Nonsense Novels

By Stephen Leacock

Book Overview

Nonsense novels is a collection of superficial spoofs about every imaginable literary genre - the detective story, the hero story, the antihero story, the sea drama, the family drama, etc. He basically took a certain theme that most writers made a formula of and then annihilated it.

But unlike most spoofs and parodies, Leacock never risked turning over-critical and over-assessing. You can see his efforts to keep the reader laughing, and nothing more. He was superficial, as if to almost suggest the mood of writers who repeat a literary formula to achieve a shortcut to fandom. And one can only admire his intention to do this - he made fun of others by making fun of himself - there is character in such an attempt. (Sarthak Pranit)

About the author:

Stephen P. H. Butler Leacock FRSC (30 December 1869 - 28 March 1944) was a Canadian teacher, political scientist, writer, and humorist. Between the years 1915 and 1925, he was the best-known English-speaking humorist in the world. He is known for his light humour along with criticisms of people's follies.

Early in his career, Leacock turned to fiction, humour, and short reports to supplement (and ultimately exceed) his regular income. His stories, first published in magazines in Canada and the United States and later in novel form, became extremely popular around the world. It was said in 1911 that more people had heard of Stephen Leacock than had heard of Canada. Between the years 1915 and 1925, Leacock was the most popular humorist in the English-speaking world.

A humorist particularly admired by Leacock was Robert Benchley from New York. Leacock opened correspondence with Benchley, encouraging him in his work and importuning him to compile his work into a book. Benchley did so in 1922, and acknowledged the nagging from north of the border.

Near the end of his life, the US comedian Jack Benny recounted how he had been introduced to Leacock's writing by Groucho Marx when they were both young vaudeville comedians. Benny acknowledged Leacock's influence and, fifty years after first reading him, still considered Leacock one of his favorite comic writers. He was puzzled as to why Leacock's work was no longer well known in the United States. His works can be described as a balancing act between cutting satire and sheer absurdity. He also wrote extensively on his chosen fields of study, political science and political economy. Leacock was professor, but in his works he reflected with wit and ingenuity on everyday situations.

During the summer months, Leacock lived at Old Brewery Bay, his summer estate in Orillia, across Lake Simcoe from where he was raised and also bordering Lake Couchiching. A working farm, Old Brewery Bay is now a museum and National Historic Site of Canada. Gossip provided by the local barber, Jefferson Short, provided Leacock with the material which would become Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town (1912), set in the thinly-disguised Mariposa.

Leacock was awarded the Royal Society of Canada's Lorne Pierce Medal in 1937, nominally for his academic work. (Wikipedia.org)

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0CMG1KB9Z
• ISBN13: 9798889423201
• Release Date: October 2023
• Publisher: Indoeuropeanpublishing.com
• Length: 128 Pages
• Weight: 0.36 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

great insight,clever wit and great use of vocabulary

A style all his own, with linguistic skills targeting your funny bone. He finds humor everywhere and shares it with you masterfully. Build your vocabulary and increase your insight into others while laughing so hard you make people wonder what you are reading.

Some sense in Nonsense

Wit is often not associated with the academe. Therefore it is a suprise to see such wit in Stephen Leacock. As a professor of Economics at McGill University in the mid 20th century, Leacock was counted among Canada's greatest humorists. In the Nonsense Novels, Leacocks unleashes parodies of most literary genres: The Great Detective, the first tale, satirizes Arthur Conan Doyle's Scandal in Bohemia. There are tales of capers involving gullible women, a desert island landing with an alternate ending, analysis of societal conditions, and some stories that are plain nonsense. A Hero in Homespun and the Man in Asbetoes are two worth reading; the latter being a farcical exposition on the future of capitalism and scientific advancement - very scary, if it were not so funny. I was introduced to Leacock while browsing gutenberg.org, and have not been disappointed. If you feel overwhelmed by the importance attached to triviality today, then you might do well to pick up and read the Nonsense Novels.

Brilliant Humor from 90 Years Ago-- Still Funny & Relevant

Leacock is one of a handful of literary parodists and humorists (Perelman, Benchley, Twain) whose parodies, though more or less a century old, are still laugh-out-loud funny. If you're a Sherlock Holmes fan, Leacock's "Maddened by Mystery: or, The Defective Detective" will make you chortle. If you appreciate romance novels, "Gertrude The Governess" will still tickle. Canadian Leacock was a master humorist with a light touch, and an unerring deflator of cliche and presumption. This collection of short pieces will still entertain the sophisticated fan of written humor, and should be in every collection. *Note: The full text of this book is available online.

Best buy in comic reading ever!

Where do I begin to describe the absolutely astonishing quality of Leacock's work? I first heard of Stephen Leacock when reading a book about the Marx brothers. It seems Groucho was on a train, and happened to pass the room of Jack Benny (who was traveling with them, working on the same vaudeville circuit. Groucho heard Benny screaming with laughter, and popped his head into Benny's room to see what the commotion was. Benny told Groucho that it was a book by Leacock, whom Groucho admitted to not knowing. Benny told Groucho, "It's the funniest stuff I've ever read!" Groucho later bought a copy of the book, loved it as much as Benny, and said that he always looked for anything written by Stephen Leacock.Okay, but what about his stories? Leacock's stock in trade was the parody of classic literature - stories about humble girls of (unknowingly) noble ancestry, who are engaged to work as servants for title lords, only to fall in love with the son of the mansion are turned into hysterically funny romps, where the lies not in the intentionally funny line, but in carefully crafted twists of standard sentence construction. A sample, from the above-described story, called "Gertrude the Governess; or Simply Seventeen":"Young Ronald said nothing; he flung himself from the house, flung himself upon his horse, and rode madly off in all directions."Leacock treats the classic tale of knighthood (handsome, strong knight declares his love for the gentle maiden of the castle, and she loves him too, though they've never met) to similarly wicked entanglement of story and prose."Sorrows of a Super Soul" tells the classic Russian tale of an unrequited love, while "Carolyn's Christmas" the story of the old farmer, his family away (one son in the city, another in prison), his farm mortgaged, and a strange girl happening upon the family on Christmas Eve, with a baby, but no wedding ring. Both of these, and all other stories in this slim book, will have you laughing until you cry. Buy a copy, get hooked. If Groucho and Jack Benny thought this was the best humor ever, how can it not satisfy you too?