It’s possible to be too serious. When that happens, we think of ducks. They never have a break in their quacking schedule. Or if it’s not ducks, then it’s word-play. And that was what ITMA was all about. So let’s turn the clock back. Tommy Handley was the front man. Ted Kavanagh was the script-writer. ‘It’s that man again’ – with a bit of help from Mrs Mopp, Mona Lot and Colonel Chinstrap helped a generation to forget the war and quickened up their reflexes. Along with C.S. Lewis they prodded an audience into forgetting ration books, black-out and fire-watching.
Mention ITMA today and we meet incomprehension. It has gone the way of Fred Astaire, Rita Hayworth and other celebrities. It remains in good company. There was one contemporary of Tommy Handley who went the graphic road and gained his own celebrity status: Heath Robinson. Robinson was a cartoonist who lived in a world of his own. From bits and pieces of metal, string and nuts and bolts he would design a fanciful gadget that worked to achieve a result by the most outlandish route possible. This self-deprecating engineer would leave no complication untested, no fragile connection that failed to be incorporated. The classic absent-minded professor had found his niche.
Milton’s fallen angels pondering the mysteries of divine election had allowed themselves to become too serious. For some questions we lack the necessary tools to do the job – and we always will. Perhaps that is what hinders us when we start discussing whether God can make two plus two equal five. Perhaps it is lack of common sense.
Saki (H.H. Munro) is a good antidote for lost common sense. ‘In baiting a mouse-trap with cheese, always leave room for the mouse.’
CAREER MOVE
If you like sketching your way through a page or two, have you got what it takes to be an illustrator? Artists and script-writers come from somewhere. Sometimes they turn up unexpectedly. Sometimes the aptitude is there but the opportunity is not. Persist. Cultivate that aptitude. Kavanagh was born in New Zealand and started training to be a doctor. He had an aptitude for creating dialogue. Heath Robinson was born into a London family of artists. His individual style became known world-wide. H.H. Munro started out as a policeman and found another career.
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