I Didn't Even Know Norm Macdonald Was Sick...

Seriously, I really didn't... It would appear that Norm, in typical Norm fashion, kept his illness very well-hidden, perhaps to avoid all those common platitudes that at best are vain, and at worst they're just dark voids where comedy goes to die. In a way it's almost as if he made his own death into a joke, what with his weird style of saying the most wicked things in such a blunt way that people couldn't help but laugh as a way to release the tension. I have heard it said, and wish I had been the one to come up with it, that Norm was the comedian that, not only willingly confronted the elephant in the room, but he actively hunted it down. Indeed, Norm's comedy style was often as blunt and as brash as an elephant rifle, and yet he was often at times so subtle you needed some deep soul-searching and a degree from the University of Science in order to understand it. In another saying that I also wish I had been the one to come up with, it was almost as if Norm was doing comedy strictly for himself, we were just along for the ride... And now it's quite sad that the ride is over and thus we will never truly know where Norm Macdonald got his ideas from.

Normie, Normie, Normie... Normie, Normie, Normie... Death, Normie!

Cancer is one mean ol' bastard, I tells ya... It comes seemingly out of nowhere to slowly, or not so slowly, infect you all over the place, wanting to grow so badly, spreading all over your body, your flesh, your bones, your blood, everywhere until you're nothing but a fading corpse... I mean, this cancer's a real jerk! And it's a double jerk because one month before taking my Norm it took away Sean Lock, another one of my favorite comedians. It seems damn near unstoppable and deep down we know, though we don't always know rationally or fully accept, that one day we will all become chairmen of the D-E-A-D. That day has sadly come for Norm, and thus almost all of my top favorite comedians are now gone, except one, at the time of writing, of course. And completely out of nowhere too, because one minute a guy is seemingly alright, and the next he's just gone. In a way I suppose it was smart of Norm to keep it discreet because his comedy style likely wouldn't have allowed for a lot of laughs if fans were also worried about him. In fact it's quite a weird feeling, a comedian's death that is, because in one second you're sad, in another you're laughing out loud at one of his jokes, and the next you're sad again. It's a constant roller coaster, these strange mood swings, and I guess Norm wanted to avoid them completely, at least for as long as he was around. Maybe more than teachers or firefighters, he's the real hero. And as bad as cancer is, at least Norm didn't die of salt.

To me personally I'd say Norm's rise was meteoric, he quickly went from nobody I knew to becoming my absolute favorite comedian, though like with most things I love, I didn't love him immediately at the beginning. I think I have a good excuse though, because Norm's style is very bizarre... He doesn't tell jokes quite in the traditional way, not like the king of comedy, Rodney Dangerfield, who constantly fired off quick one-liners in rapid succession, and changed subject either with great ease or even without a proper transition. Norm was different, Norm loved to go on and on and on, adding a ton of details as he went, making the joke long and hard and tortuous. I suppose a lot of people would find it boring, I for one greatly hesitated in showing a logician friend of mine the infamous “professor of logic” joke because it's four or five minutes long... And yet, when you begin to love Norm, you can't resist going through his bits four or five times, and at least I can speak for myself when I say that whenever I go back I laugh at some detail I hadn't quite noticed before. It's just the way he spoke, the intonation on unexpected syllables, the innuendos and implications, the completely and utterly unnecessary details, it all makes me think Norm knew the punchline more or less but loved to improvise until he got there. And in a million different ways I tried to mimic his style a little bit, only to fail miserably because Norm was a total weirdo, and I say that with all the love in the world.

Another aspect of his style I tried to mimic, and also failed completely, was his thing of playing dumb. It's incredible how much he got away with, it's always downright bizarre to see him surrounded by clearly unintelligent people who don't seem to realize they were being made fun of. It's way more impressive than it looks too, at least to me, because I found that trying to act dumb loses its spice when people actually take you for dumb and thus act accordingly, or they drag you into a crazy debate you have no hope of leaving unscathed because they truly bought your crazy, outlandish theories. But of course, Norm never really cared, and so he went on and on playing the fool even if in reality he was incredibly sharp and well-read, though he claimed to only have read six books in his entire life, which is funny since he also claimed one of his favorite books was In Search of Lost Time, which alone spans seven volumes... Funnily enough, it was Norm's mention of that book that made me go back to it and give it another go, which ended up making it one of my favorites too, and also I might as well add that Norm's casual but meaningful defenses of christianity helped me see it with new eyes. All this to say that Norm's entire style, though incredibly difficult to perform, it almost looks easy...

Still, Norm was never one to shy away from things that were hard, much like Adam Eget for that matter, and that's why their podcast together was the best, with Norm constantly bringing up contentious issues in absolute stark seriousness, and Adam playing along as a trusty, bumbling sidekick who messed up every other time, though with his moments of brilliance too, which kinda include his moments of failure... I'll always have to admire Norm's incredible brilliance in casually asking fellow comedians such awkward questions that left them completely stumped, wondering if they were in the right place, wondering if Norm was even doing comedy at all when he was actually killing left and right. And that is where the rewatch value comes from, you really have to get past the initial awkwardness to reach the juicy comedy in the middle, after which you really won't find a better podcast, or a better duo, or a better friendship, or a better comedian, or a better man, or a better value for your hard-earned fifteen dollars.

And now, after Norm's long-suffering death, what do we do? I think nothing, or maybe not much. I think it's always okay to be sad from time to time, I suppose tears are as good as laughter, and though a lot of us now have more tears than laughter, it doesn't have to be that way, certainly not forever. Indeed, a comedian's death will always be a strange thing, it's almost disrespectful in a way to feel sad for their passing since it's almost as if in death they achieved the complete opposite of what they hoped to achieve in life. Should we then feel completely happy? Also no, and I'm sure Norm knew very well that even his lord and savior Jesus Christ wept for Lazarus, even mere moments before raising him from the dead. I think we can likewise do the same, or at least something symbolically similar – we can feel a little bit sad now only to then go back through the years and listen to every single one of Norm's jokes, wherein he still lives, as immortal as an old chunk of coal.

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Em continuação com o meu artigo anterior, comprometo-me agora a uma interpretação de um outro poema do mesmo poeta... mais ou menos. Porque os vários heterónimos pessoanos são todos iguais e diferentes, e diferentes e iguais. Qualquer leitor encontra temas recorrentes nos vários poemas porque de certa forma todos estes poetas se propuseram a resolver as mesmas questões que tanto atormentavam o poeta original. Mas a solução encontrada por Alberto Caeiro é algo diferente na medida em que é quase invejável ao próprio Fernando Pessoa, ainda que talvez não seja invejável aos outros heterónimos. Por outro lado, talvez eu esteja a projetar porque em tempos esta poesia foi deveras invejável para mim. Ao contrário do poema anterior, do qual nem sequer tinha memória de ter lido e apenas sei que o li porque anotei marcas e sublinhados na margem da página, este poema é um que li, que gostei e que apresentei numa aula qualquer num dia que me vem agora à memória como idílico. Mas em típico estilo d...

Paulo Seabra

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