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Document generated on 09/27/2021 12:14 a.m. Labour/Le Travailleur Reviews / Comptes Rendus Volume 60, Fall 2007 URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/llt60rv01 See table of contents Publisher(s) Canadian Committee on Labour History ISSN 0700-3862 (print) 1911-4842 (digital) Explore this journal Cite this review (2007). Review of [Reviews / Comptes Rendus]. Labour/Le Travailleur, 60, 249–332. All rights reserved © Canadian Committee on Labour History, 2007 This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ REVIEWS / COMPTES RENDUS Faith Johnston, A Great Restlessness: ted to romantic adventure and when the The Life and Politics of Dorise Nielsen communist movement in Canada could (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press no longer provide enough excitement to 2006) keep up her adrenaline levels, she re-emi- grated, upping the ante not only by going She was born Doris Webber in London, yet again to an arena that guaranteed an England in 1902 and died, with a long- uncertain future but somewhere where left husband’s surname and an affected she did not even speak the language. “e” added to her christened name, in Bei- Indeed, in the 23 years Dorise Nielsen jing, China in 1980. In between, she lived spent in China, she never really mastered 31 years in Canada (1926–57), filling the the language. She supported herself mod- roles of rural teacher, farmer, political eling the speaking of English to party activist, Member of Parliament, party workers being educated for international worker. contact and correcting fractured idi- What motivates someone like Dorise oms in documents and communications Nielsen? Certainly her experience as translated for official purposes. But it is unhappy wife to an unsuccessful dirt also clear that a major role Dorise played farmer in a place (northern Saskatch- in Beijing was that of a leading member ewan) and time (Depression) guaranteed of a showcase of resident and subsidized to leave only the moribund unpoliticized foreigners, westerners prized for their was a defining factor, but I think only in dedication to the cause and used as pub- terms of the direction she took, not in lic symbols of international support for terms of the general manner in which she Mao’s regime. The conclusion that she rel- lived her life. Johnston locates Nielsen’s ished this role as a figurehead committed modus operandi in a “great restlessness” to communist ideals is supported by the and provides information that indi- fact that she never seriously considered cates her family found her challenging leaving, rolled without great personal even before she left England. Her largely angst with the punches of the Cultural uninformed plan to emigrate to remote Revolution, and handily wrote off long Saskatchewan evoked distress from her friendships with people who could not mother, derision from her brother, and keep the faith, at least not without doubts stubborn determination from Dorise, and the asking of awkward questions. At once she became aware of their resistance. the end, she was given a memorial ser- For someone who spent her life working vice at the cemetery for revolutionary for that most intellectually identified heroes. In this, she managed a continuity of international movements – Marx- of acceptance not commonplace to others ism expressed in the political arena in in her expatriate community. variously named versions of communism I may have made her sound like an – Dorise always in the end stayed true adventuress, which of course she was, but to her feelings. Hers was a life commit- she could have chosen to live a life com- Table of Contents for Reviews, pp. 5–6 . Book 1.indb 251 10/16/07 2:38:26 PM 252 / LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL mitted to a less admirable ideal than that ful piece of luck that allowed her to sup- of everyone contributing what they can port her children and also to allow her to to their society and taking back only what use her god-given gifts in a way that was they need. Beyond that, Johnston con- meaningful to her. A talented and attrac- tends that Dorise likely incorporated little tive speaker, Dorise Nielsen became a from Marxism into her own intellectual political propagandist and for one term makeup, despite committed, decades- during World War II, was Canada’s first long study and note-taking. For this rea- Communist and third female to serve as a son, it is unlikely that she struggled much member of the House of Commons. with the wavering nature of the party It was the instability of Saskatchewan line. She probably did not have deep intel- political weather in the late thirties that lectual needs for clarity and logic. What provided the opportunity for Nielsen’s she did seem to understand instinctually election to the House of Commons in however was the importance of discipline March 1940 as a so-called “unity can- as an anchor for a, well, restless personal- didate,” meaning hers was a candidacy ity. Her dogged dedication to living out that had been negotiated among various the textbook life of a “communist” is her factions of the fractured prairie left out most apparent demonstration of aware- of which ccf predominance would even- ness of herself as someone who, if left to tually rise. She was more than able to drift, would do so. do justice to the job. Her stamina in the There were four children in all this, one face of endless car trips over bad roads, of whom died in the meaningless tragedy her ability to take enjoyment in deliver- too many prairie pioneers were doomed ing constant slight variances of the same to act out. The other three had erratic message in community after commu- childhoods and were pursued in adult- nity, her cheerfulness in times of little hood by the demons that unhappy child- food and poor accommodation, the fact hoods breed. Paternal alcoholism and that she cleaned up well on a non-exis- maternal restlessness reproduced them- tent budget for clothes and hygiene, her selves in various guises at various times acceptance without sentimentality that in Dorise and Peter Nielsen’s descen- her need to make a living for them must dants. Still, it is difficult to imagine a inevitably mean hard times for her chil- trouble-free life for children born into a dren, all these were of great worth to the grinding poverty that their parents had Communist Party of Canada, with which not prepared for, that their parents had she was first secretly and later openly no control over, and that precious few affiliated. Blessed with an acolyte’s abil- other people seemed concerned enough ity to follow the party line (which in this about to do anything. period included dancing to the changes of Describing the desperate circum- Stalin’s relationship with Hitler), Nielsen stances of parts of the prairies during seemed to be able to turn on a dime and the Depression is one of the many things to take just as much enjoyment in driving Faith Johnston does well in this biog- a point home one day that she had cheer- raphy. People were forced into taking fully and wittily refuted the day before. actions that were both distressing and That her speeches were a delight is not in necessary. Children were boarded out question. Even the Mounties who were with strangers, wives stayed with hus- spying on her said so in their reports. The bands who had lovers, fathers left and cpc had a good show woman and it used were virtually never heard from again. her in every way that it could. In all this, Dorise Nielsen had a wonder- “Use” was of course the operative Book 1.indb 252 10/16/07 2:38:26 PM REVIEWS / COMPTES RENDUS / 253 word. As soon as Fred Rose entered the dian historiography. This book informs House by way of a by-election in Québec, us on aspects of women, the left, the west, Dorise found herself juniored. Failing to and on Canada’s place in international find re-election in 1945, Dorise had to communism. And, not least, it introduces accept being centred in Toronto as part us to a fascinating character, one whose of working for the party, despite her years restless life is worth the telling, in and of of effective service in the west. Faced itself. with a wide variety of issues it wanted to Janice Dickin talk about, the party relegated Dorise to University of Calgary women’s issues. All this, despite the fact that she was the big draw for public lec- tures. She pulled in the crowd but it was Carolyn Podruchny, Making the the boys who got to go for glory. Voyageur World: Travelers and Traders By 1955, by which time her youngest in the North American Fur Trade child was 21, Dorise left Canada looking (Toronto: University of Toronto Press for a more authentic revolutionary expe- 2006) rience. After a period in England, she and the man who had been for some time Most societies have created a series of her significant other, stumbled towards convenient stereotypes that represent in Beijing, where she found her last career. shorthand form crucial aspects of their Johnston comments on the loneliness shared history and sense of identity: John that marked Nielsen’s last years there Bull and Jolly Jack Tar do the job for Eng- but isolation was always a continuing land, while Uncle Sam and possibly G.I.
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