Canadian Identity - Distinctly Canadian

Distinctly Canadian

• The search for the Canadian identity often shows some whimsical results. To outsiders, this soul-searching (or, less charitably, navel-gazing) seems tedious or absurd, inspiring the Monty Python sketch Whither Canada?
• In 1971, Peter Gzowski of CBC Radio's This Country in the Morning held a competition whose goal was to compose the conclusion to the phrase: "As Canadian as..." The winning entry was "... possible, under the circumstances." It was sent in to the program by Heather Scott.
• Robertson Davies, one of Canada's best known novelists, once commented about his homeland: "Some countries you love. Some countries you hate. Canada is a country you worry about."
• Pierre Berton, a Canadian journalist and novelist, said: "A Canadian is someone who knows how to make love in a canoe without tipping it."
• British novelist Douglas Adams said each country was like a particular type of person, and "Canada is like an intelligent 35 year old woman". America, on the other hand, is a "belligerent adolescent boy" and Australia is "Jack Nicholson".
• A half-joking definition of a Canadian, offered by The Economist in 1993: "an American with healthcare and no guns", in reference to the countries' contrasting levels of public medical care and gun ownership.
• The well-known actor Mike Myers once commented about his native country: "Canada is the essence of not being. Not English, not American, it is the mathematic of not being. And a subtle flavour - we're more like celery as a flavour."
• Prime Minister Mackenzie King quipped that Canada was a country with "not enough history, too much geography".