The Albie Collection

Albie on Laughter

... an elixir of my life

An ever-growing collection of moments and memories.
I joke, therefore I am I joke, therefore I am

I joke, therefore I am.

'What happened?’ I am asking the question into the darkness, ... A voice answers, close to my ears, I think it is a woman’s, ’... a car bomb ...‘ and I drift back, smiling inside, into nothingness.

I am elsewhere and other. ... What has happened to me, what is left of me, what is the damage? I am feeling wonderful and thinking easily in word thoughts and not just sensations, but maybe there is internal destruction.

Let me see . . . A joke comes back to me, ... and I smile to myself as I tell myself the joke, and feel happy and alive because I am telling myself a joke, the one about Himie Cohen falling off a bus, and as he gets up he makes what appears to be a large sign of the cross over his body.

A friend is watching in astonishment. ‘Himie,’ he says, ‘I didn’t know you were a Catholic.’

‘What do you mean, Catholic?’ Himie answers. *‘Spectacles . . . testicles . . . wallet and watch.’ *

My arm is free and mobile and ready to respond to my will. It is on the left side and I decide to alter the order a little, I am sure Himie would not mind in the circumstances.

Testicles ... My hand goes down. I am wearing nothing under the sheet, it is easy to feel my body. My penis is all there...

I move my hand up my chest ...

Wallet ... My heart is there ...

Spectacles . . . I range my fingers over my forehead, and cannot feel any craters or jagged pieces, and I know I am thinking clearly...

Watch ... my hand creeps over my shoulder and slides down my upper arm, and suddenly there is nothing there ... So I have lost an arm, that’s all... They tried to kill me, to extinguish me completely, but I have only lost an arm.

Spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch. I joke, therefore I am.

(Excerpts from The Soft Vengeance of a Freedom Fighter)

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'...the many roots of a single tree'

There are times for solemnity, times for earnestness, times for passionate calls to battle, and times for laughter. This is a time for laughter, the listener participating in the story by means of almost continuous and celebratory laughter... As I launch into my story, Zuma sits close by and watches me intently, ready to respond with warm chuckles and vigorous swings and shakes of his body to each statement I make...

I pause so as to give space for the Himie Cohen joke, where the story will resolve itself in genuine euphoric comedy. I wonder if Zuma has heard it already, I suspect that it has done the rounds in ANC circles, though in the rather reduced form of: 'And the first thing comrade Albie did in the hospital was feel for his balls.’

Looking directly at Zuma’s smiling face, and swinging round from time to time to confront comrade John with the humour of my story, I launch into the final portion. ‘... what do you mean, Catholic? ... spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch.’ Zuma doubles up and yells with laughter...

... we do not have to become like each other, erase our personal tastes and ways of seeing and doing things, but rather contribute our different cultural inputs so as to give more texture to the whole. This is how one day we will rebuild South Africa, not by pushing a steamroller over the national cultures, but by bringing them together, seeing them as the many roots of a single tree, some more substantial than others, but all contributing to the tree’s strength and beauty.

(Excerpts from The Soft Vengeance of a Freedom Fighter)

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Humour across cultures Humour across cultures

... we do not wipe out our personalities and cultures, ... rather we bring in and share what we have, Zuma's African-ness, his Zulu appreciation of conversation and humour is mingling with my Jewish joke, enriching it, prolonging and intensifying the pleasure... we do not have to become like each other, erase our personal tastes and ways of seeing and doing things, but rather contribute our different cultural inputs so as to give more texture to the whole.

Signature: Albie

Laughter and the Law - The Laugh It Off Case

Freedom of expression

Justice Albie Sachs and Thandi Matthews in conversation about The Laugh It Off Case

A graduate of Rhodes University School of Journalism wished to challenge the power of commercial logos to colonise the mind. He made t-shirts which he sold online, parodying the logos of a number of corporates. Carling Black Label were not amused. When they saw t-shirts with 'Carling Black Labour' parodying the brand and condemning the company's labour practices, they went to the High Court. It granted them an order prohibiting the sale of the t-shirts, which was upheld in the Supreme Court of Appeal. Writing for a unanimous Constitutional Court, Justice Moseneke overturned the order, holding that Carling had not shown that the detriment to the sale of their beer outweighed the journalist's free speech rights. Writing in agreement, Justice Sachs asked whether the law has a sense of humour, and replied that he did, adding reflections on the role of parody and laughter as an elixir of democracy.

VIDEO CHAPTERS:

  • DOES THE LAW HAVE A SENSE OF HUMOUR?
  • FROM HIGH COURT TO CONSTITUTIONAL COURT
  • AMUSING RESEARCH
  • THE POINT OF PARODY
  • THE JUDGMENT
  • HUMOUR, A SOLVENT OF DEMOCRACY
  • INFUSING FLAVOUR IN COMMON LAW AND STATUTES

From The Albie Collection Compendium of Judgments (see Law menu)

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Humour in society Humour in society

A society that takes itself too seriously risks bottling up its tensions and treating every example of irreverence as a threat to its existence. Humour is one of the great solvents of democracy. It permits the ambiguities and contradictions of public life to be articulated in nonviolent forms. It promotes diversity. It enables a multitude of discontents to be expressed in myriad of spontaneous ways. It is an elixir of constitutional health.

Signature: Albie
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