Stephen Leacock
| Stephen Leacock | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | 30 December 1869 Swanmoor, a suburb of Rye, Isle of Wight, England |
| Died | 28 March 1944 (aged 74) Toronto, Ontario, Canada |
| Language | English |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Ethnicity | English |
| Citizenship | Canadian subject |
| Education | Upper Canada College |
| Alma mater | University of Chicago |
| Genre | Humour |
| Subject | Sciences |
| Notable works | Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town, Arcadian Adventures With the Idle Rich |
| Notable awards | Lorne Pierce Medal, Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada |
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. The Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour was named in his honour.
Stephen Leacock was born in Swanmore, a village near Southampton in southern England. He was the third of the eleven children born to Walter, Peter Leacock (b.1834), who was born and grew up at Oak Hill on the Isle of Wight, an estate that his grandfather had purchased after returning from Madeira where his family had made a fortune out of plantations and Leacock's Madeira wine, founded in 1760. Stephen's mother Agnes, was born at Soberton, the youngest daughter by his second wife (Caroline Linton Palmer) of the Rev. Stephen Butler, of Bury Lodge, the Butler estate that overlooked the village of Hambledon, Hampshire. Stephen Butler (for whom Leacock was named), was the maternal grandson of Admiral James Richard Dacres and a brother of Sir Thomas Dacres Butler, Usher of the Black Rod. Leacock's mother, Agnes, was the half-sister of Major Thomas Adair Butler, who won the Victoria Cross during the Indian Mutiny.
Peter's father, Thomas Murdock Leacock J.P., had already conceived plans eventually to send his son out to the colonies, but when he discovered that at age eighteen Peter had married Agnes Butler without his permission, almost immediately he shipped them out to South Africa where he had bought them a farm. The farm in South Africa failed and Stephen's parents returned to Hampshire, where he was born. When Stephen was six, he came out with his family to Canada, where they settled on a farm near the village of Sutton, Ontario, and the shores of Lake Simcoe. Their farm in the township of Georgina in York County was also unsuccessful, and the family was kept afloat by money sent from Leacock's paternal grandfather. His father became an alcoholic; in the fall of 1878, he travelled west to Manitoba with his brother E.P. Leacock (the subject of Stephen's book My Remarkable Uncle, published in 1942), leaving behind Agnes and the children.
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