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Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2020 October 17

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October 17

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Parody of Kipling's "If--" attributed to Churchill

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Here is a parody of Rudyard Kipling's "If—", attributed to Winston Churchill:

similarly attributed here in this animated short by Hanna Rybak:

but which doesn't appear in Wikiquote:

Churchill was a fan of Kipling and had a good sense of humor, so such a parody from him wouldn't surprise me, but the tone doesn't sound right for Churchill and "sexual orientation" in the penultimate line sounds anachronistic. Who wrote this parody, and how did it become misattributed? -- ToE 14:28, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I can't answer your query, but as an ageing Brit (who remembers watching Churchill's state funeral on TV), I concur that this does not have the feel of his writing. In a couple of places it is quite ungrammatical and/or unidiomatic, as if it has been translated (badly) from another language, and for me has hints of US English (beyond spellings like "color"), and of postdating his life. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 2.122.178.0 (talk) 14:45, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Among the many anachronisms, the use of "sexual orientation" (oops, didn't notice that this was mentioned in the question) in the last line is enough for me to rule it out as Churchillian. I would date it as no earlier than the 1990s. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 15:32, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. Ngrams show that "a loved one" and "deal with stess" were rare until the 1970s. As you say "sexual orientation" hardly occurs before 1970, and does not start to pick up until after 1980. And it is incoherent in places. Unbelievable as his work. --ColinFine (talk) 15:40, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
It's in Jack Kornfield's book A lamp in the darkness: illuminating the path through difficult times (2011). It's also in The Gospel Unhindered by Dan Bouchelle (2005) [1]. Jack is on Twitter [2], so if you have a Twitter account you could ask him where he got it. 92.31.142.178 (talk) 15:54, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I just looked up the original poem. It contains the famous line
If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs...
Dan Bouchelle is on Twitter too [3]. 92.31.142.178 (talk) 16:15, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Oooh! Thanks, those are great leads! -- ToE 18:52, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I'd be surprised if the spoof was written by a native English-speaker. "f you can skip past the ears of the allegations made ​​by a loved one, when everything goes wrong is not your fault" is not English as she is spoke. It reads to me like a machine translation from Chinese. DuncanHill (talk) 13:39, 20 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I know this is off-topic but — as a parody of If—, this thing is pretty poor. Doesn't have the same meter or rhyme scheme (or a recognizable travesty of either). Doesn't evoke trumpets in the background with its phraseology. B+ for the dog sentiment; C− overall. --Trovatore (talk) 17:41, 20 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Additionally, Churchill famously breakfasted on Scotch whisky and a cigar, [4] so I'm not sure that morning caffeine intake would have been of much concern to him. Alansplodge (talk) 17:57, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
He was quite partial to lapsang souchong. Smoky things! --jpgordon𝄢𝄆 𝄐𝄇 18:13, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Colony of the Queen Charlotte Islands

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I asked this on the talk page of Colony of the Queen Charlotte Islands last year but it seems no one really watches that article, so I'll ask here: Did this colony exist? In the act creating British Columbia in 1853, it states the colony "shall include Queen Charlotte's Island". That not only contradicts the article saying the colony existed until 1863, but also, there's the general fact that this is the only official mention of any kind of colony of the Queen Charlotte Islands/Haida Gwaii that I can find. Which makes me wonder if this article is, not a hoax, but an incorrect synthesis of info. --Golbez (talk) 22:26, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the article you linked includes a Google Books link mentioning a British government letter. It appoints James Douglas lieutenant-governor of the islands; it says it "conveys... no power to make laws or constitute a regular government", but it gives him "a position of authority as representing Her Majesty's Government in the district". That sounds as though the islands were considered unorganized British territory and not a colony. (I note in passing that the British Empire once included quite a lot of territory that was not constituted as colonies.) --174.89.48.182 (talk) 23:12, 17 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
You could raise this at Wikipedia talk:Canadian Wikipedians' notice board which is very active, or at least post a link to this query. Alansplodge (talk) 14:30, 18 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it did exist, briefly, before the entire area was annexed into British Columbia. This is a pretty good source that could be used to expand the stub. But there were two Colonies of British Columbia: the Colony of British Columbia (1858-1866) which did not include Vancouver Island or any of the archipelago islands, which the Queen Charlotte colony was merged into in 1863, and the subsequent Colony of British Columbia (1866-1871) which formed from the merger of the former with the Colony of Vancouver Island; neither of these were formed in 1853. Could the source you have be referring to the 1866 colony? Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 16:03, 20 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Golbez: Alansplodge (talk) 17:09, 20 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]
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