The Novel in English

W. H. New

WHEN Canadian Literature peace. Seething with political disruption, began in 1959, Canada was happily ex- it discovers a winter not of discontent so periencing a traumatic publishing season. much as of a humourless determination All at once appeared an impressive to protest. Like Ronald Hambleton (to collection of books: Richler's The Ap- use the title of his 1959 novel), Mac- prenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, Mac- Lennan has insisted in the past that Lennan's The Watch that Ends the "every man is an island" — a canoe, on Night, Sheila Watson's The Double the ocean, with a storm rising. By indi- Hook, John Buell's The Pyx, Gallaghan's vidually accepting this, his earlier charac- Collected Stories, and others. They came ters, George Stewart, Catherine, and at the end of a curious decade, one that Jerome Martell, could survive the threat for all its wars had been basically hope- of disintegration. They could accept their ful, enjoying affluence while its people selves, in effect, and "living their own remembered the Depression, and empha- death", let others live theirs. But the sizing the need for at least the appearance characters of Return of the Sphinx — of security at a time when World War II Alan and Daniel Ainslie— so much could not yet be spoken of with objective more bound by a preconceived notion of dispassion. But 1959 began a decade too, a world order, so much less capable of a rather less satisfied one, certainly less understanding any other, cannot com- overtly stable, and these books contain municate. Failing, they locate the fault within them a hint of the disappoint- outside themselves: the one, defensive, ments that writers in the sixties were to finding threat in "winter" rebellion; the worry over and respond to. other, rebellious, and in his own way Some indication of this changing atti- equally narrow-minded, trying to an- tude can be seen in the direction taken nounce the "winter" as the only truth. by Richler and MacLennan alone. Richler's The Apprenticeship of Duddy Whereas The Watch that Ends the Night Kravitz similarly closes on a "dark" pos- had ended in a metaphysical peace, with sibility, though the ironic treatment the promise that Montreal's winter iden- makes it seem less foreboding. Duddy, a tity would be subsumed in its inter- triumph both because and in spite of national role, MacLennan's later novel himself, threatens to become an extra- Return of the Sphinx (1967) denies that ordinary kind of conservative when he

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buys land and so acquires a bourgeois into happiness — Mitchell's The Kite position in the eyes of society. It's hardly (1962), Elliott's The Kissing Man what he expected, but the irony is a nice (1962), Moore's The Luck of Ginger touch at the end of his comic progress. Coffey (i960), St. Pierre's Breaking The implications are more astringent, Smith's Quarter Horse (1966). But often however. What happens when rebels, a "peace" that is discovered at the end achieving power, turn into inverted con- of a book is possible only after denying servatives? What can the mild conserva- a way of life that had been apparently tive do when he starts to look like a peaceful. Rudy Wiebe's Peace Shall Des- dangerous liberal? Richler's comic gifts troy Many (1962) is an obvious example. turn these possibilities into high camp in Set in a prairie Mennonite community, it the interrupted scenarios that make up explores the nature of repression: in Cocksure (1968), but again in this later young people who are coming to sexual work the characters lose their identity maturity, and in a society that by at- rather than find it. They live lives de- tempting to deny violence actually breeds signed for them by Madison Avenue and it. Yves Thériault's Agaguk (tr. 1963) is the movies so much that real emergen- comparable: the title character, if he is cies cannot break their stance; humanity to find contentment, must leave his band disappears along with naivete, and only and relinquish to his wife some of the the brittle would-be sophisticates remain. traditionally male prerogative of making In another context entirely, Northrop family decisions. David Walker's Where Frye notes: "A provincial society will the High Winds Blow (i960), Jane produce a phenomenon like the tea party Rule's The Desert of the Heart (1964), described in F. R. Scott's well-known Brian Moore's The Emperor of Ice- satire, 'The Canadian Authors Meet'. A Cream (1966), Margaret Laurence's A metropolitan society would turn the tea Jest of God (1966), and Robert Hunter's party into a cocktail party, and the con- Erebus (1968) supply further examples; versation would be louder, faster, more all five of them, showing crises of con- knowing, and cleverer at rationalizing its science that lead to violence or disrup- pretentiousness and egotism." It doesn't tion, also suggest a hesitant and uncertain mean it will be more worthwhile, and it but basically positive future. nicely describes Cocksure. In the popular formula books, too Frye also points out in The Modern (written with varying degrees of imagin- Century what is a favourite Blakean ation and skill), where one might expect theme with him: "The child's vision is saccharine solutions, we find an accom- far behind us. The world we are in is the panying kind of muted terror. This per- world of the tiger, and that world was haps has always been true, from Gothic never created or seen to be good. It is novels to detective fiction, so it is not the subhuman world of nature, a world surprising to find it in Arthur Hailey's of law and of power but not of intelli- In High Places (1961), Charles Israel's gence or design." This sensibility, with all The Hostages (1966), or in other works its attendant frustration, is what charac- by these prolific writers. Though too terizes the writing of the sixties. A few often the terror can itself become a works do escape, often through irony, stance, a stylization exploited for its sen-

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sationalism or indulged for its commer- quickly as possible towards decadence. cial value, it will sometimes be more than But as writers around the world in the this. It will pervade a whole work, as in previous decade had shown — The James Glavell's King Rat (1962), and Aunt's Story (1948), Catch-22 (1955), not so much characterize its tone, or be etc. — "madness" in a mad world that in conflict with even a comic tone, as it fancies itself sane comes to be a kind of will underlie the situations and provide sanity. Leonard Cohen's now famous lyric the sensibility by which we understand "Suzanne takes you down" is a perfect them. A Victorian example of all this extension of this. Cohen, George Bower- would be Edward Lear's "The Jumblies", ing (Mirror on the Floor, 1967), and which for all its comic surface presents Gwendolyn MacEwen (Julian the Magi- us with a frightening world. The decade cian, 1963) have all been concerned with of the 1960's is not so far from the Vic- developing new techniques for Canadian torians as it has often liked to think, and fiction, and with breaking down not only its conflicts involving identity, order, the barriers between poetry and prose but chaos, religion and science have their also those between the sensual and the roots in an earlier time. spiritual. It is one of the things "Su- The works of Marie-Glaire Biais, one zanne" is about, and one that the mad- of the best of the new writers of the ness/holiness/innocence/guilt complex decade, illustrate this exploration of the tries to evoke. "psychology" of the present day. Mad Political protest is a different kind of Shadows (tr. i960), Tête-Blanche (tr. extension of this same problem of chaos, 1961), and A Season in the Life of and (also characteristic of the 1960's) we Emmanuel (tr. 1966) all present "ab- see the psychology of it examined in normal" families wending their way as Robert Kroetsch's The Words of My Roaring (1966), and David Lewis Stein's fine first novel Scratch One Dreamer (1967). We see the political encounter between youth and age, Québec and les Anglais, raised vividly in MacLennan's Return of the Sphinx (1967), but ex- tended into violence more frequently in French-Canadian works, as in Hubert Aquin's Prochain Episode (tr. 1967), Jacques Godbout's Knife on the Table (tr. 1968), or Gratien Gélinas's play, Yesterday the Children Were Dancing (tr. 1967). Fortunately there are more and more French-Canadian works being quickly and artistically translated into English, which may not serve the cause of bilingualism, but does give aid to understanding, so there is at least some interim value. And if the translations are

123 THE WRITING OF THE DECADE themselves artistic, the more reason to the point taken up by so many of the appreciate their existence. partly political books, like Scratch One Also translated have been works which Dreamer; the hero, here, would prefer to inform the literature with a political avoid committing himself to anything, background: Jean le Moyne's Conver- but he finds himself drawn into action gences (tr. 1966), or Jean-Paul Desbiens's until he finally chooses to act. Whether The Impertinences of Frère Untel (tr. or not this is freedom is another question. 1965), which should give English-speak- As Alden Nowlan writes: ing writers a new perspective towards their land. The venture into political In those days, the vanquished surrendered their swords like gentlemen, spheres is interesting in Canadian fiction, the victors alone unusual enough to be noteworthy and surrendered their illusions. noteworthy enough for Edmund Wilson The easiest thing to do for a cause is to die for it to pick up and even overstress in his О Canada (1965), for the political books And in Nigel Foxell's Carnival (1968), still work as psychological studies. To with its German setting, we find just such ignore this aspect of the recurrent exami- a choice examined. By choosing to leave nations of self, in emphasizing the politi- the country rather than fight a duel that cal, is to ignore what has by now become could only strengthen other people's posi- the typical Canadian mode. The number tions, Walter Phalts gains a kind of per- of works one could list in illustration is sonal liberty at the expense of a possibly not endless, but so long as to be biblio- ephemeral fame. That he still looks like graphic rather than discursive. Writers a loser is natural in a world like the one like Peter Taylor, Diane Giguère, George Foxell shows us, but what it feels like — Ryga, Margaret Laurence (in a beautiful from inside Walter Phalts, for example — 1964 novel, The Stone Angel, recreating is what more and more writers have tried in retrospect the life of an old woman to express. during her dying days as she strives for a In the process, subjects for fictional freedom she has never quite realized she examination have widened — particularly has), and Henry Kreisel (with his second with censorship retreating into the back- novel, The Betrayal, 1964) all have come ground — and expression has become into print. And all are concerned not just freer; characters do and say things that with broadly political relationships, but earlier writers might have known but not with the individual reasons for them, written about, heard but not said. The which is something different. result, as one might expect, is a mélange Freedom has been a key word in the of license and art, and the license is as fiction of the decade, a freedom variously much an impingement on freedom as it is defined in political terms, or as freedom freedom itself. But readers retain the from the material minutiae of modern choice of which books to read, so ulti- life, or as freedom to act as an individual, mately we are better off. This does not or as freedom from the self and the sense defend all recent Canadian novels, for perceptions that limit its understanding. many, despite their vivid details, are rude How individual a person can be in an age rather than revealing; they exploit rather of causes and moral imperatives is exactly than attempt to understand. If Stephen

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Vizinczey's In Praise of Older Women crossfire in Israel at the end of the book, (1965) begins delightfully comically, it deliberately sacrifices her companion in ends up a sort of "Rake's Digress", order to preserve herself. Is this sense or repetitive and in the long run boring. cowardice? Is amorality possible? The And Harold Horwood's Tomorrow Will questions stand unresolved. People at be Sunday (1966) or Scott Symons' large, not aware of the 'facts', consider Place d'Armes (1967), the one embar- Bernice a heroine, and she complacently rassed, disguising itself in sympathy, and accepts the tribute. It was "what they the other militant, displaying the nar- needed", she adds, and if the sentiment rator's wilful self-degradation, both en- smacks of condescension, it is also honest. courage not understanding so much as a Honesty has become callous, and the commercially successful snigger. underlying bitterness shows through. It Leonard Cohen's Beautiful Losers isn't disillusionment particularly; it's just (1966), on the other hand, is a different disappointment, made acrid by a kind of quality of book entirely. It is written well anarchy when love itself seems insular and it has something to say — all too rare and values dead. When Austin Clarke, a combination, but welcome when it ap- in his third novel The Meeting Point pears. The narrator, trapped in a triangu- (1967), examines the prejudice and vio- lar affair involving both his wife and lence that face West Indian immigrants their male lover, is both satisfied and in Toronto, we are still not far from this desolated by his relationships and is any- feeling. After its wry comedy the book thing but free because of them. Con- turns "sour", and the central character, stantly losing himself and being made Bernice Leach, becomes less angry than beautiful by his experiences, and con- hollow. She ends up listening to "talking stantly recognizing and losing respect for and talking" — to words — which are himself, he is torn in opposing directions, meaningless beside her knowledge of in- seeking at last in metaphysics for an justice and her more and more futile answer to his dilemma. But in seeking a ache for understanding. spiritual communion with Catherine There is no immediate or easy exit Tekakwitha, a 17th Century Iroquois from problems like these, no peace un- saint, he discovers not the peace that tainted by a kind of corruption, no beauty MacLennan's characters could find in undisturbed by the very existence of the metaphysics in The Watch that Ends the self, which at once allows an individual Night, but brutal sensuality and the kind identity and limits what it can do. Like of accompanying doubt of saintliness, the Cohen's poems in Flowers for Hitler suspicion of pride, that one finds in an (1964), Clarke's novel and Ducharme's earlier work like Callaghan's The Loved speak to their generation of commitment and The Lost (1951). Réjean Duch- and emptiness. The ironies are dark, the arme's brilliant The S wallow er Swallowed humour is brittle, and any affirmations (tr. 1968), raises a comparable dilemma. are a little wistful in an uncertain world. The young girl narrator, caught in Arab

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