tyresias | Funny Business: Why do Quebecers love comedians so much?

Please follow the link if you want to read the entire article. http://www.cbc.ca/arts/theatre/francophonecomedy.html by Patricia Bailey, a Montreal-based writer and broadcaster.

Why do Quebecers have such a strong appetite for comedy in the first place? I put that question to comedian Guy Nantel after watching his popular one-man show, Les Vraies affaires, which bills itself as a politically incorrect look at modern life — everything from relationships to politics. Most of the act was completely lost on me; I just didn’t get the Quebec cultural references or the joual (dialect).** Nantel believes Quebecers are drawn to local comedy because it speaks about their unique experience as French-speaking North Americans surrounded by a sea of English.

"I’m not sure if we’re depressed, but there’s a sense of inferiority here in Quebec. We have an internal conflict. We feel we belong to the world as a culture, but we also feel that we’re small. And we are. We are just a few million people surrounded by three hundred million [English-speaking] people.”

**note: the author is based in Montréal. True, that doesn't tell me how long she's been there, but yikes...