Finlay Tyson
BA Modern
and Contemporary History
‘The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there’ is an infamous quote by writer and historian L. P. Hartley. It is a quote championed by many in the field of history and displays the differences between the present and the past. However, there can sometimes be a blind allegiance to the view that the past is so different that the ways in which we have stayed the same get ignored.
People and their attitudes have, obviously and undeniably,
changed over the thousands of years of human civilisation. But there are some
characteristics that have been shown repeatably throughout history to have some
sense of continuity, and one, more than any, which has withstood the test of
time is humour. For a good modern historical example of this you need look no
further than the gallows humour of the two world wars of the twentieth-century.
In fact, the very term ‘gallows humour’ fits in with this idea of a humour
continuum. Originating from the First World War there are a series of examples,
but one of the best preserved and well-known is the Wipers Times. The Wipers
Times was a satirical newspaper produced by soldiers to mock traditional
newspapers and the war in general (Fig. 1). It was started
when the 12th battalion of the Sherwood Foresters, stationed in Ypres, chanced
upon a printing press that had been abandoned when its civilian owner had fled.
A sergeant, who had been a printer in peacetime, salvaged the press and started
printing.
