Souvenir

Quite. This link (I hope) is to an article in yesterday's Ottawa Citizen: "Canadiana 101; What defines us?".

Dear God. Who wrote that? The tea lady?

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/...3-f75b22a4bfbe

NoreenC

I agree. I think the media makes it sound a lot worse than it is. I still find friendly cheerful people here, believe it or not My Canadian In-Laws have recently visited and thought it was a great place to live. My mother-in-law said that if she had stayed longer she wouldn't have wanted to return!The only reason I am contemplating moving to Canada is because my husband wants to return there, although I have lived there and I do like it. I enjoyed my time there very much. It's a long story, but it's a second marriage for both of us and we can't afford to buy here. We've not been married long enough to have the necessary funds. My husband has been working out finances and thinks we can buy a place of our own in Nova Scotia to retire. Basically if I hadn't married a Canadian I'd be happily staying here. The country has its faults, but so has every other country.

Tableland

Not for much longer!

dbd33

I subscribe to the print version of the Guardian Weekly. That has some cracking writing, I roared at a review of "Prezza" lifted from the Observer - I'd quote it but am not at home.

On edit:

"This is a shabby book, but it could be the starting point for a good one about the decline of the political memoir. Prezza, a title that announces an ambition to be sold alongside celeb trash, thuds into bookshops already groaning with a slagheap of political hiss-and-tell. Yuk from Cherie about her menstrual cycles and contraceptive equipment jostles for space with Michael Levy on Tony's taste for massages from Carole. Now John P lumbers up, late as usual, with his bulimic bid for attention. Here we have another futile exercise in self-justification and self-pity which has nothing fresh, acute or profound to say about power. It is not even funny."


http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/...283260,00.html

Tableland

What, you don't got writin' like that in Canada?

dbd33

I don't recall ever being moved to an emotion other than irritation by the writing in a Canadian publication. I can't watch the news on television as I just end up screaming "not true, and not even ****ing English" at it. I don't think Canadians have written humour (I used to sail with a close relative of Steven Leacock who brought me examples of his stuff but, if it's funny, I don't see how). They do have slapstick.

Tableland

Slapstick - well that's a start. We had slapstick back in 1905, so give them a hundred years or so and they'll get there. The US produces some written humour though - P.J. O'Rourke, Bill Bryson, and many other much more venerable fellows.

In edit - just thought of the guy that wrote Rare Birds. Can't recall name and while not exactly a classic it did make me chuckle in places. Quite cynical.

Souvenir

I was given a book of Leacock's short stories (not that he was Canadian). I can appreciate his writing style and see some humour in it but he seems to repeat it over and over again. You probably wouldn't notice if several pages were missing.

Nice to see that Morgentaler has been given the Order of Canada.

dbd33

The US thirst for humour contributes to the lack of it in Canada. The wittiest show on US TV, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, is largely written by Canadians. Writers drain south like doctors.

Tableland

Ah je vois. You have the Montreal Comedy thing as well, though? It's unfair comparing anything comedic with the UK because Britain has always produced the best comedy. Light years ahead of other nations. From Del Boy to Have I got News for You. Even 50% of Laurel & Hardy was British. And the Only Fools and Horses format is copied all over the world.

dbd33

Just Pour Rire, or some other franglais. I don't think that's especially Canadian comediens though, like the Montreal Jazz Festival it's in Montreal but an event with international performers.

Oakvillian

Will Ferguson? Wrote "how to be a Canadian" with his playwright brother Ian, also a vaguely Bryson-esque Canadian travelogue "Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw."

Mordecai Richler wrote some biting satire, too, if you count that as "written humour" - Barney's Vision has a rich vein of satirical humour to mine.

dbd33

Already it screams "same old, same old". I'm not the government, I don't explicit local content in every joke.

Have to give you that one.

Souvenir

Very vaguely. It's drivel.

iaink

I think maybe it was written by AdrianTO?


Surely the original article should have been "Fed up of Britain, Come to Alberta"