REVIVAL OF “CHAD”

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26199, 9 July 1946, Page 5

REVIVAL OF “CHAD”

HUMOUR IN BRITAIN

PUNGENT COMMENTARY NATIONAL SAFETY-VALVE (From E. G. Webber. N.Z.P.A. Special Correspondent) (Rec. 11 p.m.) LONDON, July 8. During the war years an anonymous humorist evolved a figure known as “Chad,” which chalked, pencilled and scratched on walls, windows and hoardings throughout Britain served to express the typically British reaction towards current complaints. As portrayed by even the most amateur hand, Chad is represented by the top of a bald head with a long nose and two surprised eyes peering over the top of a wall designated simply by a chalked line. Purists add the tips of two hands on either side of the head, but the caption never varies, with the exception of the key word. It is always, “ Wot, no —and the blank space can be filled in and followed either by a query or an exclamation mark according to the feelings of the perpetrator. Poignant Subjects

To-day, “Wot, no beer! ” is unquestionably the most poignant demonstration of the Chad art, but “ Wot, no fags! ” and “ Wot, no matches? ” almost rival it in the force of their remonstrance. Chad became so well known during the war that it is on record that the commanding officer on an air station felt impelled to parade his men and warn them that Chad must disappear for ever from the walls of messes, from the fuselages of planes, and from many other inappropriate vantage points selected for his laconic protests. He returned from parade to find “ What, No Chad? ” inscribed on his blotter. Less well authenticated is the schoolboy’s version, “Wot, no Tyler? ” Although Chad, like posters advertising the Gaieties of last year, still remained in many of his manifestations, he slipped into partial eclipse with the end of the war. What Chad there was was definitely of war-time vintage. But now the war has gone and its after-effects continue to multiply. Chad has returned in all his pristine simplicity to express the feelings of what must be a very large section of post-war Britain. Yesterday, for instance, when I wedged myself with considerable difficulty into a train compartment built to hold 10 but already holding 15, I was considerably comforted, in spite of a temperature of over 80 degrees and a stout fellow-passenger who stood on my foot, to find Chad with us in our sufferings. He was scrawled three times in pencil on a vacant advertising space on the wall. “ Wot,” he said. “no room?” “Wot, no ticket?” and “Wot. late again? ” Bread Under Fire Chad, of course, has his own views on bread rationing. “Wot, is that all? ” is one of his comments on Mr John Strachey's 63 ounces a week. “Wot, only one slice? ” is another. He is also the most popular public commentator on prices. I saw him the other day scrawled on' a fruiterer’s window saying, “Wot, peaches six bob each?” and 1 agreed with him. I also saw him scrawled on another window making pungent comment on the prices of grapes, but it was unprintable. Chad shares the feelings of the great British public on fish as a continuous article of diet. Britons have had so much fish in lieu of other things during and since the war that even fish lovers are inclined to take a jaundiced view of the recurrent plaice and übiquitous cod. “ Wot,” says Chad in several prominent places, “ fish again! ” Chad has his own sense and appropriate timing. Crowds returning recently from one of Britain’s largest summer race meetings saw him chalked on a railway overbridge remarking, sympathetically. “ Wot, no shirt? ” He could also have added with justification, “Wot, no summer? ”

Those who are given to philosophising upon the scources of British greatness may very well turn -to Chad as a cheerful illuminating contrast to the forms of expression of more politically minded people elsewhere who scrawl “ Viva Stalin ” or “ Viva II Duce ” on hoardings. Chad’s comment would probably be “Wot, no laughing?”