Manhattan) outsiders. They could see -- and comment upon -- "where it was at" precisely because they were not "where it was at."

In other words a George Burns, a Jack Benny, (and later) a Lenny Bruce, a Mort Sahl,
a Mel Brooks, a Woody Allen, could poke fun at American fables and foibles and foolishness around them because they were not allowed to be part of it. Or, at the very least, because they did not feel part of it. As a renowned Canadian named Marshall McLuhan once noted about the media -- I may be paraphrasing here -- "We don't know who discovered water, but it certainly wasn't a fish." Translation: fish are too busy swimming about in water to realize what they are swimming in. And so are white Protestants in a white Protestant society (usually -- there are no hard-and-fast rules to comic inspiration). But the Jews -- and, more and more, other "outsiders" -- were truly like fish out of water, free to look down into that water and mock the hell out of the feel-right-at-home, complacent, well-adjusted bourgeois fish happily swimming about below.

Canadian humour is also like classic Jewish humour in that it is often self-deprecating; it pokes fun at Jews themselves and by doing so, magically comes out on top. Many people think that self-deprecation implies self-hatred. On the contrary. More often than not it says something far more complex: "I am only human; I have flaws," it declares; "I am willing to admit this." By poking fun at their own failings, self-deprecating comedians (whether Jew, Canadian, woman -- or WASP, for that matter) end up in far better shape than the Other to whom they are admitting their weaknesses.

You can probably already see the Canadian connection to this argument: The United States is this huge, vulgar, wealthy, dangerous, irresistible country to the south. And here we are, the citizens of the country to the north, who can look down (both geographically and -- often unfairly -- morally) upon the polluted waters of American society and poke fun to
our hearts' content.

In short there are great, and often, comic advantages to being an outsider. And in the political, social, economic scheme of things we Canadians are very much outsiders to where it really does all happen: the United States.

We Canadians also tend to take ourselves far less seriously than Americans, which also helps. After all, we are not at the centre of the world; we are not the world's policeman;
we are merely a friendly, disarming (and usually unarmed) peacekeeper in Cyprus -- or Sarajevo.

Not that my little theory explains why there is so much quality comic talent in this country, especially when much of that humour is not necessarily about the United States, or even about being an outsider. Does his nationality explain Stephen Leacock's hilarious parody
of nineteenth-century Romantic literature, "Gertrude the Governess," or his wicked study
of the personal life stories of those famous men of math, "A, B, and C"?

Does one need to be Canadian, as are the writers and performers of the Montreal-
based comedy troupe Radio Free Vestibule, to write a crushing attack of the Disney corporation's propensity to sue any-one who dares infringe upon their copyright? Would not a talented essayist such as Ed Hailwood be talented in any country? Or Susan Musgrave? Or Ray Guy?

Indeed, though we Canadians are so often labelled with that terribly descriptive adjective, "nice," how many Americans are aware that their funnybones have been molded by a much larger number of (scathing) Canadians than any other people. From Frank Peppiatt and John Aylesworth's "Hee Haw" to Lorne Michael's "Saturday Night Live," to Andrew Alexander's "SCTV", to the wildly successful on cable, and as-of-1992-picked-up-by-CBS "Kids in the Hall," to David Steinberg, John Candy, Catherine O'Hara, Martin Short, Mike Myers, Howie Mandel, and a stunningly large number of other major com-edy writers and performers of this half-century, who have been "that good" that they "made it in the States." (And I won't even mention the several Canadian comedy writers who wrote a great deal of Johnny Carson's material over three decades, if only because I can't
remember their names. But you get the point.)

To be honest I have no idea why Canada has produced such a stag-geringly high number of inspired comedians, comic essayists, political satirists, parodists, editorial cartoonists, sketchwriters, and more.

What I do know -- and what every reader of this book shall soon discover -- is that this country has produced some of the richest lodes of comedy in the world, and that it is about time that a goodly selection be found in one place.

In collecting the best of over one hundred Canadian men and women I found it important to include a large number whose names (if not whose selections) will undoubtedly be familiar to many: Richler, Atwood, Gallant, Fotheringham, Quarrington, Slinger, Zolf, Carrier, Guy, Torgov, Tremblay. But there will be many, probably even dozens, whose names will be new to you, and whose comedic gifts are awesome.

I am particularly proud of the cartoonists included, ranging from the fine daily (Lynn Johnston of "For Better or For Worse," Warren Clements of "Nestlings," Jim Unger of "Herman") to the world-class editorial (Peterson, Dewar, Gable, Mayes, to name a few).
I am also proud of the quite extraordinary stage, radio, and TV sketches which were so generously shared with me -- and now with you -- from such major artists as Johnny
Wayne and Frank Shuster, The Royal Cana-dian Air Farce, Second City, Kids in the
Hall, CODCO, the Frantics, Double Exposure, Smith and Smith, and, yes, several more.

Here is where I should share a (possibly important) fact with you, the reader: I wrote to over 150 Canadian authors, essayists, cartoonists, poets, comedians, playwrights, et al, asking them to suggest their best. Fully 90 percent did so (the several deceased notwithstanding). Why did I do this? you ask. Because I am of the firm belief that writers know what works best -- what got the most laughs in their readings, their performances, their stand-up routines. And, with the very rare exception, they were "right." What they sent me, or recommended to me, was usually uproarious -- and often not "available" to the public before now. To paraphrase Hamlet, "for this release, much thanks."

This is one very funny book. Open to any page -- you dirty it, you buy it -- and see what
I mean. It's got plenty of cartoons for those who have had a rough day but deserve better than what's on TV, especially if the show was written by some talentless non-Canadian from south of the border. And even more especially if what's on TV is a discussion about the Canadian constitution.

As my late grandmothers -- Russian-born, inarticulate in every official language except Yiddish -- would say, "Enjoy."