Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll, and the University College Lit: The University of Toronto Festivals, 1965-69

Abstract

In the late 1960s, the University College Literary and Athletic Society (the Lit) sponsored three festivals devoted to “Pop” art, psychedelia, and propaganda. As part of the 1967 festival, the Lit unsuccessfully attempted to have Timothy Leary visit to discuss the usefulness of LSD. This paper explores the festivals at University College, the controversy they created, and their successes and failures as cultural events, within the context of the history of student protest in Canada and the attempt to meld extra-curricular and counter-curricular activities in the 1960s as part of a wider search for “relevance” at the University of Toronto and in Canada as a whole.