C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Critical and Biographical Introduction by Bernard Keble Sandwell (1876–1954)
By Stephen Leacock (1869–1944)
S
Stephen Leacock’s literary work began during his student career at Toronto, and a number of the humorous sketches which have since been permanently embodied in his published volumes first found a home in the lighter contemporary periodicals of that period in New York and London. His earliest books were educational and historical in character—‘Elements of Political Economy,’ 1905, and ‘Baldwin and Lafontaine’ (in the ‘Makers of Canada’ series) in 1906. These were followed by some smaller historical and biographical works, and it was not until 1910 that he gathered together a number of his humorous sketches and short stories and published them in a very modest form, at first for Canadian circulation only, under the apologetic title of ‘Literary Lapses.’ Their success was immediate, and they were followed in 1911 by ‘Nonsense Novels,’ consisting chiefly of satirical exaggerations of the absurdities of various current formulæ of popular fiction. In 1912 there appeared ‘Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town,’ which still ranks as the author’s most important creative work, containing a number of most carefully observed portraits of character-types of present-day Canadian life, and of ordinary Canadian people, with only just sufficient exaggeration to draw attention to their peculiarities and foibles, and with a far greater insight into the social and economic conditions of Canada than has been shown by any other author. ‘Behind the Beyond,’ in 1913, was a continuation of the vein of the ‘Nonsense Novels,’ and ‘Arcadian Adventures with the Idle Rich’ was a good-humored exposition of the numerous social and economic anomalies resulting from the development of an exceedingly wealthy class in a young and supposedly democratic community. ‘Moonbeams from the Larger Lunacy’ (1915) and ‘Further Foolishness’ (1916) continued the good work of amiably satirizing some of the most absurd ideas and fashions of the day. A serious volume, entitled ‘Essays and Literary Studies,’ also appeared in 1916, and contained the critical and philosophical work of the author during several years, including much penetrating literary criticism. An admirable example of Professor Leacock’s critical ability will be found in his estimate of the work of O. Henry, included in the L
The underlying quality which makes Stephen Leacock’s humor valuable and enlightening is the extreme accuracy of his observation both of human types and of the conditions in which they move and develop. In a very real sense the creative work of the humorist is based upon the critical work of the professor of economics; so that Leacock the writer of ‘Behind the Beyond’ and Leacock the lecturer on the principles of political economy are not in the least two different persons, but merely two strata of the same person. A short story in the ‘Arcadian Adventures’ and a lecture on the rise of the industrial millionaire in the United States and Canada are two different treatments of the same theme, and require the same first-hand knowledge and intimate comprehension—except that the story requires more of both than the lecture. Thus the whole of Leacock’s creative work deals with types and conditions with which he has familiarized himself by constant contact and careful study during his work as an economist, a traveler, an agriculturist (during the summer months), a political campaigner, an instructor of youth, and in several other capacities. As most of this work has been carried on in Canada, he possesses unrivaled qualifications for translating into literature the raw material of Canadian characters and Canadian life—a task which involves many of the difficulties and hardships of the literary pioneer.
His literary mechanism consists chiefly of a very easy and conversational, almost confidential, style, not unreminiscent of Dickens, but containing a suggestion also of the classic American humorists in its unexpected quips and turns of phrase. “The more I mix with the millionaires, the more I enjoy the things they mix,” is a typical example of this form of wit, both in its neatness and in the fact that it clothes a characteristically sardonic comment upon its subject-matter. Not infrequently these unexpected turns of phrase bring in a note of pathos in the midst of the most rollicking fun, a very fleeting note but the more effective for its suddenness. He is imperturbably good-humored, with the good humor of the detached and philosophical observer, convinced that all the world’s ills can be comfortably borne if one can only learn to laugh at them. There are no villains in his stories, and in his parodies the typical villains of ordinary moralizing fiction are reduced to their logical absurdity; for he has unbounded sympathy with everything that is human.