A One Hour Documentary Produced by Reel Girls Media Inc. BRIEF OVERVIEW Rudy Wiebe is one of Canada’s most cherished and acclaimed writers. A two- time Governor General’s Award winner, Wiebe has been compared to Hemingway, Faulkner and Balzac for nimbly marrying detailed historical fact to enthralling fiction. His novels, short stories and non-fiction books are provocative but compassionate tales about Western Canadian history and his Mennonite heritage. Renowned for giving a literary voice to Canada’s aboriginals, Wiebe is the author of several groundbreaking epics. They include The Temptations of Big Bear (a tragedy about the great Cree chief who became embroiled in the Northwest Rebellion) and A Discovery of Strangers (the gripping tale of how Arctic natives rescued the first Franklin Expedition). In the fall of 2005, filmmakers followed Wiebe around Saskatchewan and Alberta as he reflected on his experiences in the Canadian Prairies which have informed his destiny as a writer and produced the epic stories for which he’s renowned. Wiebe speaks eloquently about the death of a beloved sister, the Frog Lake massacre that was Big Bear’s undoing, and the murder conviction of Big Bear’s great-great granddaughter (a case that prompted Wiebe to controversially collaborate on her autobiography, Stolen Life: The Journey of a Cree Woman). Fascinating and wild, these places and experiences shaped Wiebe as a teller of profound stories about Canada’s north and west. Press Kit ©Reel Girls Media Page 1 of 10 SYNOPSIS Between the Stones and the Ocean: A Portrait of Rudy Wiebe is a one-hour arts and entertainment documentary that profiles Western Canadian writer Rudy Wiebe, still remarkably vital and prolific at 71, during one memorable, golden autumn on the Prairies. “He writes about the history and landscape – two significant elements of the Canadian experience, and he’s written about them memorably in all of his novels, “ says writer and director Scot Morison. Wiebe is a grand old man of Canadian literature. Twice named winner of the Governor General’s Award for English-Language Fiction (for The Temptations of Big Bear in 1973, and A Discovery of Strangers in 1994), he’s the author of nine novels, several of them epics that encompass the sprawling history and geography of Western Canada. There are also four short story collections and non-fiction works, all published globally. The documentary follows Wiebe from his rural writing retreat outside of Edmonton to the Speedwell area of Saskatchewan where he was born in 1934 and lived until age 12. There his sister Helen died as a teen, an event that later inspired his first published fiction. Recalling his adolescence in Coaldale, Alberta, Wiebe reminisces about reading through its tiny library and sparking an ambition to attend university. In Edmonton, he recalls University of Alberta professor Frederick M. Salter challenging him to write about Mennonites in Canada. With the resulting novel, Peace Shall Destroy Many, Wiebe launched a career crafting startling historical literature about misunderstood people. Wiebe is a proud Mennonite, whose parents fled religious persecution in the Soviet Union in 1930. His heritage, with its radical, ecumenical Christian vision has figured prominently in his novels. Yet Wiebe is best known for his bold historical fiction about the life of Canada’s aboriginals. In such novels as The Temptations of Big Bear, about a famous Cree chief caught up in the Northwest Rebellion, The Scorched Wood People, a fiercely revisionist portrait of Metis leader Louis Riel, and A Discovery of Strangers, about contact between the Dene people and the first Arctic expedition of explorer Sir John Franklin, Wiebe determinedly gave this country’s original residents a literary voice. The film examines the emotions fortifying that voice. Wiebe speaks frankly about his son’s suicide (which contributed to a 10-year gap in his novel writing) and about his controversial collaboration with Big Bear’s great-great-granddaughter Yvonne Johnson, a convicted murderer with whom Wiebe co-wrote the autobiography Stolen Life: The Journey of a Cree Woman. Writers Aritha van Herk and Robert Kroetsch champion his singular style: poetic and bloody-minded in both its content and punctuation. Aboriginal filmmaker Gil Cardinal recognizes him as an honourable custodian of history. On the shores of a lake near Big Bear’s burial ground, a central truth is underscored: Wiebe was one of the first non-native writers convinced that the experiences of Canada’s first residents were stories essential to our collective memory. Over a sterling career he’s embedded that belief inside some of our country’s finest literature. “With his impressive, immersive approach to research, you really get a sense of time and character in these landscapes,” says the film’s producer Ava Karvonen. Press Kit ©Reel Girls Media Page 2 of 10 QUOTABLE QUOTES “He’s got a voice of his own. You read three lines and you know that Rudy wrote them…that’s almost more in the American tradition of the great stylists like Hemingway or Faulkner, where you read a bit and you know who wrote it.” Author Robert Kroetsch “He was really one of the very first writers who took seriously the stories and the history and the importance of First Nations people (in relation) to our larger story.” Author Aritha van Herk “One of the great writers this country has produced of all time.” Former Editor-in-Chief, McClelland & Stewart, Anna Porter “He’s somebody we should all be proud of. Not just for the work he’s done, but for the man he’s been, the way he’s conducted himself.” Filmmaker Gil Cardinal “I’m a great champion of The Temptations of Big Bear. That was news for all of us when that book came out…it was kind of giving permission to deal with a great part of our history that had been either not represented or misrepresented.” Author Robert Kroetsch “Yvonne is a kind of example of all the things that have gone wrong with Canadian government policy and the way the Canadian government has treated the native community in this country. And the abuse and the violence and the addictions that she suffered are classic addictions, abuses and suffering on almost every reserve in Canada. Exactly the kind of thing that Big Bear had feared would happen to his people.” Rudy Wiebe on Yvonne Johnson “When it got published in the early Seventies, people said to me, ‘Why do you bother writing about an old Cree Indian who’s dead now?’ And then, 20 years later they said to me, ‘How dare you write about an old Cree Indian that is dead!” Rudy Wiebe on The Temptations of Big Bear “Native people have not accused me of appropriating their voices. What they say is, “If you show respect and understanding of our world, we respect you for that.” Rudy Wiebe on his critics Press Kit ©Reel Girls Media Page 3 of 10 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY, Rudy Wiebe o Of This Earth, 2006 o Place: Lethbridge, A City on the Prairie (with Geoffrey James), 2004 o Hidden Buffalo, 2003 o Sweeter Than All the World, 2001 o Stolen Life: The Journey of A Cree Woman (with Yvonne Johnson) 1998 o River of Stone, 1995 o A Discovery of Strangers, 1994 o Chinook Christmas, 1992 o Playing Dead, A Contemplation Concerning the Arctic, 1989 o My Lovely Enemy, 1983 o The Angel of the Tar Sands, 1982 o The Mad Trapper, 1980 o Alberta/A Celebration, 1979 o The Scorched Wood People, 1977 o Where is the Voice Coming From? 1974 o The Temptations of Big Bear, 1973 o The Blue Mountains of China, 1970 o First and Vital Candle, 1966 o Peace Shall Destroy Many, 1962 Press Kit ©Reel Girls Media Page 4 of 10 BIOGRAPHY, Rudy Wiebe Rudy Wiebe was born in the hamlet of Speedwell, near Fairholme, Saskatchewan on October 4, 1934. He was the youngest of seven children. His Mennonite parents, Abram and Katarina Wiebe, had fled religious persecution in Soviet Russia and emigrated to Canada in 1930. In 1945, his older sister Helen died at age 17, after a long illness caused by rheumatic fever. Wiebe’s first published story was a contest-winning entry based on the death of his sister, published in 1956 in the magazine Liberty. He spent his adolescence in Coaldale, Alberta, a town 10 miles outside of Lethbridge in sugar beet-growing country. He did not speak English until age six, although at home he spoke a Low German Prussian dialect, and at church High German. From the University of Alberta, he received a B.A. 1956 and a M.A. in Creative Writing in 1960. He studied under a Rotary International Fellowship at the University of Tuebingen in West Germany. In 1962, he received a Bachelor of Theology degree from the Mennonite Brethren Bible College. In 1962- 1963 he was editor of the Mennonite Brethren Herald. He resigned the position because of the Mennonite community’s opposition to his first novel, Peace Shall Destroy Many. It’s the story of a young Mennonite man struggling with the pacifism of his religion as the First World War rages. Wiebe taught at Goshen College in Goshen, Indiana from 1963 to 1967. From 1967 to 1992 he was Professor of Creative Writing and English at the University of Alberta. Wiebe has published twenty-five books, including nine novels and the non-fiction best-seller Stolen Life, the Journey of a Cree Woman, co-authored with Yvonne Johnson. He was awarded the Governor General's Award for fiction for The Temptations of Big Bear in 1973, and again in 1994 for A Discovery of Strangers.