When the end of the world was (a lot less) funny

Despite the prediction of Mr. Harold Camping and his Family Radio International I'm sitting at my desk as May 21, 2011 winds to a peaceful (or at least no more globally cataclysmic than usual) close.

Watching the river of news and reaction flow by on Twitter, I'm seeing both ridicule and also an undercurrent of relief. 'We knew he was probably wrong, but - really - you never know,' pretty much sums it up.

But the jaunty dismissiveness ('People are making Rapture jokes like there's no tomorrow' 'Worst. Rapture. Ever.' ) has struck me most. Compare it with the iconic Beyond the Fringe sketch about the end of the world written by and featuring Peter Cook, Jonathan Miller, Dudley Moore and Alan Bennett. Cook plays a messianic guru elucidating the specifics of the end of the world to three fawning acolytes. 'When will it be, this end of which you have spoken?' asks Miller.  'In about thirty seconds time, according to the ancient pyramidic scrolls… and my Ingersoll watch,' replies Cook.

They wait, and prove to have their timing wrong again. 'It's not quite the conflagration I'd been banking on,' Cook states.

This was 1961. The Cold War was at its height. The public fear of global nuclear war was dire. No one who heard Moore's line 'And will this wind be so mighty as to lay low the mountains of the earth?' would have failed to understand that such an annihilating wind could, indeed, end their world at any time.

It must have been a lot harder then to be funny about the end of the world. It was a mighty brave, too. 

1 response
Simon, I grew up with that amazing Monty Python sketch! "Will this wind be . . ." "What?" "Will this wind be .. . " SO good. You're so, so right to point out the fact that, in the Cold War, the world was quite worried about a wind mighty enough to lay low the mountains of the earth." And I think all of us are still this worried. The "Rapture" gave people a chance to laugh at their fears, then. But today the fears remain. Thank you so much for posting this.