What is Literature?

 By Ashley Lister

 A good friend of mine presented me with a book earlier this month: What is Literature? by Jean Paul Sartre.

Anyone who has spent more than ten minutes in my company will have heard me make some scathing comment against the French. Some of my favourite jokes are targeted against the French for their lack of cleanliness or their inherent cowardice, or their general societal deviance.

I saw a genuine French army rifle for sale on eBay last week. The ad said, ‘Never fired. Dropped once.’

How can you tell if a Frenchman has been in your backyard? Your bins are empty and your dog is pregnant.

Why do the French smell so bad? So blind people can hate them too.

Yet, despite my penchant for sharing these unworthy quips, my friend entrusted me with a copy of Sartre’s What is Literature? I read a little Sartre whilst I was studying my degree. Sartre’s thoughts on existentialism had a mercurial quality where, at one moment I would think I was reading the gibberish ramblings of a lunatic, and the next I would think I’d been granted a momentary insight that rationalised all the complications of existence.

I haven’t yet read all of What is Literature? It accompanies me to college on days when my teaching means I’ll have an hour or two to spare between classes. It goes with me on car journeys when the only other alternative is talking to family. It’s a reminder that a good friend sufficiently recognised my tastes to select such an appropriate gift. And, to me, nothing else sounds quite so much like a good book.

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There was an old man from Blackpool…

By Ashley Lister

My father was a music hall comedian. I’m not saying his material was bad but, on the night variety died, his act was held for questioning.

Actually, that’s unfair.

He was very good at making people laugh. I remember his last words to me. “Don’t turn the machine off. Please. Please, for the love of God. I’m sure I’ll recover. I don’t want to die.” How we all chuckled.

But I’m not sure if it’s because of father’s influence that I’ve developed my lifelong passion for humour.

“Do I make you laugh?” I asked my wife.

“Not when you’ve got your clothes on,” she replied.

I think that’s what she said. It’s difficult to tell what someone’s saying when they’ve always got a pie in their mouth. Not that I’m saying my wife’s fat, but her patronus is a cake. (A mysognistic northern joke there for all the Harry Potter fans reading this. Talk about aiming at a niche market).

Humour is such a personal thing that it’s probably encoded in our DNA. Freud talked about humour in terms of the tendentious and the innocent, although why we listen to a German talking about humour is a mystery to me. It’s like listening to a Frenchman talk about bravery, or a Canadian sing about irony, or a Spaniard talk about compassion for animals… (Have I offended enough stereotypes yet with this postmodern humour?)

In poetry the form most commonly associated with humour is the limerick. And, whilst Shaun was singing the praises of Edward Lear at the start of this week, I have to admit I find him annoying. (Lear not Shaun. I think Shaun is perfectly lovely). Too often Lear’s final rhymes merely reiterate the sentiment expressed in the opening line. Here’s an example:

There was an Old Man of the Wrekin
Whose shoes made a horrible creaking
But they said, 'Tell us whether,
Your shoes are of leather,
Or of what, you Old Man of the Wrekin?'

To me, the final line in this Lear limerick seems like a weak conclusion to a potentially stylish verse. Lear could have had the final rhyme of squeakin’, leakin’, Peking or a myriad other alternative rhymes that would be superior to the reiteration of the Old Man of Wrekin.

However, rather than write a limerick to conclude this post, I’d like to see regular readers contributing limericks in the comments box below. For those who are unsure how to start, I’d suggest you begin with the words:

There was an old man from Blackpool…

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