Further Foolishness

by Stephen Leacock

Stephen Butler Leacock (1869 -1944) was a Canadian writer and economist. Leacock, always of obvious intelligence, was sent to the elite private school of Upper Canada College in Toronto, where he was top of the class and so popular he was chosen as head boy. 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. Although he wrote learned articles and books related to his field of study, his political theory is now all but forgotten. Leacock was awarded the Royal Society of Canada's Lorne Pierce Medal in 1937, nominally for his academic work.

Genres: Humor, Essays, Fiction, Ebooks

164 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1916

About the author

Stephen P. H. Butler Leacock, FRSC, 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. The Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour was named in his honour.

Wikipedia article.

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

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.

[Lawrence]

returning to Leacock's Victorian humor -- a good slice of Canadiana. Takes me back to high school English lit as well.

[Lucy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This particular collection didn't thrill me, I found it a bit dated and some of the attitudes rather less pleasant than some of his other work.

[Janelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

2 stars. Leacock let me down with this book.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

He's funny, but not quite Mark Twain (who he is often compared to).