"Antigonish" is an 1899 poem by American educator and poet William Hughes Mearns. It is also known as "The Little Man Who Wasn't There", and was a hit song under that title.
Contents
Poem
Inspired by reports of a ghost of a man roaming the stairs of a haunted house in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada, the poem was originally part of a play called The Psyco-ed which Mearns had written for an English class at Harvard University about 1899. In 1910, Mearns put on the play with the Plays and Players, an amateur theatrical group and, on 27 March 1922, newspaper columnist FPA printed the poem in "The Conning Tower", his column in the New York World. Mearns also wrote many parodies of this poem, giving them the general title of, Later Antigonishes.
Song
In 1939, "Antigonish" was adapted as a popular song titled "The Little Man Who Wasn't There" by Harold Adamson with music by Bernie Hanighen, both of whom received the songwriting credits. A 12 July 1939 recording of the song by the Glenn Miller Orchestra with vocals by Tex Beneke became an 11-week hit on Your Hit Parade reaching #7. Other versions were recorded by Larry Clinton & His Orchestra with vocals by Ford Leary, by Bob Crosby & His Orchestra with vocals by Teddy Grace, by Jack Teagarden & His Orchestra with vocals by Teagarden, and by Mildred Bailey & Her Orchestra. In 2005 the heavy metal band Nodes of Ranvier featured the first verse of "Antigonish" in their instrumental song "Novocain For No Reason". The first verse is also used in the Billy Bragg song "Goalhanger" on his 1996 William Bloke album.
Appearances in popular culture
Mearns' "Antigonish" has been used numerous times in popular culture, often with slight variations in the lines. Versions are frequently featured in modern entertainment:
Film
Literature
Comics
Television
Music
We passed upon the stair
We spoke of was and when
Although I wasn't there
He said I was his friend…
Other media
A version printed in Mad magazine around the time of the Church Committee hearings read:
There was a man upon the stair
When I looked back, he wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I think he's from the CIA.
A version appeared in March 2008 that played on the contrast between UK Prime Ministers Tony Blair (1997–2007) and Gordon Brown (2007-2010). Allegedly it was composed by a minister in the Labour government.
In Downing Street upon the stair
I met a man who wasn't Blair.
He wasn't Blair again today.
Oh how I wish he'd go away.
A version appeared in issue 33 of the DC Comics title 52. It was spoken by The Question
...Upon the stair,
I met a man who was not there...
He was not there again today,
I wish to gosh he'd go away.
Lines from the poem are used as the only lyrics in a computer demo called Rush by Singular Crew.
In a dissent in the 2008 United States Supreme Court case Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, Justice David Souter referenced the poem when he noted that, "The State responds to the want of evidence with the assertion that in-person voter impersonation fraud is hard to detect. But this is like saying the 'man who wasn't there' is hard to spot".
A version appeared in the 24 March 2015 edition of The Canberra Times in a cartoon drawn by David Pope, where Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbot (as Scrooge) is reciting the lines while averting his eyes from a ghostly ex-Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, who sits on the stairs reading the report from the Moss Review into abuse in the Australian immigration detention centre on Nauru - a reference to Fraser's reputation as a moral compass and embarrassment to current sitting Liberal Party Members.
Last night I saw upon the stair
A tallish man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
Oh, how I wish he'd go away!