Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town is a Stephen Leacock book, first published in 1912. It is generally considered to be one of the most enduring classics of Canadian humorous literature. The fictional setting for these stories is Mariposa, a small town on the shore of Lake Wissanotti. Although drawn from his experiences in Orillia, Ontario, Leacock notes: Mariposa is not a real town. On the contrary, it is about seventy or eighty of them. You may find them all the way from Lake Superior to the sea, with the same square streets and the same maple trees and the same churches and hotels.

This work has remained popular for its universal appeal. Many of the characters, though modelled on townspeople of Orillia, are small town archetypes. Their shortcomings and weaknesses are presented in a humorous but affectionate way. Often, the narrator exaggerates the importance of the events in Mariposa compared to the rest of the world. For example, when there is a country-wide election, the town of Mariposa, was, of course, the storm centre and focus point of the whole turmoil.

The story of the steamboat Mariposa Belle sinking in Lake Wissanotti is one of the best-loved in the set. The apparent magnitude of this accident is lessened somewhat when it is revealed that the depth of the water is less than six feet. Men from the town come to the rescue in an un-seaworthy lifeboat which sinks beneath them just as they are pulled onto the steamer, and the narrator earnestly remarks that this was one of the smartest pieces of rescue work ever seen on the lake.

In Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town, Stephen Leacock masterfully captures the charm and quirks of small-town life in early 20th-century Canada. Set in the fictional town of Mariposa, these stories offer a humorous yet affectionate portrayal of the everyday lives of its inhabitants.

Through a series of vignettes, Leacock introduces us to memorable characters, each embodying the universal traits and foibles of small-town archetypes. His sharp wit and keen observations bring out the humor in their flaws, while also celebrating their humanity.

A timeless classic, this collection not only entertains but also offers insightful reflections on the enduring nature of community life.

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)

The world's humour, in its best and greatest sense, is perhaps the highest product of our civilization.

Stephen Leacock writes a masterful account of how humour works--and of how it very often doesn't. As well as being remarkably insightful about the various ways in which a joke can fall flat, Humour as I See It is an exceptionally humane testimony from one of the English language's most gifted humourists.

Eris Gems make available in the form of beautifully produced saddle-stitched booklets a series of outstanding short works of fiction and non-fiction.

Stephen Leacock was arguably, for a decade or so after the First World War, the most popular humorous writer in English. He is little known today, but his work is surprisingly relevant to modern readers. Some parts have aged beyond relevance, but then there are little spurts of brilliance which he would have dreaded to know are still cacklingly funny now. For example Moonbeams, which is 99 years old, contains a satirical skewering of gamification as a motivation technique for managers. It's the earliest one I've read, and it perfectly encapsulates the flaws in badges and levels motivational design. I realise that's a bit obscure, but I presume other people will find other little side references as hilarious as I did, from their own areas of interest. (Timothy Ferguson)

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)

Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town is a sequence of stories by Stephen Leacock, first published in 1912. It is generally considered to be one of the most enduring classics of Canadian humorous literature. The fictional setting for these stories is Mariposa, a small town on the shore of Lake Wissanotti. Although drawn from his experiences in Orillia, Ontario, Leacock notes: Mariposa is not a real town. On the contrary, it is about seventy or eighty of them. You may find them all the way from Lake Superior to the sea, with the same square streets and the same maple trees and the same churches and hotels.

This work has remained popular for its universal appeal. Many of the characters, though modelled on townspeople of Orillia, are small town archetypes. Their shortcomings and weaknesses are presented in a humorous but affectionate way. Often, the narrator exaggerates the importance of the events in Mariposa compared to the rest of the world. For example, when there is a country-wide election, the town of Mariposa, was, of course, the storm centre and focus point of the whole turmoil.

The story of the steamboat Mariposa Belle sinking in Lake Wissanotti is one of the best-loved in the set. The apparent magnitude of this accident is lessened somewhat when it is revealed that the depth of the water is less than six feet. Men from the town come to the rescue in an un-seaworthy lifeboat which sinks beneath them just as they are pulled onto the steamer, and the narrator earnestly remarks that this was one of the smartest pieces of rescue work ever seen on the lake.

The stories in the book were initially published as a sequence of short literary pieces serialized in the Montreal Daily Star from February 17 to June 22, 1912. Leacock reworked the series - by the means of additions, combinations, and divisions (but no deletions) - and assembled it as the book's manuscript. The book was first published on August 9, 1912. Leacock corrected proof pages of the first edition of Sunshine Sketches while in Paris.

In 1923, George Locke commented in the New York Evening Post that library students had chosen the book as one of a dozen [...] books of prose fiction would best represent the works of Canadian authors to readers who wish to know something of Canadian life.

The book, along with the Champlain statue in Couchiching Beach Park on Lake Couchiching, were used in tourist promotions for the town as proof of Orillia's civic pride in the decades following the 1925 Dominion Day celebrations.

In 1952, the book was adapted into a television series, Sunshine Sketches, by CBC Television, the network's first foray into Canadian-produced drama. The cast of the series included John Drainie as the Narrator, Paul Kligman as John Smith, Timothy Findley as Peter Pupkin, Eric House as Dean Drone, Peg Dixon as Liliane Drone and Robert Christie as Golgotha Gingham.

A second television adaptation premiered on CBC in 2012, and stars Gordon Pinsent and Jill Hennessy. This made-for-TV movie features two stories from the book, The Marine Excursions of the Knights of Pythias and The Hostelry of Mr. Smith, and was created to coincide with the book's 100th anniversary. The stories are a mix of fact and fiction; drawing on details of Leacock's own life and that of his literary creation. (wikipedia.org)

Lesser books have gotten greater reviews but the measure of a book's quality is not by the stars it receives but by the mirth it delivers to its readers. Stephen Leacock's book or rather contribution to human knowledge shall remain etched in the crests and troughs of mine. Every now and then as I shuffle through my memories I shall always relive this collection with a chuckle if not instantaneous laughter. That being said, the story 'With the photographer' seems relevant even in today's age of the gram. I suspect that human nature was really so predictable to this under rated humorist that he truly saw things Behind the beyond! (Amar Viswanathan)

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)

Stephen Leacock was enormously popular in the first half of the twentieth century. Further Foolishness was published in 1916 and, while some sections show their age and have lost their effectiveness, it still has the capacity to entertain a modern reader.

It is divided into four topical sections: Follies In Fiction, Movies and Motors, Men and Women, Peace, War, and Politics and Timid Thoughts On Timely Topics. These can be read in any order. The third section is the weakest and the humour is dated. On the other hand, it has a historical and cultural significance. There are some essays which certainly stand out. Are The Rich Happy? is still very funny. the Snoopopaths is a satire lampooning popular pulp novels of the time. Particularly interesting is Madeline of the Movies: A Photoplay done back into words. Here Leacock is satirising the old silent morality film-short of the type created by D.W.Griffith and his Biograph company. We can still read this sketch with considerable pleasure. But one should remember that we tend to see such films as naive and antiquated. But Leacock was actually dealing with a state-of-the-art technology when he wrote it. He refers to it as a moving picture photoplay. So there is an additional layer to the satire which we may miss entirely. The final piece in the book is an interesting essay Humour as I See It which is well worth reading.

Thus, many of the essays in the book show their age, but they also reveal what people found funny nearly a century ago. At the same time there are a fair number of genuinely humorous pieces which still work. Considering that Further Foolishness is in the public domain and available free from Project Gutenberg, it is well worth reading. (Richard)

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.

... (Wikipedia.org)