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Revisiting Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town The PLeA Vol. 37 No. 2 Revisiting Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town Stephen Leacock’s has proven to be one of Canada’s most venerable works of fiction. Written in 1912, this collection of interconnected short stories about small-town Canada has never been out-of-print. Mordecai Richler may have best- explained the book’s longevity when he said that it is “as much good honest fun to read today asSunshine it was whenSketches first published.” can be understood to be more than just a good-natured satireThe of small-town PLEA SunshineCanada. It Sketches can help of us a Littleexamine Town the roots, benefits, and limits of Canada’s liberal democratic tradition. From prohibition debates to elections to reconciliation, this issue of uses to ask how have we succeeded as a liberal democracy? And how can we do better? PM40030156 WeLcome To mAriPosA Montreal Star SunshineSome time Sketches around of New a Little Year’s Town Day 1912, the commissionedStar Stephen Leacock to write a series of interconnected short stories. Over the course of six months and for $600, Leacock created . One chapter was published in the every second Saturday from February 17 to June 22, 1912. It was re-published in book form on August 9, 1912. Set in the fictional town of Mariposa, the first chapter opens by saying “I don’t know whether you know Mariposa.Sunshine If not, Sketchesit is of no consequence, for if you know Canada at all, you are probably well acquainted with a dozen towns just like it.” However, there is little question that the setting and the characters of are largely based on one particular town: Orillia, Ontario. About 100 kilometres north of Toronto, Orillia is whereSunshine Leacock Sketches spent most of his summers. Orillia’s reaction to was varied. Some residents appreciated being Leacock’s inspiration. They even wanted in on the joke. ForOrillia example, News Leacock Packet said that Orillia lawyer Mel Tudhope “wrote me a mock letter threatening to sue me for libel against these people.” As well, a review of the book in the December 12, 1912 said “there is no room for resentment, in fact Orillians are rather proud to think that Orillia is the ‘little town,’ which has been immortalized as a type of Canadian life.” Globe and Mail However, not everyone in Orillia was tickled. The local barber—who became a character in the book—told the in 1951 that “I used to talkSunshine to the fellowSketches while I was shaving... but I never thought he was going to put it all in a book.” And one local in particular— Leacock’s mother Agnes—was reportedly not happy with how mocked Orillia’s Canon Greene, even though she liked the book as a whole. Nevertheless, Canon Greene himself reportedly never resented Leacock’s portrayal of him. Sunshine Sketches Regardless, it was clear to the people of Orillia that they were being mocked. This probably contributed to changes made to when it was converted from serial to book. Several character names were changed to obscure Leacock’s Orillian inspirations. According to Leacock, the “names were too transparent.... it was only in fun but it led the publishers to think it wiser to alter the names.” Sunshine Sketches Humor and HumanityEven though Leacock was mocking his fellow Orillians in , Leacock most likely had good intentions. As heSunshine says in Sketches the preface to his book , “the essence of humor is human kindliness.” To be sure, there is a critique of people and a critique of society in . Even so, Leacock portrays Mariposa as a community of kindly people with forgivable flaws. As D.H. Carr wrote in the introduction to the book’s 1960 educational issue, Leacock “is having fun, but it is fun with something he loves—the life, in all its patterned variety, of a little Ontario town he knows with easy and perfect intimacy.” Discuss Sunshine Sketches Sunshine Sketches 1. Leacock wrote in 1912. Given the time and the author: Sunshine Sketches a) What perspectives would be dominant in ? b) What perspectives would be left out of ? 2 c) How would this shape the overall narrative of the book? plea.org JusT some GoinGs on in mAriPosA mArine DisAsTer! The GreAT church Fire! eLecTion! When the Mariposa Belle sinks The nearly-bankrupt in less than six feet of water, a Church of England Church botched rescue effort ends with When a federal in Mariposa burns to the the rescuers needing to be rescued election is called, ground under suspicious too. Once the passengers are the campaign in circumstances. Fortunately safely off the ship, the Mariposa Mariposa sees facts for the congregation, the Belle floats free from the lake being pushed aside in church is insured for twice bottom and carries on to the favour of meaningless its replacement value. The dock.Sunshine Sketches statistics, candidates insurance company goes to embracing shady court to halt the payout, but ’ marine electioneering tactics, Judge Pepperleigh throws out disaster is an anagram of and voters throwing the case and saves the church several steamboat sinkings the public interest from insolvency.Sunshine Sketches on Lake Simcoe and Lake aside and casting their Couchiching in Leacock’s time. ballots purely out of self- Just like in , However, the 1898 sinking of interest. St. James’ Anglican Church in the Longford may be closest Orillia suffered a fire in 1906. to the Mariposa Belle. The Historian Jack GranatsteinSunshine However, unlike Mariposa’s Longford got stuck on a Lake Sketchescalled the election church fire, St. James did Couchiching sandbar. A campaign in not burn to the ground. And lifeboat was sent, and once “the definitive unlike Leacock’s story, the the passengers disembarked analysis” of Canada’s fire at St. James was not the boat floated free. 1911 federal election. This insurance fraud. In fact, St. election pitted Sir Wilfred James was forced to make • Laurier’s Liberal government financing plans to fund the The rescue boat that against Robert Borden’s church’s restoration. was provided decades Conservatives. That election’s earlier to Mariposa by the debate largely focussed on • Macdonald government trade with the United States The insurance company sinks when trying to and government patronage. tries to get out of paying save the Mariposa Belle. the congregation’s claim. This reveals that public • Do insurance companies safety plans can also The voters of Mariposa view want to maximize their have shortcomings. their own personal gain as more client’s benefits? Do they What should the role of important than the broader want to minimize their the state be in ensuring interests of society. What is the own payouts? Or is the public safety? risk to society as a whole if citizens truth somewhere in fail to consider the common good between? when casting ballots? 3 plea.org ProhibiTion A hisTory oF ProhibiTion AnD Liquor reGuLATion Societies in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa have been consuming alcohol for at least 5,000 years. Alcohol in North America is a different story. On Turtle Island—the land we Stephen Leacock was a fierce now call Canada—Indigenous people did not brew alcohol. opponent of prohibition. In his 1919 Alcohol was introduced to the land by Europeans. For essay “The Tyranny of Prohibition” he most of the time since alcohol’s introduction, government claims that “the fundamental fallacy of has been regulating it. While the government’s reasons prohibition is that it proposes to make for regulation are varied, two overriding themes can be a crime of a thing which the conscience seen: alcohol causes harm to individuals and to society of the great mass of individuals when misused, and alcohol is a source of revenue for the refuses to consider as such.” For government. Leacock, the heavy regulation of Government regulations on alcohol have not always been liquor was draconian because people applied equally. Historically, these regulations have been would find it regardless of whether or most discriminatory towards Indigenous people, and not the government tried to restrict SellingCanada’s of race-based Strong Liquors alcohol to lawsthe Indian only began Ordinance to be unravelled Sunshineit. Leacock’s Sketches hostility towards over- in the 1950s. One of the first discriminatory laws was the regulation of liquor can be seen in of 1777. Issued by the British governor in Quebec, this law banned Josh Smith, Mariposa’s hotelier, refuses the private sale and distribution ofIndian liquor Act to of Indigenous 1876 to close his bar at the regulated hours. people. The Indian Department became the sole supplier of Smith’s “moral code was simplicity alcohol to Indigenous people. The went itself,—do what is right and take the further. It completely prohibited Indigenous people from consequences.” To Smith, doing what buying or drinking alcohol unless they gave up their Indian is right is locking the bar’s doors after status. Though these laws were said to be a response to the all the regulars are inside the bar, negative effects that alcohol had on Indigenous people, the being served. The regulars in Smith’s laws were underpinned by the false and racist “firewater beverage room include the town’s myth,” described by University of Nevada researcher Joy Judge Pepperleigh. Unfortunately for Leland as a tendency throughout history to view Indigenous Smith, he mistakenly locks the doors one night before Judge Pepperleigh is inside the bar. The enraged judge then saw to it that the law would be followed: Smith is found guilty by Pepperleigh’s court for serving liquor after hours. Smith saves his liquor licence through an elaborate scheme to rally the locals to his cause.
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