Create a Somewhat Romantic Image of Herself As Author and to Preserve
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create a somewhat romantic image of herself as previously published letters to her other author and to preserve some degree of distance literary correspondent, Ephraim Weber. But even among her close friends. there remain more than sufficient examples of new insights to make the present collection an Realities were always faced by Montgom• important addition to the slowly increasing ery, but she softened them whenever possible body of works about the author. Montgomery with her love of nature and her sense of once wrote to MacMillan: "In a few humour. Literary tours provide amusing generations letters will be obsolete. Everyone moments such as her conversation with the will talk to absent friends the world over by wife of a history teacher whose student in• radio. It will be nice, but something will be lost cluded Anne of Green Gables in between with letters." Her prediction is turning out to Katherine of Aragon and Jane Seymour in a be accurate, but fortunately not in time to list of Henry VIII's wives. A luncheon with prevent an increased acquaintance with the Emmeline Pankhurst elicits the following com• writer through the pages of her own correspon• ment: "She had a sweet, tired gentle dence. face—looked more like a Presbyterian elder's wife who had nothing more strenuous in her Susannah Joyce-Jones life than running the local Ladies Aid and put• London, Ontario ting up with the elder.'' Montgomery's capacity for joy was most fully realized through her deep sensitivity to In Her Own Right: Selected Essays on nature, which is frequently described in terms Women's History in British Columbia. Bar• of fantasy and mysticism. A group of spruce bara Latham and Cathy Kess, Eds. Camosum trees at sunset are "... like dark, slender College: Victoria, B.C., 1980. Pp. 302. witchmaidens weaving their spells of magic in a rune of elder days" and walking in the woods, she identifies herself as ". the priestess of an oracle under her sacred pines." In Her Own Right is an ambitious attempt by Although she finds the beauty of the Muskoka a group of lay historians to write a women's breathtaking, her visits home to her Island history of British Columbia. According to the provide a spiritual reunion with her old editors, their purpose was not intentionally "to haunts. Such heightened perceptions produced advance the theoretical explanations of an interest in psychic experimentation, and women's historiography in Canada," but to Montgomery writes several interesting ac• offer a regional perspective on various ac• counts of attempts to communicate with a dead tivities B.C. women have been engaged in friend, and prophetic dreams about the out• historically. This means looking at topics such come of battles during the First World War. as immigration, politics, reform, prostitution, and (with reference to native women) hunting. As the years of their correspondence Over half of the seventeen articles in this progressed, Montgomery's letters to Mac• volume focus on institutions. Thus, B.C. Millan took the form of yearly epistles, women are considered within the milieu of or• frequently running to more than twenty pages. phanages, Women's Institutes, suffrage and Since much of their material was culled from moral reform organizations, University Clubs, her journals, there are some repetitions of the trade unions and social welfare services. Already in its second printing, this collection Each essay has a bibliographic section, often has some distinct merits and is a welcome ad• not as complete or comprehensive as one dition to the literature of women's history in would like, but which embodies primary and Canada. However, it also suffers some serious secondary material as well as the occasional shortcomings, even within the restricted mention of other historical resources like tapes framework adopted by its editors. and photographs. Illustrations in the book are well-chosen and add to the impact of the Envisioned as early as the twenties, the work essays. At the end of the book, there is an ap• came to fruition in the late 1970's as part of a pendix by Linda Louise Hale, "Votes for student summer employment project. It is Women: Profiles of Prominent British Colum• based on papers, theses (non-doctoral) and bia Suffragists and Social Reformers" which, essays especially prepared for the volume. To while not entirely systematic, is a handy com• its credit, Camosum College was instrumental pilation. The use of photographs in this ap• in making publication possible. Judging from pendix certainly helps bring these women a lit• the "Contributors" list, most are outside the tle closer to life. field of history. One finds undergraduate and graduate students, non-students, persons This volume further contains some longer studying education, political science, library essays on significant but forgotten women such science, and women's studies, a Chief Finan• as Helena Gutteridge. Roberta Pazdro's cial Officer of a Texas oil and gas corporation, "Agnes Deans Cameron: Against the an Executive Director of the Manitoba Coun• Current" tells us about a lively B.C. "equal cil for International Cooperation, and a local rights feminist" who at the time of her funeral archivist. None are professional historians. in 1912 was called "the most remarkable Herein lies an inherent weakness. woman citizen of the province." (p. 101) There is a study of a staunch religious mater• nal feminist by Gloria Whelen in "Maria But, to begin with the book's merits. En• Grant, 1854-1937: The Life and Times of an thusiasm for the subject matter is evident Early Twentieth Century Christian." Another throughout. Moreover, the time period over biography is Tami Adilman's "Evlyn Farris which the essays span is considerable. Chron• and the University Women's Club." This ologically, the volume begins in the mid-19th woman, born in Nova Scotia and the daughter century during the B.C. gold rush. Jackie of a professor and clergyman at Acadia Lay's "To Columbia on the Tynemouth: The University, subsequently became a prominent Emigration of Single Women and Girls in Liberal and 'organizational woman' in British 1862" provides some interesting insights into Columbia at the turn of the century. These the importation of potential wives for single studies are helpful in expanding our sparse miner's and others. Another essay, "Helena knowledge of women's history. Gutteridge: Votes for Women and Trade Unions" by Susan Wade chronicles the life of a B.C. suffragist and trade unionist who was ac• Using statistical techniques, Michael H. tive on women's issues until her death in 1960. Cramer suggests in "Public and Political: Over a century of B.C. history is thus covered. Documents of the Woman's Suffrage Cam• And as mentioned, thematically the volume paign in British Columbia, 1871-1917: The slices through many different aspects of B.C. View from Victoria" that there was "little cor• history. relation between the successes of the Liberal party and the suffrage referendum despite the primary sources appears solid, some studies in fact that both won decisive victories in the this volume suffer from obvious thinness. For province." (p. 94) This finding raises some in• example, one simply cannot understand the teresting questions on the suffrage movement response of Vancouver women to the depres• and politics that might well be followed up in sion by exclusively relying on either the Minute analyzing other provincial elections where the Book of the Local Council of Women of Van• suffrage issue dominated. Deborah Nilsen, couver or the Yearbook of the National Council too, offers some excellent data using graphs, of Women of Canada. This merely leads to tables and maps to supplement her arguments much guesswork and superficial findings. on Vancouver prostitution. The possible use of social science techniques to advance our un• A lack of general background in Canadian derstanding of women's history is made history is evident too. Amor de Cosmos, who evident in both these studies. This can only be greeted emigrant single women in 1862, is encouraged. described as the editor of the Colonist (p. 32), but no mention is made of him as future Less satisfactory is the overall quality of premier of the province, nor is any significance writing. The excessive, injudicious and fre• given to his presence on the arrival of the ship. quently wholly unnecessary use of quotes In another essay the problem in the B.C. relief should have been eliminated during the camps during the depression is noted and the editorial process. The overall writing style sit-down strike of June 1938 is mentioned (p. tends to be choppy, and this reader would have 271), but not a single word is said on the more welcomed a redrafting. Here is also where significant On-To-Ottawa Trek by B.C. relief some serious consultation with professional camp workers and others which had taken historians would have helped immeasurably. place a few years before. The above are exam• For example, an essay on "Sexism in B.C. ples of not having done one's homework. This Trade Unions" shows little real knowledge of clearly detracts from the quality of writing and the working class history that has been written interpretation. in Canada, let alone the problems of collective bargaining. Nor are present day unions with There is also little overall synthesis within strong feminist leanings, for example, SOR- each of these essays. Despite its claims, In Her WUC mentioned. In another essay, the Own Right is unsuccessful as regional history. YWCA is called an organization for ' 'welcom• True, women in one region of Canada are ing friendless girls"; reference to a recent being studied here, but no real effort has been study ignored in this essay's bibliography, made to place these women within the context would have led to a different interpretation.