Talking excrement PAGE 6
$6.50 Vol. 21, No. 6 July/August 2013
Suanne Kelman A Self-Made Queen Margaret Atwood and the hard work of literary celebrity
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE
Geoffrey Cameron The Baha’i exodus to Canada
Sarah Elton vs. Pierre Desrochers Food fight for the planet
Rudy Buttignol Can the CBC be saved?
PLUS: non-fiction Hugh Segal on one of Canada’s most genial immigrants + Frances Henry on black power in Montreal + Rinaldo Walcott on book burnings and other anti-racist gestures + Christopher Pennington on Canadians in the U.S. Civil War + Sophie McCall on Grey Owl’s forgotten wife + Michael Taube on Canada’s forgotten royal + Laura Robinson on residential
Publications Mail Agreement #40032362 schools + Barbara Yaffe on Ontario as seen from Quebec Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to LRC, Circulation Dept. fiction Marian Botsford Fraser on Flee, Fly, Flown + Deborah Kirshner on The Blue Guitar PO Box 8, Station K Toronto, ON M4P 2G1 poetry Elana Wolff + Kirsteen MacLeod + Maureen Hynes + Ruth Roach Pierson + Mary Rykov New from UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Across the Aisle Margaret Atwood and the Pathogens for War Opposition in Canadian Politics Labour of Literary Celebrity Biological Weapons, Canadian Life Scientists, and North American Biodefence by David E. Smith by Lorraine York by Donald Avery How do opposition parties influence How does internationally renowned author Canadian politics? Across the Aisle Margaret Atwood maintain her celebrity Donald Avery investigates the challenges of illuminates both the historical evolution status? This book explores the ways bioterrorism, Canada’s secret involvement and recent developments of opposition in which careers of famous writers are with biological warfare, and presents new politics in Canada. managed and maintained by the scores of insights into the peril of bioweapons – one individuals working behind the scenes. of today’s greatest threats to world peace.
The Colonization of Mi’kmaw Merry Hell Joe Salsberg Memory and History, 1794–1928 The Story of the 25th Battalion A Life of Commitment The King v. Gabriel Sylliboy (Nova Scotia Regiment), by Gerald Tulchinsky Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914–1919 by William C. Wicken Gerald Tulchinsky traces the life and by Captain Robert N Clements, MC Winner of Canadian Historical Association’s intellectual journey of Joe Salsberg, who edited by Brian Douglas Tennyson Macdonald Prize and Clio Atlantic Prize became a major figure of the Ontario Merry Hell is a captivating tale for those Left, a leading voice for human rights in In this award winning book, Wicken uses who enjoy stories of war and battle, the Ontario legislature, and an important the testimony of six Mi’kmaq men in the and one that will entertain readers with journalist in the Jewish community. 1928 Sylliboy court case to explore how Clements’s richly colourful anecdotes and individuals and communities remember key witty poems, none of which have been events in their past. published before.
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EDITOR Bronwyn Drainie 3 The Politics on Our Plates 20 The Cultural Queen of Canada [email protected] A debate A review of Margaret Atwood and the Labour CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Sarah Elton and Pierre Desrochers of Literary Celebrity, by Lorraine York Mark Lovewell, Molly Peacock, Anthony Westell 6 What Goes In Must Come Out Suanne Kelman ASSOCIATE EDITOR A review of The Origin of Feces: What 22 Are Book Burners Always Villains? Robin Roger Excrement Tells Us About Evolution, Ecology A review of Dear Sir, I Intend to Burn Your POETRY EDITOR and a Sustainable Society, by David Waltner- Book: An Anatomy of a Book Burning, by Moira MacDougall Toews Lawrence Hill COPY EDITOR Tim Sly Rinaldo Walcott Madeline Koch 8 A Quiet Exodus 24 Black Power in Montreal ONLINE EDITORS Diana Kuprel, Jack Mitchell, An essay A review of Fear of a Black Nation: Race, Sex Donald Rickerd, C.M. Geoffrey Cameron and Security in Sixties Montreal, by David PROOFREADERS Austin 11 Bountiful Diversity Mike Lipsius, Robert Simone, Heather Frances Henry A review of Ontario in Transition: Achievements Schultz, Rob Tilley and Challenges, by Jean-Louis Roy 26 From Zlín to the Royal Society RESEARCH Rob Tilley Barbara Yaffe A review of A Life of Learning and Other Pleasures, by John Meisel EDITORIAL ASSISTANTS 13 Blood in the Water Aimee Burnett, Joshua Greenspon, Hugh Segal A review of Saving the CBC: Balancing Profit Lindsay Jolivet, Rahel Nega, Samir and Public Service, by Wade Rowland 27 Chilling Lessons Siddiqui Rudy Buttignol A review of They Called Me Number One: DESIGN James Harbeck 16 Sunshaft Secrets and Survival at an Indian Residential School, by Bev Sellars ADVERTISING/SALES A poem Michael Wile Laura Robinson Elana Wolff [email protected] Grey Owl’s Wife DIRECTOR, SPECIAL PROJECTS 16 Letter to a Fallen Angel 28 A review of Anahareo: A Wilderness Spirit, by Michael Booth A poem Kristin Gleeson PUBLISHERS Kirsteen MacLeod Sophie McCall Alastair Cheng 16 Jewel Beetle Dress [email protected] 29 From Confederacy to Confederation Helen Walsh A poem A review of Blood and Daring: How Canada [email protected] Maureen Hynes Fought the American Civil War and Forged a BOARD OF DIRECTORS John Honderich, C.M., Vanity Fair’s Lucian Freud Nation, by John Boyko 17 J. Alexander Houston, Frances Lankin, A poem Christopher Pennington Trina McQueen, Jack Mintz Ruth Roach Pierson 31 A Neglected Royal ADVISORY COUNCIL 17 Tosca A review of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent: Michael Adams, Ronald G. Atkey, P.C., Q.C., Alan Broadbent, C.M., Chris Ellis, A poem Father of the Canadian Crown, by Nathan Drew Fagan, James Gillies, C.M., Mary Rykov Tidridge Carol Hansell, Donald Macdonald, Michael Taube P.C., C.C., Susan Reisler, Grant Reuber, 18 Old on the Road O.C., Don Rickerd, C.M., Rana Sarkar, A review of Flee, Fly, Flown, by Janet Hepburn 32 Letters and Responses Mark Sarner, Bernard Schiff, Marian Botsford Fraser Barry Riddell, Anne Giardini, Royce Reed Scowen MacGillivray POETRY SUBMISSIONS 19 Prodigies under Pressure For poetry submission guidelines, please see A review of The Blue Guitar, by Ann Ireland
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2 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada DEBATE The Politics on Our Plates Should we push away from globalized food production, or just keep digging in? Sarah Elton versus Pierre Desrochers
n April, the LRC and Diaspora in the spirit of freedom of expression, Dialogues hosted the inaugural I am all for debate. However, when Iedition of the Spur festival it comes to our food system and in Toronto and Winnipeg. At one the future of the planet, we are past extremely lively Winnipeg session, the point of debate. Now it is about locavore Sarah Elton met her rhetorical choice. We can choose to debate the arch-nemesis, Pierre Desrochers, a merits of industrial food until we dedicated globavore. can’t see each other through those They waged a verbal battle over three-metre-tall lambsquarter plants what each has called, respectively, anymore, and then we can watch our “destructive” large-scale farming our food system collapse. Or we can practices and the “elitist” local food choose to take action now. Today movement. The moderator, local I bring you good news: there is a reporter Bartley Kives, challenged global sustainable food movement Elton to imagine the drudgery of that is working right now around surviving Canadian winters on the world to build food systems that nothing but locally sourced rutabagas. are not only more environmentally Then he forced Desrochers to face his sustainable but also just and ethical. aversion to life on the farm, cultivated A sustainable food system is during a childhood spent surrounded one that provides for us today as by corn fields. well as tomorrow. What this looks The result was a witty, informed discussion become the norm with climate change. His work like in practice is the antithesis of the industrial about how to feed a growing number of mouths has found that it is actually the weeds that are food system. It is farms where the soil is healthy, with the economy and the environment at stake. The growing the best. They are going to fare the best where the nutrients are managed responsibly, following is an edited and condensed transcript of in these extreme conditions of climate change. where farmers steward the water, where they pay the event. The lambsquarters in his climate change test plots attention to biodiversity both in the soil and in the grew to be two times the size of those on the farm, hedgerows—the pollinators, the birds. Bartley Kives: I want first to allow Pierre and and that would be three-metre-tall lambsquarters. The second major characteristic of a sustainable Sarah to start off in a debate. Each of them is going Weeds are already a huge problem for farmers. food system is that it is one where farmers can earn to make a five-minute presentation, roughly, and Farmers use herbicides today to kill weeds, before a living. A sustainable food system also involves then they are going to go at it. Let’s start with Sarah. they grow, but the science shows us that as carbon rethinking the economics of food, figuring out a Sarah Elton: To research my new book, dioxide levels increase—as they do with climate way for family farmers to earn a living wage and Consumed: Sustainable Food for a Finite Planet, change—these chemicals are no longer as effective. also a way for rural communities to thrive. I travelled around the world. I met with scientists That means weeding giant, herbicide-resistant There will always be skeptics of any social and economists and farmers and all sorts of people weeds by hand. It is like Little Shop of Horrors come change. This social movement is building our safety who are looking into the answer for how we feed to life in the field. net, and the future really is just a blink away. The the growing world population. The scientific Not only is modern conventional agriculture not industrial food system has run its course. It must be consensus is that climate change is having such equipped to feed us in the future, but it is also now replaced to ensure that those who come after us can a profound impact on the Earth, as well as on the contributing significantly to climate change and the feed themselves just as well as we can today. biosphere, that the way we grow our food now in destruction of our natural environment. For one BK: I know Sarah just said there shouldn’t be a the industrial food system is just not suited to the thing, it is draining our groundwater aquifers. The debate, but we are going to let Pierre speak. climate of the future. I open my book with a story toxic chemicals and fertilizers we use to grow food Pierre Desrochers: Sarah, that was pretty of a U.S. Department of Agriculture scientist, Dr. in the monocultures of the industrial food system scary. I should perhaps tell you a little bit more Lewis Ziska, who looks at how plants respond to are polluting the soil and the water, and the oceans, how I came to write about food. I grew up in the higher temperatures and to higher levels of carbon too. Meat production is responsible at least for countryside. My parents had an apple orchard—a dioxide—the conditions that will increasingly 18 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. sugar shack, I mean. We kept chickens in our I know we are gathered today for debate. And backyard before it was cool, or before it became Sarah Elton is the author of Consumed: cool again. We had rabbits. My brother and I would Sustainable Food for a Finite Planet Pierre Desrochers is a professor of geography at the not eat them, because we liked our rabbits very (HarperCollins, 2013) and Locavore: From University of Toronto. His main research interests much. Every fall we would trade them with our Farmers’ Fields to Rooftop Gardens—How are economic development, technical innovation, neighbours, so that we would eat the neighbours’ Canadians Are Changing the Way We Eat business-environment interactions, energy policy rabbits instead of eating our own rabbits. (HarperCollins, 2010). She is the food columnist for and food policy. He and his wife, Hiroko Shimizu, My first paying job, although Revenue Canada CBC Radio’s Here and Now in Toronto and writes are authors of The Locavore’s Dilemma: In Praise never knew anything about it, was working for the regularly about food for TheAtlantic.com, The of the 10,000-Mile Diet (PublicAffairs, 2012). raspberry producer across the street. I worked for Globe and Mail and Maclean’s. the Quebec Farmers’ Union at one point. My job
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 3 was to go to downtown Montreal with a bus driver and organic fields beside each other. Organic into the future and adopt new technology and to pick up new immigrants who would actually do agriculture had 40 percent lower greenhouse gas new ways of thinking and innovation while being field work that French Canadians did not want to emissions. It is quite an unethical system that we mindful of what people did in the past. It is this do anymore. Like many country kids, I left at 15 and have that creates this dichotomy—these cheap blending of perspectives that is moving people into I thought, I’m done. I am moving to the city. I do calories making people unwell, as well as drawing the future. not want to have anything to do with food anymore. on the planet’s resources to such an extent. PD: Where did the shoes of Monsieur André So I became an economic geographer. Part of BK: I am going to localize this conversation. This come from? my job description is to understand why businesses is Winnipeg. We just got out of winter now that it is SE: His new shoes? He was actually wearing locate where they do and why economic activity is almost May. How would you propose that people in rubber Crocs. And just before you say so— organized across space the way it is. Over time I also this immediate environment eat local all through a PD: A petroleum product. specialized in energy and transportation. winter that lasts from the middle of October usually SE: It’s hilarious, yes. I totally recognize that A few years ago, my department invited a to the end of March, early April? Would you be irony. But it is not about states that do not trade prominent environmental studies professor to proposing greenhouses, or we all live on rutabagas with anybody. It is about figuring out what is a new speak. He is known for having developed what is all winter? way that is sustainable. In fact, the Laguiole cheese called the ecological footprint. One conclusion of SE: There is a greenhouse outside of Winnipeg that those farmers produce is traded. You can get his analysis is to say “If you live beyond your local that I learned about today, and it is a passive it in the United States at Whole Foods. We do need foodshed, you are essentially an ecological parasite. greenhouse where the farmer manages to grow trade. No one is arguing against trade. And look at my data—by far the most parasitical Asian vegetables all year round, even in winter. So PD: That’s the thing. People say, don’t drink a people in the world are the Japanese.” My wife’s there are ideas—we just have not explored them whole bucket of arsenic, it’s not good for you. Here, name is Hiroko Shimizu. She grew up in Tokyo, and because the focus has been on stoking the fires of have a little glass. I am sorry, but a bad thing is a she was sitting right next to me that evening. She the industrial food system. bad thing—the scale does not matter. What really is not very tall, but she is kind of feisty, so she was PD: That is not a new idea. If you look at Paris in kills me with local food activists is that they will about to raise her hand and embarrass me in front the late 19th century, about a sixth of the greater have their smart phones, they will use software of my colleagues. Parisian area was devoted to food production. that was developed halfway around the world, I had to promise her that evening that I would This was in the days before the car, so people were if they can export their products they will, their explain to the world why the Japanese are not producing vegetables in greenhouses or under clothes are made halfway around the world, but parasites. They just do not have enough land to cloches, which are the things you put over the food is somehow different. But if you think about grow their food, so they have specialized in other vegetables. In the 1820s they succeeded in growing it, the only real difference between those people things. And they import food from locations that green asparagus year round. And in the late 19th and subsistence farmers is that today, in advanced have better growing conditions. Overall, we argue, century they began to grow other things year economies, we live in a world where we are able the world is a better place for that. round, including pineapples. They used to grow to get people off the farm so that they can become But the problem is that at the turn of the 20th pineapples in greenhouses in Paris. software engineers—so that they can become century, the United States began to close its door to Eventually, the system fell apart when the chemical engineers and can design things like Japanese imports. When the food ceased to come railroad came along. It became possible to import crops. You cannot have your cake and eat it too in to Japan, Japan went to the food. They invaded things from southern France, Italy, Spain into the that respect, Sarah. Taiwan to grow rice; they invaded Manchuria to Parisian market. So the food supply became more SE: But I am concerned about climate change. grow soybeans. And there were all the horrors of abundant, and a lot cheaper. These people gave Pierre, are you concerned about greenhouse gas the Second World War. Hiroko wanted to explain up on farming year round in greenhouses around emissions and a warming climate? the benefits of a global trade system not only in Paris because it didn’t make any sense. Southern PD: I’m concerned about the weather. I mean, terms of providing more abundant, cheaper and Manitoba is very good at growing canola and a historically! Seriously, two bad harvests in a more diversified food than before, but also in few other things, and you have better yields here row and you would have a famine, and before terms of promoting food security and world peace. than elsewhere, so it makes total sense that you the carbon age came long, Sarah, people were At the same time, I was, to be honest, a bit fed would specialize in that. There are such things as starving— up with people who do not see anything good in economies of scale. Small is often beautiful, but SE: Do you believe in human-caused climate the way we grow and trade food today, when we bigger is typically better. change? live much longer than ever before, we are taller SE: In fact, small farms produce more than PD: I believe we have an impact on the climate, than ever before and we are fatter than ever before. large farms. There is a term I am sure you know— but I still believe we are better off trading food Poor people are fat today. This is a remarkable from geography—called the inverse relationship over long distances. For example, when we have development by historical standards. Yes, our between farm size and output. The World Bank a drought like the one in Ontario last summer, system is not perfect, but the case we tried to make uses IR when building development projects. Small nobody starves because we are able to move in in our book, The Locavore’s Dilemma: In Praise of farms tend to grow more food. They think it has to food from other regions that have great summers the 10,000-Mile Diet, is that the problem that we do with the labour. It seems like labour is used more to grow food. I am more than willing to trade off have with our food system today is not that it is too efficiently on a small farm than on a large farm. having a little bit more carbon emission but more globalized and killing all sorts of stuff, but rather Pierre, you keep talking about going back. long-distance trade, which brings more resilience. that it is not globalized enough. Whatever problems I think that nobody in the global sustainable food SE: Do you believe in anthropogenic climate remaining with our food system can usually be movement wants to go back to a time where people change, yes or no? The mainstream scientific attributed to subsidies, barriers to trade and issues are subsistence farmers who have to knit their own community says that humans are causing like that. socks and eat potatoes for three quarters of the year. greenhouse gas emissions, and therefore disturbing SE: I don’t know quite where to start. Well, I will (I like to knit socks!) our climate—do you believe in this, yes or no? start with the issue of the historical narrative that However, I took several trips to write my book. PD: I believe that we are having an effect on it, brought us to where we are today. It was a series of I went to the south of France and spent time with but that there has not been any change in the global historical events, like colonialism, trade routes and farmers who used to be into industrial agriculture. temperatures in the last 15 years, so the fears are political decisions, that led us to the point where, They cut themselves out of the industrial food greatly exaggerated, in my opinion. after the Second World War, the mega machine system and have been building up their connection BK: You grew up on a farm, Pierre. How much of that is the industrial food system was assembled with nature, and building a stronger, more your thesis is just contrarianism and not wanting to pretty quickly. But it had been coming for several sustainable food system. The man who has led this go back where you came from? centuries before that. I think what motivates writers effort is André Valadier, who told me, “I always PD: Part of it is. I look at the kids I went to school like Michael Pollan, and what motivates me as a remember the words that my parents told me. My with—the school was surrounded by a cornfield. journalist, is a desire to point out something wrong parents always said that if you go out into the fields I went to school with kids whose father was driving in society: our food system is destroying our planet. in the winter and the snow is blowing, and you can’t a dairy truck; others were growing potatoes and There is a scientific consensus about this, that the find out where you’re going, you get lost, and you various other things. The last time I checked, two food system contributes greenhouse gases that have to retrace your steps.” Then—he was 78 years of them stayed on the farm. All the others left. And cause climate change. In fact, it has been proven in a old when I was with him—he said, “But I do not that is typically what you see in the countryside 30-year, side-by-side trial by the Rodale Institute in need to wear my old sabots de bois”—he does not today. The farmers’ kids have left and you have the United States, where they planted conventional need to wear his old wooden clogs. He can move young idealists from the city moving back and
4 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada buying land from people whose kids are gone. I would argue that it is not so much being a contrarian and reacting; it is that cities are better for jobs. Many of the kids I went to school with now have car dealerships. One has a tractor dealership. One became a lawyer, another a broker, a nurse. That’s the life they chose. And they knew the alternative. The fact is, Sarah, you can typically get food that is very comparable for a third of the price at a supermarket. People should become welders, electricians—jobs for which the market is willing to pay a good price—rather than go back to the countryside and produce food that is overpriced for people who cannot afford it. BK: What about the idea that some of your Quebec high school buddies left the farm because of the low profit margins involved in industrial agriculture? PD: I have never heard a farmer who was happy about prices. I don’t know if people are different in Manitoba, but where I grew up, I don’t remember a farmer saying “Prices are so good this year, I’m so happy I’m going to make a killing.” But that is the market sending a signal. You have got to grow your operations to become competitive, and food today is much cheaper than it ever was. We have had price spikes since 2007, and there are a number of reasons for that, but in 2005, the same basket of goods cost you only about a third of the price that you would have paid five decades before. The same comparable bread, tomatoes, potatoes, what have you. A third of the price. And I think that is a good thing. BK: Thanks very much, Pierre and Sarah, for being here.
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July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 5 What Goes In Must Come Out The problem of excrement in a seven-billion-person world. Tim Sly
The Origin of Feces: What Excrement Tells Us About Evolution, Ecology and a Sustainable Society David Waltner-Toews ECW Press 190 pages, softcover ISBN 9781770411166
avid Waltner-Toews’s latest book, The Origin of Feces: What Excrement DTells Us About Evolution, Ecology and a Sustainable Society, is an extraordinary document. My thesaurus offers no term beyond “comprehensive” or “all embracing,” but that is the descriptor I need. This tome offers more than a superficial (or even “superfecial”) exposé of matters scatological. It engages its subject matter at every conceivable level of enquiry, curiosity or serendipity, and this is accomplished not with subjective and arcane musings or the author’s personal philosophical preferences, but for the most part with empirical observations and quantitative arguments, drawn from a wide range of disciplines and experiences. Caution: The book is oblivious to treading on (or in) anything socially unpleasant, and in this regard appears to have and, especially, its passage through other species their prizes for feasting and breeding purposes. little or no sympathy with the more delicate reader and treatment cycles are more reminiscent of a We are treated in excruciating detail to the who must prepare both for vivid descriptions of web than a thread, or even better described by the microbiological minutiae of numerous pathogens every type and source of excrement, as well as for a Spanish word maraña (a “tangled web” or thicket). and parasites lurking within the waste stream from collections of puns that far exceeds the merdiocre. This is the topic that is perennially fascinating animals of every dimension and habitat, from By combining his training in veterinary to little boys and cited by the rest of us in its single- elephants to termites and from whales to mollusks. sciences and public health epidemiology with his syllable Saxon form through every conceivable We are reminded that it is not the triatomine enthusiastic worldview of economics, ecology, metaphorical conjugation as noun, pronoun, bug’s gentle feeding on the wetness at the corner anthropology, agriculture, food distribution gerund, adjective, all forms of the verb (except, of the sleeping Peruvian’s eyelid that spreads and biodiversity, Waltner-Toews presents curiously, the imperative), and of course as the trypanosomiasis (Chagas’s disease), but its act of simultaneously a microscopic, macroscopic and celebrated expletive. It is, as Waltner-Toews defecation just before it retreats. On awakening, the sociocultural analysis of excrement, its significance, points out, as ubiquitous in our guarded private victim rubs his or her eyes and becomes infected its potential and the consequences should we fail contributions as it is in our less-guarded linguistic with the parasite that waits in the fecal pellet. to restore its inherent balance within the natural contributions, but this, the author insists, conceals Waltner-Toews’s historical perspectives begin world. The work does come across initially as a widespread lack of appreciation and awareness of with the primordial ooze, meander through somewhat restless and meandering, and in this the true role of feces in our global existence. ancient myth and legend, to the privy middens of sense a random dip anywhere into the text may Instead of a dry “scientific” investigation, the Middle Ages, focusing at length on the very reward the reader with a wealth of information. The Origin of Feces is a carefully delineated two- real part played by human excrement and its But it is worth remembering that this clearly dimensional phenomenon. Indeed, Waltner-Toews lack of adequate disposal that allowed epidemics is not a topic that follows a single thread, with delights us with the Saganesque complexity of of cholera and typhoid fever to sweep through items being addressed in logical sequence. The worlds-within-worlds as he takes us into a still- Europe’s burgeoning cities following the industrial multidimensional aspects of animal and human steaming deposit of elephant dung. With the revolution more vigorously than when most of the excrement, its significance, symbolism and status, recently relieved pachyderm only metres away, population lived simple rural lives. Even today, the arrival of her evacuations has already caused epidemics of enteric illnesses self-propagate Tim Sly is an epidemiologist and professor in the intense excitement among several species of wherever fecally contaminated drinking water is School of Occupational and Public Health at dung beetles in the vicinity. Through the author’s ingested as a result of collapsed infrastructure or Ryerson University. He has published in the United experience and passion for dung beetles, we marvel where monitoring systems have been rendered Kingdom, the United States and Canada, and has in the strategy and subterfuge between competing ineffective or non-operational by disaster, conflict worked in Brazil, Taiwan and the Caribbean. species of scarabidae as they gather and roll away or incompetence.
6 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada But this is manifestly not a thesis that urges mass in elephant dung, while other animal excrement to the end of The Origin of Feces, I found I had adoption of the type of water-carriage system to has been converted or processed to yield plastics, reached a certain level of satisfaction with it, and which “more fortunate” populations have become fuel oil, water filter media and even artificial vanilla dare I say almost saturation; I felt I was dripping accustomed. Indeed, the author takes great pains flavouring. with malodorous goo, and needed to move on. to point out that the advent of the water closet, Waltner-Toews has a way of presenting his ideas, As a scientist, however, I found myself asking why widely attributed to Thomas Crapper but in fact juxtapositions, contrasts and comparisons that I had not made these obvious links between food invented far earlier, has actually contributed to the at times can leave the reader frankly breathless. and feces in quite the same way. Since the time massive problems of transportation, treatment and Leaping from one observation point to another, of Malthus, we have been studying with growing disposal of human waste, as well as to the growing he explores the mysteries of the transformation anxiety the problems involved with feeding swarms shortage of water in many parts of the world. The of intestinal nutrients from a species-specific of humans infesting planet Earth. We now are at “out of sight, out of mind” ideal, appropriately mass of fibres, proteins, fats and moisture into seven billion according to the best estimates, and translated as the “flush and forget” ethic, while substrates—nutrients—that sustain and enrich our growth is still exponential. What goes in has to convenient, and pleasant to our sensibilities at subsequent realms of existence. The Surinam come out sooner or later, and that is the point of this home, is seen as extravagant, especially to the cockroach is held as a splendid example of such work. The problem of feeding everyone is mirrored millions who live without running water of any complex transformations and sequences involving about 24 hours later by the problem of disposal of kind, and the (mostly) women who must walk biological waste. The cockroach searches for plant roughly an equal amount of waste. Isaac Asimov great distances to bring meagre quantities back life near bird droppings that contain nitrogen may not have imagined such a parallel universe, for cooking and drinking. From this perspective, and phosphorus, which encourage plant growth. and to my knowledge did not write about it, but the dumping of four to six litres of David Waltner-Toews did, and has perfectly good drinking water for The advent of the water closet has presented it in spectacular detail. The each flush of a standard toilet can Origin of Feces offers a challenge to only be considered as immoral and actually contributed to the massive our R&D innovators to think about depraved. Successful composting is effective ways of attenuating both the discussed at great length, and it is problems of transportation, treatment global food and water crises and at evident that Waltner-Toews supports the same time. a far greater investment in alternative and disposal of human waste. We may not be able to eat the stuff methods of waste disposal, some directly in the same way that the of which have been developed by societies less While foraging, the roach can inadvertently ingest author’s beloved dung beetles do, although I would sophisticated in their technology but more efficient the eggs of a parasite that were contained in the not be surprised if a particularly progressive food in meeting their disposal needs. droppings. In the body of the roach, the parasite product development team already has on their The work brings home the meaning and undergoes several more stages of development, drawing board a prototype high-fibre meatless language of feces and examines a staggeringly and when the roach is eaten by the bird, the burger along these lines. But there must be wide range of concepts, traditions, cultures and parasite completes the remaining stages of its effective, modern ways of recycling nutrients on a practices relevant to the waste stream. It proposes transformation in the nictating membrane of the large scale that would address both the oversupply the rightful place of the materiae merde in global bird. It matures, produces eggs that are swallowed of manure and the shortage of nutrients for ecology, as well as its specific role in maintaining by the bird and deposited once again on the ground growing food and water. This would need to be a a crucial balance in regional food production, soil to await another roach. vast improvement on traditional night-soilage, and remediation and bio-economics. The author draws upon his extensive background in the economy of scale could also incorporate In this endeavour, the author holds forth at length in public health and veterinary sciences, and his co-generation of methane for use as lower carbon about the unequal transfer of resources inherent experiences and observations in many obscure fuel, or the extraction of fuel oil, while avoiding in global food production and consumption. corners of the world, to present a multidimensional the recycling of pathogens which has plagued the The export of food is seen as a depletion of the examination of the true role of excrement and organic movement. soil in the growing area and the removal of its its importance to the complex webs within the David, I’m with you all the way! water. The importation of that food represents an biosphere. Even global warming does not escape accumulation of waste solids and its attendant scatological scrutiny, in the form of a link—in water in the consuming region. Were we to follow fact, several—to excrement. In a marine setting, a logical path to correcting the imbalance, we for instance, the total estimated population of Get monthly might consider exporting equivalent volumes 12,000 sperm whales in the Southern Ocean alone of high-protein natural manure back to the removes an estimated 200,000 metric tonnes updates from producing region to enrich the soil, as well as to of carbon from the atmosphere annually and organize restoration of water. Clearly, this is an deposits it into the ocean depths in the form of iron oversimplification. Workable solutions are far more compounds contained in this cetacean’s feces. the LRC’s complex and should avoid the unconscionable The Origin of Feces is also much more than a wastage of resources and carbon costs inherent novelty theme park trip through the alimentary editor-in-chief. in such a massive transportation. Waltner-Toews canal and ending in the sewer. It is certainly agrees, citing excremental complexity as a “wicked descriptive in ways rarely, if ever, seen in a problem” that cannot be expected to be diminished modern text. But we are also confronted with Sign up online for our e-news- by the type of science described by Thomas Kuhn ominous predictions about the careless disregard letter to receive a monthly as “normal.” Efficient and effective solutions, that humans, particularly those in “civilized” Editor’s Note from Bronwyn the author affirms, can only be possible through communities, have about their waste and its the deployment of multifaceted approaches and ultimate fate. In this, Waltner-Toews is very clear in Drainie, with the details of initiatives. his admonitions that not only are we as individuals new LRC pieces now online— And in this lies, perhaps, the most compelling what we ingest, but we are also similarly, and including topical full-text idea presented in The Origin of Feces: the eminently perhaps with more consequence, defned as a realistic premise that no single construct, rule or society by what we do with our excrement. articles republished from our principle will bring about the needed changes to This is a rare book in that it offers something archives for newsletter sub- correct this or any other imbalance in the natural for everyone on your Christmas book list: the scribers—and other maga- world, especially where human fingerprints are all epidemiologist, the economist, the microbiologist, over it. Any remedy, Waltner-Toews insists, has to the anthropologist, sociologist and historian. zine-related news. encompass local as well as global perspectives and The classicist will appreciate the numerous wisdom. There is no shortage of inspired creativity knowledgeable references to Roman, Greek and in this regard; since ancient times, herbivore dung Babylonian culture and mythology, the literary Visit
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 7 ESSAY A Quiet Exodus Welcoming Baha’i refugees from Iran was a humanitarian landmark—and an enduring immigration lesson. Geoffrey Cameron
n 1973, the Trudeau government decided that Canada’s immigration and refugee poli- Icies were outdated and in need of revision. Canada’s response to a series of refugee situa- tions—the Czechs in 1968, Asian Ugandans in 1972 and Chileans in 1973—had each required the creation of new regulations, and it was clear that a more general framework was needed to allow for a more flexible and nimble response to humani- tarian crises. A series of government-led national dialogues on immigration were held, culminating in the passage of the Immigration Act in 1976, and its implementation two years later. The act made a number of important changes to refugee policy. The most important included the principle of admission to Canada on humanitarian grounds and a provision for private sponsorship of refugees (which had previously been an ad hoc arrangement with each refugee situation). The act was almost immediately tested by the “Boat People” crisis of 1979–80, during which close to 60,000 Indochinese (Vietnamese) refugees were resettled in Canada—more than half of them pri- vately sponsored. While the Indochinese program has been widely The Threat of Genocide from schools, properties were seized and virtually discussed and analyzed, it was followed by another, The Baha’i minority of Iran was targeted by ascend- all citizenship rights were stripped from Baha’is. smaller refugee movement to Canada that has ant Islamic hardliners in the aftermath of the Baha’is were banned from leaving the country, received scant attention from scholars or journal- 1979 Iranian revolution. Baha’is were the clearest just as the nascent regime was in the midst of ter- ists. The Iranian Baha’i refugee program ran from obstacle to ideological unity in the clerics’ project rorizing the community. Writing in the New York 1981 to 1989, blending private sponsorship and to fuse the state with a radical version of Shi’a Islam. Review of Books in 1982, Firuz Kazemzadeh raised government-assisted resettlement, in a unique Iran’s clerical elite had a particular animus towards an alarm: “the threat of genocide hangs over the model of partnership between government and the Baha’is, the country’s largest religious minority heads of the Baha’is of Iran.” civil society. Around 2,300 refugees were resettled and followers of a post-Islamic religion—heretics, Canada was a leading voice in the international in about 220 communities across Canada, and in their eyes. outcry against the attacks on Baha’is. In June 1980, Canada’s program was used as a model to open The Baha’i faith has its origins in mid 19th- Canada’s House of Commons was the first legis- doors to resettlement for some 6,000 more Baha’i century Persia. Baha’u’llah, its prophet-founder, lature to pass a resolution (unanimously) calling refugees in 25 countries around the world. At a spent most of his life as a prisoner and exile, attention to the situation of the Baha’is in Iran. The time when private sponsorship and civil society eventually passing away under house arrest near government brought a resolution to the United partnerships are a focus of changes to refugee law Ottoman Akka (now in Israel). The Baha’i faith is Nations Sub-Commission on the Prevention of and policy, the Baha’i program offers lessons from an independent world religion that espouses the Discrimination Against Minorities, initiating a an early case of private sponsorship. oneness of humankind and a vision of society that series of interventions by the UN Commission on is both spiritually and materially prosperous. Its fol- Human Rights. Canada matched its diplomatic Geoffrey Cameron is principal researcher with lowers in Iran have experienced persecution since words with protective action—its special resettle- the Baha’i Community of Canada, and a PhD the inception of the religion. ment program for Baha’i refugees was the first student in the Department of Political Science at Following the revolution, the early attacks on dedicated effort to extend international protection the University of Toronto. He is the co-author of the Baha’is included more than 200 executions and to Baha’is fleeing violence in Iran. Exceptional People: How Migration Shaped Our “disappearances,” which appeared to be coordi- World and Will Define Our Future(Princeton nated to eliminate those in visible leadership posi- Making It Happen University Press, 2011), with Ian Goldin and Meera tions in the community. Baha’i graveyards and holy The Baha’i Community of Canada approached the Balarajan. sites were razed, children and youth were ejected government in 1981 to seek its assistance in reset-
8 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada tling stateless Baha’i refugees. Lloyd Axworthy, encountered a frustrated Dennis Scown, the Douglas Martin, secretary general of the Baha’i Canada’s future foreign minister, had just been immigration program manager, who was only five community, fostered the relationship with head- named minister of employment and immigration, weeks into his posting and already irritated by the quarters. Martin worked with Gerry Van Kessel and and the case of the Baha’is was one of the first he cumbersome procedures established for process- Kirk Bell, director general of policy at the immi- encountered. Axworthy’s response was influenced ing Baha’i cases. In her meeting notes she recorded gration ministry, to develop the private sponsor- by two factors. The first was an earlier approach by him saying, “I think all these cases have been blown ship policy framework and to maintain a flow of his constituents to support the June 1980 House of up, and none [of them is] urgent.” Anyway, he said information about the dynamic situation in Iran. Commons motion condemning attacks on Iranian to Mojgani, they would be stuck in Pakistan for at In 1983, Bell approached Martin about increasing Baha’is. He was familiar with the Baha’i case and least a year—that was how long it would take to the resettlement quota for Baha’is, whose quick was convinced of its seriousness and urgency. The process their applications. Mojgani spent most of social and economic integration into Canadian second was the availability of a policy framework the day listening to the problems with processing society had impressed officials. While the quota for private sponsorship, which had been tried and Baha’i refugees and discussing practical solutions had already been increased several times (which tested in the case of the Indochinese resettlement with Scown. itself was remarkable, in the context of an overall program. Despite his initial reluctance, Scown would forge drastic reduction in refugee resettlement quotas Canada bypassed the lengthy procedure of a warm and productive partnership with Mojgani. during the 1980s), Bell suggested something dif- determining refugee status through the United At his suggestion, she first facilitated the reloca- ferent: Canada would include Baha’is who lacked Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and tion of scattered Baha’i refugees to Islamabad, and financial means in a new government-assisted refu- encouraged its officers to grant refugee status to she spent up to 20 hours a day preparing them for gee program, and those with more resources would Iranian Baha’is, provided they could verify their their interviews, getting their paperwork in order move through the private sponsorship system. The status as Baha’i. For this, refugees relied upon offi- and prescreening candidates who met Canada’s Baha’i community would still manage resettlement cial letters of support from the coordination. Baha’i Community of Canada. During the 1980s, the Two categories of refugees In June 1980, Canada’s House of Commons greater part of Canada’s Middle were identified for resettlement East refugee allocation was in Canada: those living outside was the first legislature to pass a resolution made available for the resettle- of Iran, who faced difficulty ment of Baha’is from Iran. The renewing their passports as (unanimously) calling attention to the Canadian preference for reset- Baha’is, and those who had situation of the Baha’is in Iran. tling Baha’i refugees did not fled to nearby countries and go unnoticed. A Canadian stu- were in particularly vulnerable dent who was visiting Pakistan situations. Those who met these criteria would be resettlement preferences. With Mojgani’s help, became frustrated that Canada was not resettling granted refugee status and visas in Canada, and Scown lowered the waiting time for refugees from more Afghans—who, according to UNHCR assess- they would be transported, settled and socially one year to two weeks. Soon, he recommended ments, enjoyed a relatively secure position in integrated by the Baha’i community itself. doubling the quota of Baha’i refugees, and then Pakistan. She perceived the Canadian preference As early as December 1981, Canada’s Department offered to do it again. When Ottawa telexed Scown for Baha’is to be at the expense of the family she of Employment and Immigration included an in February 1985 to ask for a status report on Baha’i sought to sponsor. appendix to its immigration manual providing visa refugee processing out of Islamabad, he replied on The student wrote to her member of Parliament, officers with special directions regarding refugee the same day: David Kilgour, the parliamentary secretary to the applications made by Iranian Baha’is. They were to foreign minister, complaining about the “preju- be “reviewed as sympathetically as possible with Post has gone and will continue to go out of dices” of Mark Davidson (then a visa officer, now a view to approval by the use of positive discre- its way to facilitate processing of Bahais. In a senior official at Citizenship and Immigration tion wherever reasonable.” Cases that could not be fact, in past eighteen months have had quota Canada) in Islamabad: “Even [his] body language approved would “require Ministerial concurrence for govt sponsored Bahais raised from fifty and expressions indicated his biases … I could not in refusal.” to one hundred fifty per year … Virtually all help but get the idea this man was on some kind Despite the clear policy direction from Ottawa, Bahai cases are interviewed within two wks of crusade for the B’Hai [sic], at the expense of the there was initially some inconsistency and lengthy of applying … At present we have no/no cases Afghans.” Kilgour forwarded the complaint to Joe delays with processing Baha’i refugee applications. awaiting interview and have informed Bahais Clark, the foreign minister, who came to Davidson’s Gerry Van Kessel, a manager in the refugee branch, wud welcome more applications from suitable defence in writing, citing reports from the UNHCR recalls: “One of our challenges at the beginning was candidates. that discouraged large-scale resettlement of that … there was very limited recognition [of the Afghanis and stressed the vulnerability of minor- Baha’i faith] at that time … The posts abroad were Mojgani continued to nurture friendships with ities from Iran. Clark noted that far from expressing very suspicious of what [headquarters was] trying to immigration officers at Canadian and other foreign his personal bias, Davidson “was following a policy do.” Indeed, headquarters did not have the authority missions in a number of countries. However, the established by the government.” to direct officers to approve specific cases, and some relationship with Scown was special. He became That the program did not attract more attention officers resisted the approach of the Baha’i program. so impressed with the Baha’is that he began to was in all likelihood a function of the quiet way in Because field-level officers exercised a high degree advocate their case to his colleagues from other which it was carried out, with no effort made to of discretion in evaluating refugee applications, countries. He urged his Australian and American attract publicity by either the government or the Baha’i applications were not always treated with the colleagues to resettle Baha’is, at a time when their Baha’is—primarily to avoid inadvertently inflaming flexibility that was intended by Ottawa. governments were reluctant to do so. An experi- the situation further in Iran, at a time when Canada In response to this growing problem, the enced officer with years of field experience, Scown was applying pressure on the Islamic Republic to ministry helped to train two staff of the Baha’i was accustomed to deception and manipulation stop persecuting Baha’is. community in its immigration procedures. Mona by those who wanted a way into Canada. But with Mojgani and Carolyn Dowdell began to undertake Mojgani, he said, “there was no BS—she gave you Coming to Canada visits to Canadian missions with a view to acquaint- the straight goods … and once I got to know the As private sponsors, the Baha’i community took ing foreign service officers with the situation of [refugees], they sold themselves.” responsibility for many aspects of resettlement the Iranian Baha’is and to affirm the policy direc- Trust and credibility are the currency of cooper- in Canada. The Iranian Baha’i Refugee Office was tion coming from Ottawa. This strategy expedited ation, and this lesson was borne out in the field established in Toronto to coordinate the movement processing in the early phase of the program, just as well as at headquarters. At a meeting between of refugees to Canada and, later, to other countries when the violence in Iran was intensifying further Baha’i representatives and the principals at the that established quotas for Baha’is. and more Baha’is were fleeing the country, often Departments of External Affairs and Immigration, One particularly notable aspect of the resettle- on foot under extremely dangerous circumstances. the spokesperson for immigration declared, “the ment process is the broad distribution of refugees Pakistan and Turkey were emerging as primary des- Baha’is are the only group whom we have never across the country and the avoidance of major tinations for these refugees. been burned by. [They are] as concerned about the urban centres for settlement. While the Baha’i When Mojgani arrived at the Canadian High welfare of this country as they are about their own community in Canada was intensely aware of the Commission in Islamabad for the first time, she people.” humanitarian nature of their support to Iranian
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 9 co-religionists, they also saw them as contributing The Future of Private Sponsorship society organizations as potential vehicles for ser- members of their growing communities. In Rethinking Asylum, Matthew E. Price frames vice delivery at the grassroots. Acting on such a The response of communities across the country debates about asylum policy according to two rival view of private sponsorship, however, would allow led to the resettlement of refugees in about 220 cit- justifications: political action and humanitarian political imperatives to overwhelm the expressions ies and towns—including the North and on islands response. The first view sees resettlement as a tool of solidarity from the Canadian public that give rise at both coasts. When a group of refugees arrived in of foreign policy, or a way in which one govern- to sponsorship in the first place. Canada, they would typically stay in an urban cen- ment can express its condemnation of the actions Canada has made a number of recent changes tre for less than 48 hours before departing for their of another and pressure it to conform to human to private sponsorship aimed at improving the final destination, a policy adopted by the Baha’i rights norms. The second perspective sees asylum efficiency of the program. The number of “named” community in order to promote local integration. A as politically neutral, or something that should sponsorships a group can make has been capped— report prepared by the Baha’i Refugee Office made be offered to any individual in need of protection for example, when sponsors name the members of particular note of the reciprocal dynamic of the against any form of persecution. According to the extended family of a refugee already settled in integration process: Price, this approach treats asylum as a “palliative” Canada. Private sponsors were previously allowed response that ignores the political problem at its to name an unlimited number of individuals for We have found that when the refugee is not root. It has also become a more common way of resettlement, each of whom would be interviewed surrounded by an entire community of her framing refugee policy. to evaluate their refugees status. This process gen- own cultural group, she is much more likely Price makes a compelling case for restoring a erated a backlog and a relatively high number of to quickly learn the language and customs of political approach to asylum, but his framework rejected applications. The inefficiencies held up her new country. If the Canadians befriending takes a restricted view of states as the only agents other urgent asylum applications. her are sensitive and eager to learn, this does of refugee resettlement. The main advocates for a While taking steps to decrease named sponsor- not by any means necessitate her losing her broader humanitarian basis for asylum have been ships, the government is moving toward a system own cultural identity. On of preselecting eligible refugees the contrary, it provides for for “unnamed” private spon- a wonderful enrichment of That the program did not attract more sorship. It has made it easier all concerned. and faster to sponsor individ- attention was in all likelihood a function of uals who have already been The strategy was also suc- the quiet way in which it was carried out. recognized as refugees, either cessful in terms of socio- through Canadian visa office economic integration for the referrals or via formal registra- refugees. A government memo recorded the follow- civil society organizations, however—not states. tion with the UNHCR. A “public policy” category ing: “the employment record of Baha’i refugees is Indeed, the private sponsorship system introduced also allows the minister to identify members of very impressive. More than 90% find jobs within the by Canada in the late 1970s was largely a response specific groups for expedited resettlement through first year in Canada—the majority beginning work to pressure from civil society (primarily churches) private sponsorship; these groups currently include in the first six months.” to be allowed to “do something” in response to a Tibetans living in India and Iraqi Christians. Around 1984, the resettlement program broad- series of international crises. The private sponsor- Despite the obvious merits of changes that make ened its scope to focus on opening other countries ship system opened the door to a new level of civil private sponsorship more efficient, the direction to Baha’i refugees. While declining offers from the society involvement with and responsibility for of reform has been toward increasing govern- Canadian government to increase its resettlement resettlement, and to date more than 200,000 people ment control and away from civil society initiative. quota any further, the Baha’i Refugee Office over- have moved to Canada through this policy channel. Private sponsorship increasingly resembles the saw a series of visits by Mona Mojgani to dozens While the Baha’i community shouldered most government-assisted refugee program, but with of countries where she met with senior officials to of the responsibility for resettlement of Iranian civic groups footing the bill. acquaint them with the situation in Iran, share the Baha’is in Canada, the government employed bilat- The essential value of the private sponsorship success of the Canadian program and urge them to eral and multilateral political pressure on Iran to program is that it allows solidarity groups, reli- make an allowance for Baha’i refugees. Countries stop the persecution. Private sponsorship allowed gious communities and diaspora organizations such as Brazil and Ireland, which routinely resisted both humanitarian and political justifications to to complement the government-assisted refugee the entreaties of the UNHCR to admit refugees, operate simultaneously within refugee policy. The program with grassroots humanitarian action. acceded to Mojgani—in part due to the achieve- program was scaled down by 1990 as a response While altruism is part of the motivation for private ments of Canada’s program. to changing events on the ground in Iran—a mild sponsors, their action often arises from a feeling of By 1989, some 8,000 refugees had been resettled improvement to which international pressure connection with a particular persecuted group— in about 25 countries. Canada took about 2,300 undoubtedly contributed. whether because of a common homeland, religious of these people, but its policy leadership opened The Baha’i program demonstrates the value affiliation or a certain kind of persecution. A pri- the way for thousands of the others to settle in of policy coherence between the political and vate sponsorship program that closes the space for countries ranging from Uruguay to Luxembourg. humanitarian dimensions of refugee resettle- groups to identify refugees for resettlement may By 1990, the situation in Iran had changed; while ment—or, in more contemporary language, undermine the basis of its long-term viability. Baha’is were still denied most basic rights, the arbi- taking a “whole-of-government approach” to Asylum policy presents a tension between trary imprisonment and violent persecution had state-sponsored persecutions of groups. A strictly government imperatives and the humanitarian mostly stopped. The desperate traffic across -bor humanitarian approach to refugee policy, in which goals of civic groups. This tension has been man- ders had slowed significantly. As a consequence, sponsorship is entirely disconnected from foreign aged productively in many cases in the past, and the Baha’i community dissolved its resettlement policy, would indeed be palliative, since the actions there are plenty of models from which to learn. agency, and cases were henceforward handled on of states are needed to hold the offending sovereign The Indochinese case offered a model of matching an individual basis. to account. the numbers of government-assisted refugees with The Baha’i community has fortunately not had However, a cautionary note is required. privately sponsored refugees, one way to incentiv- to resort to a mass refugee resettlement program Restoring a stronger political dimension to refugee ize sponsorship without directing or controlling it. since 1989. However, the human rights situation in policy should not come at the expense of the initia- The Baha’i case offers another model, one of tight Iran is deteriorating once again, indicated by a ris- tive of sponsoring organizations. One of the primary coordination and trust building between a reli- ing tide of arbitrary arrests and symbolized by the reasons for the success of the Baha’i program was gious community and the Canadian government. unjustified imprisonment of the Baha’i community the degree of responsibility given to the Canadian By looking back to the origins of private sponsor- leadership in 2008 and their sentence to 20 years community for the selection and resettlement ship we may be able to uncover other lessons that in prison (longer than any prisoner of conscience). process. Its institutions and members were highly will help to maintain the vitality of this essential In May 2013, four UN experts on Iran, minorities, invested in the program as a result, and the impres- resettlement policy. The beneficiaries will not only arbitrary detention and religious freedom issued a sive socioeconomic outcomes of the program are be the stateless and vulnerable refugees who find joint statement condemning Iran’s persecution of a testament to the benefits reaped by the refugees new homes in Canada, but also the citizens who its Baha’i minority, and calling for the release of its themselves as a result of these relationships. choose to act on principles of hospitality, generos- imprisoned leaders. It can be tempting for government to view civil ity and solidarity with others.
10 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada Bountiful Diversity A leading Québécois scholar’s appreciative look at Canada’s biggest province. Barbara Yaffe
The author makes the case that Ontario plays, As for population movement within Canada, Ontario in Transition: and always will, a pre-eminent role in Canada Roy finds, in 16 of the 26 years between 1981 Achievements and Challenges despite the western region’s rising influence and a and 2007, internal migration patterns tipped in Jean-Louis Roy federal government that pays less heed to Trillium Ontario’s favour. Only Alberta and British Columbia Mosaic Press Country than has been the case historically. had better records. Roy’s home province of Quebec 251 pages, softcover “An interest in the future of Ontarians is experienced an internal migration deficit in every ISBN 9780889629837 tantamount to an interest in the future of all one of those years, save one. Quebec supplies Canadians,” Roy asserts. This is not just a result Ontario with half its Canadian migrants. of size, although Ontario certainly is big. With a Yet for all the praise he directs toward Ontario’s n a rainy spring day back in 1971 territory the size of France and Spain combined, variegated populace, Roy is not naive, appropriately my parents and I climbed into our and 12.5 million residents, the province is expected citing poverty and employment disadvantages that OBuick Skylark and headed west, leaving to account for close to half of all Canadians within many within the diaspora communities continue Montreal and heading for Highway 401, to a new the next quarter century. to suffer. life in Toronto. It was a journey made back then by Ontario is impressive for something else too: This is but one component of a broader many families, part of the so-called anglo exodus. it stands out as “a conglomerate of Diasporas.” challenge facing Ontarians relating to its economy My parents had grown weary of exploding Since the 1980s the province has evolved into that needs to evolve from being a player within a mailboxes and the longstanding resentment “an unprecedented model of togetherness,” a continent, heavily reliant on a U.S. market, into one displayed by Quebec’s majority toward those who post-multicultural oasis where diversity is “THE that can manoeuvre within a globalized economy. did not speak French. They were relieved to be dominant value.” Roy describes a series of shifts that have made starting over in a city that seemed to welcome all How else to explain how the late Lincoln life tougher for Ontario since around 2000: the comers. As for me, an 18-year-old leaving behind Alexander, a black lawyer and politician, son of a collapse of a dominant American market; a more friends and my studies at McGill University, I wept cleaning lady and a railway luggage handler, rose in complicated border; a newly robust Canadian all the way to Kingston. 1985 to become the province’s lieutenant governor? dollar; a lagging record on innovation, productivity As things turned out, Toronto was just fine. It was As the Alexander example shows, immigrants and competitiveness; and a debilitating provincial a big, convenient city that “had everything.” And to in Ontario are not necessarily disadvantaged the budget deficit. While gross domestic product my amazement, even the bus drivers spoke English. way they are in other parts of the world, writes Roy, growth was almost 5 percent between 1996 and While the urban landscape lacked any mountain clearly impressed by the number of prominent 2000, these days it is 0.8 percent. And the growth in its midst or a river coursing around it, it boasted Ontarians with immigrant backgrounds. Windsor’s rate in both employment and disposable income some pretty ravines and had a lake at its south end. mayor, he recounts, is of Lebanese origin; the lately has lagged behind the national average. And, quite wonderfully, no one discussed language publisher of the London Free Press has Italian roots; Ontario, once the engine of Canada’s economy politics here, or separating from Canada. Indeed, Toronto’s poet laureate hails from Trinidad; the with a history of looking after and leading other I felt excited finally to have discovered Canada. president of the Toronto Community Foundation provinces and regions, has lately qualified for It is that very sensibility that Jean-Louis Roy was born in India. equalization cash. explores in Ontario in Transition: Achievements In Toronto, the author says he found “a flowering As a result of its more modest standing, and Challenges. The book dissects the most tolerance.” The city has become a “street festival, Ontario has been demanding a “new deal” within populous province’s character as well as present- a parade, a grand bazaar.” And Franco-Ontarians, a federation that, Roy observes, is increasingly day economic challenges and, increasingly, its who make up just 5 percent of Ontario’s population, constituted by assertive regions. These days, problematic situation within the federation. are represented by an Assemblée de la francophonie Ontario is having to confront “the undeniable The fact that Roy himself is a Quebecer makes de l’Ontario. They have a Franco-Ontarian flag and momentum of western Canada.” his observations all the more compelling. The can take complaints to a French-language services In 2009, the province attempted to increase author is someone with an intimate understanding commissioner who oversees the French Language its clout by joining forces with Quebec, penning of his own society and its place in Canada, having Services Act. the Trade and Cooperation Agreement between been Quebec’s representative in Paris, a director of People do not spend much time debating Ontario and Quebec, a labour and mobility pact the Montreal daily Le Devoir and director of McGill the concept of reasonable accommodation similar to one signed in 2006 between British University’s Centre for French Canadian Studies. here, as they do in Quebec. Because, in this Columbia and Alberta, and later Saskatchewan. The 72-year-old author spent time as a visiting “heterogeneous, multiethnic, multicultural and Ontarians are growing ever more uncomfortable professor at Toronto’s York University and taught in multilingual” locale, it is the minority groups, with the diminishing level of respect the province New Brunswick. He is also chancellor of Université collectively, who have become the dominating receives and its influence within the country, Sainte-Anne in Nova Scotia. In preparing his book, majority. “It is becoming increasingly difficult to writes Roy, who believes the Stephen Harper– he spent three years interviewing 160 Ontarians. discriminate against such an important number of led government has tried to minimize federal- The most scintillating of the book’s three people.” Ontario is becoming “a society comprised provincial contacts and has treated Ontario chapters focuses on the notion—reinforcing my of diverse communities whose equilibrium is and “offhandedly.” own discovery—that anyone and everyone can will be structurally different from that of a society But if the new influence of Western Canada become a Torontonian. The process is fairly easy comprised of a majority that defines the norms is posing a challenge for Ontario, might it not and painless. and rules that apply to minorities. The province has present a welcome opportunity for the country as entered in a new phase of its history.” a whole? Had Roy lived a while in the West, the Barbara Yaffe is a longtime columnist at the So integrated is this new Ontario, so welcoming author probably would have developed a different Vancouver Sun, writing on national political issues. its largest city, that half of all immigrants to Canada perspective on Ontario’s place at the centre. As a journalist, she has resided in six of the ten now settle in the Greater Toronto Area, observes Arguably, it is healthier—even at the expense provinces, in Vancouver since 1988. Roy. of Ontario—for every region in Canada to pump
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 11 a little more iron and flex more muscle. Only in recent years have western provinces found conditions in which they have been able to assert themselves effectively, with a newly big-voiced Coming up in the LRC Alberta leading the charge on energy and B.C. becoming Canada’s all-important portal to Asian markets. The West formerly was not “in” and not able to contribute as fully as it wished to the federation. High technology, To a great extent that was because Ontario was Teen magicians so big and imposing, there simply was no room higher education Joseph Kertes at the table. Once Bill Davis spoke, who cared what Bill Bennett had to say? These days Alberta Anthony Masi and B.C.—both woefully underrepresented in the House of Commons and Senate—are The digital dark side vocally demanding their share of political Kafka’s Hat, by representation. And that is a good thing. Tom Slee A pan-Canadian perspective also appears Patrice Martin less than evident in Roy’s observations about the supremacy of Ontario’s entertainment and Sarah Roger Lisa Moore’s Caught cultural sectors, accounting for half of Canada’s jobs in film, television, publishing, music and Mark Frutkin interactive digital media. An international Roy writes: “with the exception of Quebec, whose cultural specificity is undeniable, and the Mennonite of mystery Adventures in Ottawa region [accommodating the National Capital Region] … Toronto is obviously the Magdalene Redekop bookbinding country’s cultural capital.” But this is only the case if you believe that Dana Hansen size is all that counts. One of the most culturally The Bora Laskin distinctive provinces, in my own experience, is Newfoundland, where the Great Big Sea lives, “scandal” Engineering new foods visitors get “screeched in,” mummers visit neighbours and perform around kitchen tables, Philip Girard Mark Winston innovative artists interpret the province’s starkly stunning beauty, and superb theatre regularly recounts the province’s own history to its inhabitants. And in Vancouver, where I now live, cultural specificity is part and parcel of daily life. It is true, as Roy reports, you can access the City of Toronto’s website in no fewer than 52 languages. But the same is the case in the City of Vancouver, where newcomers are apt to feel at home with every bit as much ease as they do in Toronto. Toronto, of course, as the country’s largest city—by far—impressively boasts the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, the Ontario College of Art and Design, the Royal Ontario Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Royal Conservatory of Music and the National Ballet School. But if it is cultural specificity that is being judged, the western provinces, and particularly Vancouver, are bountifully endowed. Statistics Canada projects that, by the time Canada celebrates its 150th anniversary in 2017, more than half the populations of both Toronto and Vancouver likely will be members of a visible minority. Moreover, Vancouver has more interracial couples and less residential segregation than either Toronto or Montreal. It is possible to ride the Canada Line, which runs down the spine of Vancouver, and not hear a word of English spoken, possible to visit a mall in suburban Richmond and see signage in Chinese only. Vancouver has the third largest Chinatown on the continent next to that of San Francisco and New York. And in the midst of this multicultural muddle, everyone appears to get along pretty well. All of which is to say that Roy’s thought- provoking treatise on Ontario profiles but one of ten exceptional provinces in this magnificently diverse country.
12 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada Blood in the Water Weak political support and dependence on advertising leave the national broadcaster at serious risk. Rudy Buttignol
and Successes Inside the CBC. Saving the CBC: Balancing Released in 2012, the book is Profit and Public Service a chronicle of Stursberg’s six Wade Rowland turbulent years as head of the CBC’s Linda Leith Publishing English-language service (2004 to 130 pages, softcover 2010) and his commercialization of ISBN 9781927535110 the television service. As Rowland amply illustrates, Stursberg’s blinding drive for increased ratings he title of Wade has made the public broadcaster Rowland’s book, Saving virtually indistinguishable from Tthe CBC: Balancing Profit its commercial competitors. Many and Public Service, suggests an of Stursberg’s initiatives, such as existential struggle, never settled, Battle of the Blades and Dragons' always in play generation after Den, did indeed succeed in generation. This time, Rowland significantly increasing audiences. warns, the threat to the CBC’s In Rowland’s view, however, survival is not only real but near Stursberg’s pursuit of ratings has at hand. diminished the CBC’s brand as a unique public institution and, There will come a time when further cutbacks is a form of electronic mass communication that with it, the public’s loyalty. Stursberg’s singular to the CBC’s funding will no longer lead to is designed to serve its audience as citizens rather measure of success was ratings, the bigger the quantitative tinkering with its output, but to than consumers … Its purpose is to enhance public better to attract advertisers who could compensate fundamental, qualitative transformation in life, and enrich individual lives, rather than to serve for the CBC’s shortage of money. About a third of the organization itself. I am among a large advertisers.” It is a reminder of just how far the CBC CBC Television’s revenue comes from advertising. number of knowledgeable observers who has strayed from its original purpose. This, Rowland argues, is in direct conflict with believe that stage will be reached within the The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation was the CBC’s mandate. He contrasts this situation with next two years. The tipping point will in all modelled on the British Broadcasting Corporation CBC Radio, which has been commercial-free since likelihood be the loss of NHL hockey and its in the United Kingdom. The BBC was founded in 1975. Despite budget cuts, the radio service has associated revenue. 1922 with the defining characteristics of universal maintained a large and intensely loyal following. access and quality of content, especially in news and The constant disgruntlement directed at CBC TV is Saving the CBC is essentially about the Canadian information programming. TheBroadcasting Act of rarely heard about radio. Audiences love CBC Radio. Broadcasting Corporation’s English-language 1932 required the CBC to reflect the geographic and As this review went to press, the CRTC approved the television service, CBC TV, and its compromised political realities of Canada, to counter the waves corporation’s request to introduce advertising on public mission at the hands of commercial of American programming streaming over the CBC Radio 2. With one move, the CBC has managed advertising. The French-language Société Radio- border and to promote national unity. The result to aggrieve both its core audience and commercial Canada and the CBC’s internet services get brief was a single, fully bilingual national channel, but by broadcasters at the same time: a case of short-term mention. Saving the CBC was not written for 1941 there were two public broadcasters, CBC and gain for long-term pain. general public consumption but instead for the SRC. Since the launch of a radio service in 1936 the Rowland argues that ratings “provide no clue smaller circle of people interested in public policy corporation has evolved from dominant player in as to whether or not the public interest has been and concerned with the survival of this national broadcasting to its current embattled state, buffeted served. They simply provide an indication of cultural institution. by technological change, highly concentrated how many warm bodies were located in front The book does a remarkably good and compact commercial competition and political forces that of television sets.” Unfortunately, it is not clear that job of describing the history of national public shift from benign neglect to outright hostility. Rowland’s prescription would provide any more service broadcasting in Canada, as well as Saving the CBC is a hopeful book, recommended insight. As an alternative he proposes the measuring articulating the contemporary pressures that to anyone seriously interested in the continuation of “quality, something substantially more abstract threaten the well-being of CBC TV. Rowland starts of a national public broadcaster in Canada. and certainly harder to agree upon … to break the with a helpful definition of a well-documented Rowland makes a persuasive case for how the concept into categories: sender-quality; receiver- social invention: “In a nutshell, public broadcasting perpetual pursuit of advertising revenue continues use quality; craft (or professional) quality; and to pervert its mandate, and that the only sensible descriptive (or truth) quality.” Whatever that means. Rudy Buttignol is the president and CEO of solution is to rid the network of all advertising. Where Rowland and Stursberg are in complete Knowledge Network Corporation, British There is another, more visceral reason for agreement is that the CBC’s number-one problem Columbia’s public broadcaster, and president of this book. Judging by the number of references is the lack of sufficient, multi-year funding from BBC Kids. He is the former chair of the Academy of and rebuttals, it seems Rowland was motivated government. Liberal governments of the past and Canadian Cinema and Television, and founding to respond to the tell-all memoir by Richard the current Conservative one have made major cuts chair of the Documentary Organization of Canada. Stursberg, The Tower of Babble: Sins, Secrets to the CBC’s budgets. In addition, inflation erodes
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 13 the broadcaster’s purchasing power, resulting in an The entrepreneurial spirit of independent producers chief executive through a thorough executive ever-increasing reliance on advertising. has attracted international financing for Canadian search. This would help establish a true arm’s- In contrast, the BBC is a well-funded organization productions, ensuring that Canadian works are length relationship between the CBC’s editorial with a mechanism designed to keep it at arm’s seen around the world. There is scant evidence that independence and government. length from the government and commercial-free. drama, documentary, children’s and performing In a third proposal, Rowland suggests that in Although the BBC has its own challenges with arts programming need to be created by an exclusive exchange for giving up advertising revenue, the competition from commercial broadcasters and group of in-house producers. The exception, of government make up the difference by increasing internet-based services, the funding model is not course, is in-house production of news and current the CBC’s annual grant. Considering governments’ one of them. The BBC receives a licence fee on all affairs, where the public broadcaster’s need for track records of the last three decades, that seems radio and television sets. complete editorial independence and control is unrealistic. Instead, I think the CBC’s public service After making a convincing case for what troubles essential. mandate needs to be fundamentally restructured the CBC, Rowland offers a prescription in the The biggest omission of all is the role to match its resources to the most important form of ten proposals: 1. Eliminate advertising of the provincial public networks in reflecting priorities. Money, in my opinion, is not CBC TV’s on CBC television (and do not reintroduce it to the concerns of their respective provinces. Télé- primary problem, as it is always scarce—just look CBC Radio). 2. Replace lost advertising revenue Québec, TFO (Franco-Ontario), TVO (Ontario) and at ad-free CBC Radio. Although regularly squeezed with increased, multi-year government funding. Knowledge Network (B.C.) regularly attract large for funding, its large and intensely loyal audience 3. Eliminate professional sports broadcasting. and loyal audiences. The single line that Rowland values the service. 4. Stop commissioning and acquiring independ- does devote to the subject gives the reader scant In my view, the problem is two-fold: one political ent programming and restart in-house produc- idea that these public broadcasters even exist in and the other cultural. Weak political support tion. 5. Empower the CBC’s board of directors to Canada: “Education has been downloaded to translates into no appetite on the part of the federal recruit its chief executive (in lieu of appointment by provincial public service broadcasters, where they government to change its governing structure the Cabinet). 6. Increase the corporation’s account- exist.” That’s it. and give the corporation greater independence. ability through public consultation and input in Rowland speaks of political forces that advocate As Rowland has reminded us, over the past three decision making. 7. Expand CBC Radio by at least for the privatization of the CBC, but that threat decades whether the party in power is red or one over-the-air network with a focus on arts has never been formally advanced by the federal blue has made little difference. So change here programming. 8. Expand CBC television specialty government. Here, Rowland misses the opportunity requires a clear commitment to a national public channels on cable. 9. Expand web-based digital to consider lessons learned at the provincial broadcasting service made by the prime minister. services. 10. Restore local TV and radio in medium level. Both TVO and Knowledge Network were The search for commercial revenue has shaped a and small-sized communities. formally placed under privatization review by corporate culture focused on delivering consumers At this point a few disclaimers are in order so their respective governments. Both networks were to advertisers, instead of service to the public. The that my biases are clear to the reader. I am the successful in making the case for their continued result is a risk-averse culture preoccupied with CEO of Knowledge Network, British Columbia’s existence as public institutions with new mandates being popular instead meaningful. To be clear, commercial-free public broadcaster. We resemble to “maintain and improve.” audience ratings do matter as they are a helpful the Public Broadcasting System in the United Two other provincial public broadcasters tool for understanding who is being served. But States in many ways. Like PBS, Knowledge Network subjected to privatization review were not so individual programs do not necessarily need big is funded by an annual (B.C.) government grant lucky. Access Alberta eventually became a CTV ratings. To win the hearts and minds of Canadians, combined with viewer donations solicited through station, and Saskatchewan Communications it is far more important that news and information pledge drives. Our daytime schedule consists of Network (SCN) emerged as a Rogers Citytv station. programs have depth and relevance, and that our educational programming for young children. Our The different outcomes are telling. In their time, geographically dispersed citizens have access to the evenings offer a variety of documentary, factual Access and SCN made no significant attempts to best in the performing arts and drama. and performing arts programs from B.C. and develop a viewer support program similar to the CBC’s internal culture is resistant to change, around the world; and our weekends feature a PBS model. In contrast, Knowledge and TVO are but it must change to meet the new challenges block of British drama aimed at attracting viewers’ both financially supported by the public through from technology, deregulation and globalization. financial support. Knowledge has also had to seek annual donations. During my time at TVO, it From my own experience, public and private new sources of non-government funding to remain had more than 100,000 donors. Knowledge has organizations are willing to change and do competitive. In partnership with the BBC’s 38,000 supporters. These are highly motivated civic- new things but only if provided with additional commercial arm, BBC Worldwide, we own and minded individuals who value commercial-free resources. The reality, however, is that to try new operate the for-profit channel BBC Kids. Previously, public broadcasting and voluntarily pay to keep it things we must give up others that worked in the I was the head of programming at Ontario’s that way. past. For example, to imagine a commercial-free public broadcaster, TVO, and before that I was an As for the proposals that Wade Rowland offers CBC TV one also has to consider life without independent producer. for a new CBC, the majority address operational professional sports. If it is within the CBC’s As well meaning as Saving the CBC is, it is issues that are best left to competent management. authority to live without advertising, this in turn a pity that Rowland does not go far beyond Instead, I will focus on the three public policy might help build the political capital that eventually speaking to the converted. This is reflected proposals that I think hold the most promise for leads to change in governance. in the underdevelopment of certain ideas and fundamental, structural change. The impending demise of the CBC has been the omission of others. For example, the book The absolutely most essential proposal is the regularly predicted throughout my own four underplays the role of the commercial sector in elimination of all advertising. This is central to decades in the industry. Wade Rowland believes creating quality Canadian content. They may not Rowland’s book, as he lays out how advertising that we are now approaching a critical moment in be everyone’s taste, but police procedurals on distorts the public service mission by treating all the survival of the national public broadcaster. The CTV, factual entertainment on HGTV and the viewers as consumers to be captured and measured possible loss of the NHL rights in 2014 will deprive commercial news services are often as good as for the benefit of advertisers. Whether or not CBC the CBC of the majority of its advertising revenue and sometimes better than those found on CBC. should have professional sports, amateur sports and content as well as a large number of viewers. The commercial sector produces some remarkable or no sports at all is irrelevant. By eliminating A point of no return looms. What kind of CBC will work. That’s how they remain profitable. advertising all other decisions will follow. That is emerge and who will it serve? The CBC’s internet service is also covered the work of talented professionals whose job it is to If you were pulling your hair out as you read in Rowland’s book, but much more time and interpret the public interest in the context of the Richard Stursberg’s The Tower of Babble, then consideration could have been taken to examine times and the technology, and design a relevant I highly recommend Wade Rowland’s Saving the how the digital revolution is disrupting all media, strategy that connects the public broadcaster to its CBC. It clearly outlines why public broadcasting is not just public media. public. essential and how CBC TV can regain the trust and The role of the independent production sector is Rowland also calls for a reform of the loyalty of Canadians. However, Rowland spends given short shrift, and those within it are portrayed as governance process. Currently, the CBC’s president too much time on specific operational issues best underemployed unfortunates with no job security. is a political appointment made by the Cabinet. left to professional management, and too little Over the past 30 years, the independent production Instead, following best practices in contemporary time explaining how to convince the CBC’s major sector has injected much-needed diversity, artistic governance, Rowland proposes that the CBC’s stakeholder, the federal government, to make excellence and ingenuity into the broadcast system. board of directors be empowered to recruit its fundamental changes to policy.
14 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY PRESS Northern Lights Series COPUBLISHED WITH THE ARCTIC INSTITUTE OF NORTH AMERICA
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July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 15 Sunshaft
after Strata by Marjorie Moeser acrylic on canvas, 26" x 12"
You’ll notice the gold-tipped Jewel Beetle Dress tooth of a man as he crosses into a shaft of sun Ellen Terry as Lady Macbeth this side of the vale and smiles John Singer Sargent, 1889 and shines like an island, Awake and radiant, Lady Macbeth lifts if you’re not the golden round above her head: lamenting the key breath held, sexing herself you left in another pocket, with the crown. Coffin-white arms. the wardrobe packed in a faraway crate, Magenta hair in two braids down to her knees, failure faces, actual cracks two belts of woven gold and blood predispositions. loop around her waist and hips. A spilling dress of blues and greens — I’m suggesting adorned with jewel beetles — Icarus wasn’t falling as he fell iridescent green asterisks but splashing back to birth through earth and ocean. each the size of my thumb-joint The scaffold of his soul so keen stitched up and down. it pinioned myth to wing, hubris to the beings of renewal. As if the only way to display her evil brilliance is to clothe her Elana Wolff in carapaces — not gems from Persia but these creepy crawlies that, phoenix-like, follow the scent of pine smoke to lay their eggs in burned-out forests.
This week a dead grasshopper appeared in the watercress I was washing for salad, pale green, body hinged and folded like a child’s penknife — with eyes. Letter to a Fallen Angel And here, and here, the fascination
It’s you I think of, Cassiel, with the dress: Could I sew one, as I look down from the 25th floor a basket of dead beetles at my side, in my white hotel bathrobe, pushing the needle through those hard bodies feet resting on the window, over and over again? Could I wear it — listening to Casals, who has to be the slightest button beetle weight your brother-angel — fallen scattered along the folds, over my breasts to earth with his cello. and down my back, on the glint-edged sleeves that graze the floor? Then stand in the footlights, Below, my city’s a reef: gesture and speak in faceted gleams? calcified light towers, red train tracks that undulate, white amoebas that pulse along the expressway Maureen Hynes to the dark water’s edge.
From the Brandenburg Gate, you looked down so tenderly on Berlin’s black tide. Exalted, you angels testify to all that’s spiritual in human hearts. No wonder it gets tedious: Remember, Cassiel, how you reported that the subway conductor had suddenly shouted “Tierra del Fuego”? Elana Wolff’s poems have appeared Kirsteen MacLeod is a Kingston yoga in journals in Canada, the United teacher whose poetry and prose Were you yearning for a fall? Who knows? States and the United Kingdom. have appeared in CV2, TNQ and Yet this moment, sad angel, She has published six books with The Malahat Review. She has just I long for your wings: Guernica Editions, including You finished writing her first book, Spirit I remove the white robe, dress, Speak to Me in Trees (2006), Geographies (linked non-fiction awarded the 2008 F.G. Bressani Prize stories), and is at work on a poetry go listen for the soft ding of the elevator: for Poetry, and Startled Night (2011), collection called Earthbound. She is long-listed for the 2012 ReLit Poetry currently reading George Saunders’ the sound of ascent, descent Award. A bilingual selection of her Tenth of December, Nocturne by poems is forthcoming this year with Helen Humphreys and Selected Kirsteen MacLeod Éditions du Noroît. Poems by René Char.
16 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada Vanity Fair’s Lucian Freud Tosca
marathoning into the night — only so many brushstrokes We were hoping left — terre verts mixed with umber — swift swipes you might think of flake white things through, try to get over it. brushwork — deft and layered — smooth around the man’s shoulders — crusty and impassioned No matter your along the arms beloved Cavaradossi lies executed every twitch of facial muscle — caught — every bulge at your feet, of subcutaneous thigh-fat — whorled rippled, smeared Liberty is in the air, Art will prevail and soft sable — swapped — for bristly hog’s hair brushes you, luscious diva, snipped to nubs — the middle son of the youngest can love again. son of Sigmund Freud Floria, stop! Let not nudes — his insistence — but naked portraits — “best fly your faith to realist painter alive” — fathered — with six women unfetter hope. Just fourteen acknowledged children this time, please —
there is only — long scarf knotted — so much hypocrisy please don’t jump. Fling rakishly at the neck — I allow myself — work ethic that nasty Spoletta on overdrive off the parapet instead. Capisce? selfishness — gobs of palette knife wipe-off — is what — like seagull guano — it takes to make — his studio walls coated with Mary Rykov — great art
my work — big canvases — purely an attempt — unsparing — at a record — autobiographical — of myself — and my surroundings
Ruth Roach Pierson
Mary H. Rykov is a Toronto-based Maureen Hynes’s book Rough Skin music therapist and academic editor (Wolsak and Wynn, 1995) won the who has written and reviewed for League of Canadian Poets’ Gerald Ruth Roach Pierson has published such as The Arts in Psychotherapy, Lampert Award for best first book three poetry collections: Where No Journal of Palliative Care and the of poetry by a Canadian. She has Window Was (BuschekBooks, 2002), Journal of Health Psychology. also published Harm’s Way (Brick Aide-Mémoire (BuschekBooks, 2007), Her poems have been published Books, 2001) and, recently, Marrow, a finalist for the 2008 Governor in Carousel, Misunderstandings Willow (Pedlar Press, 2011). A past General’s Award in poetry in Magazine and Jones Avenue, and winner of England’s Petra Kenney English, and, most recently, Contrary anthologized in Close to Quitting Award, she has also had poems (Tightrope Books, 2011). She is Time: An Anthology Depicting the selected and longlisted for The currently editing an anthology of Various Facets of Work (Ascent Best Canadian Poetry in English. movie poems entitled I Found It at the Aspirations, 2011) and The Art of Maureen is poetry editor for Our Movies to be published by Guernica. Poetic Inquiry (Backalong Books, Times magazine. Maureen has just She has been reading What’s the 2012). She searches for a publisher for finished reading Siege 13 by Tamas Score? by David W. McFadden, Our her first poetry collection, Dear Mr. Dobozy, Metaphysical Dogs by Frank Andromeda by Brenda Shaughnessy, Rilke and Other Poems. Currently she Bidart, Ocean by Sue Goyette and On Personals by Ian Williams and Like a is reading Sailing to Babylon by James Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Straw Bird It Follows Me, and Other Pollock and Pablo Neruda: Absence Eyes by Alexandra Horowicz. Poems by Ghassan Zaqtan. and Presence by Luis Poirot.
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 17 Old on the Road The adventures of two seniors who give their caregivers the slip. Marian Botsford Fraser
suffering from dementia, figure out how to escape apparently trifling indignities and outright abuse; Flee, Fly, Flown from their nursing home, get a banker to release how much will a “resident” tolerate? How much Janet Hepburn money from an account for which adult children will adult children pretend not to see, because Second Story Press have power of attorney, borrow a car that used to they are convinced that there is no alternative? 237 pages, softcover belong to one of them and set out on a road trip How much do adult children choose to leave ISBN 9781927583036 across Canada. unaddressed because it seems their parent has not In fact, Audrey and Lillian get not much further noticed his or her own disarray, dishevelment and than the bank when it becomes apparent even to incompetence? he number of seniors in Ontario them that driving is harder than it used to be and Hepburn’s story is told by Lillian, who maintains will increase by 30 percent in ten years. that they may have difficulty finding the way west. some order in her own mind by writing down TThis information was phlegmatically Fortuitously, a sweet-tempered, broke young man anything she considers important. Vacation. attached to recent news reports of allegations of named Rayne is loitering in a state of indecision Address of the bank. Shoes. Knapsack. And one day, abuse at a long-term care facility after she and Audrey have managed, in Peterborough, Ontario. Camille These women with slippery memories in a crafts session, to cut off the blue Parent’s 85-year-old mother, Hellen and white bracelets that make them MacDonald, suffers from dementia and a kid a long way from home trackable, “wristbands gone.” In the and resides at St. Joseph’s at Fleming, nursing home, Lillian slides between a non-profit seniors’ residence want freedom from adult supervision clarity and confusion, cheerfulness affiliated with Fleming College. and depression: “Days blur together. When Parent found her covered in and deadly routine. I suffocate beneath a heavy woolen scratches and bruises earlier this canopy suspended too close to my year (having previously suffered broken bones on the sidewalk outside the bank, and he agrees to face. The invisible shroud makes it hard to breathe. after an attack by another resident), he installed a drive their car. Implausible as this seems, it makes I stay in bed. People come and go … My mother is hidden video camera in his mother’s room for three perfect sense to the reader that these women with here and my granny … Albert sits on my bed and weeks. The camera captured horrible images of slippery memories and a kid a long way from stays for a long time … I tell him I love him, then abuse, contempt and neglect: a “caregiver” roughly home might make a confederation; their desires I hit him and tell him to leave. It’s his fault that I’m handling the clearly docile patient while changing and capacity for judgement inhabit common in this awful place … I get up to use the bathroom, her (door to the room wide open) and then shoving ground, that of wanting freedom, escape from adult but when I do, the lady in the next bed pounds on a feces-smeared cloth in her face. An attendant supervision and deadly routine. Everybody wants the door … After that, I just pee the bed.” blowing his nose on her clean sheets. Two to run away from home at some point in their lives. But through a combination of luck and employees apparently making out at the foot of the Home in this case is the (fictional) Tranquil surprisingly resilient residual strategic thinking, patient’s bed. A male resident entering the room Meadows Nursing Home in Ottawa. Hepburn nails Lillian and Audrey walk out of Tranquil Meadows. (the door again wide open) and rifling through Mrs. the infantilizing routine and artificial, pastel cheer With Rayne (whom Lillian often thinks is her son, MacDonald’s belongings. of such places: “During breakfast, the woman in Tom) at the wheel, the road trip is underway— The employees of St. Joseph’s were suspended, charge of keeping us busy with silly games and Mattawa, Cochrane, Thunder Bay. Rayne slowly with pay, and later fired. “We have a zero tolerance repetitive singsongs—I’ve forgotten her name— realizes that he is ferrying fugitives from a nursing for abuse in our long-term care homes,” said Deb zigzags between the tables, inviting each person to home but chooses to make the trip work; they Matthews, the Ontario Minister of Health. come to the recreation room to make ‘late summer abandon what is in fact a stolen car, rent a van, keep This is the nightmare of my generation. Because bouquets from fabric and pipe cleaners and seed moving. Kenora, Moosomin, Swift Current… we all may get to be characters in this drama, not pods’.” Plastic sippy cups for watery coffee, Jell-O There is comedy, poignancy and an unnerving just once, or twice, with power of attorney over our and alarm bracelets. Bingo and TV. Clothing with mix of compassion and dispassion in how Hepburn aging parents suffering from disease or dementia, name tags, like camp: “Every article of clothing has imagines the challenges of conversations, pain, but a third time, when we too become residents in a big white tag stitched on it with my name—even unreliable bodily functions, confusion and a long-term care facility. (It does not matter what socks and bras. I can’t figure out how it is that encounters with strangers both kind and vicious. it is called—“home” for the aged, nursing “home” my clothes are always getting stolen right out of There are simple joys—finding a dog, sleeping on a or care facility—it is the place where no one ever my closet when they’re marked so clearly. No one beach, scoring big at a casino, remembering long- wants to go.) believes me. They say the missing clothes are in the forgotten lyrics and singing in unison, while making Janet Hepburn’s mother, Anna Mary Greenslade, laundry, or that I’ve never had red pajamas. But I’ve a kaleidoscope out of the faces in the front seat. lived with Alzheimer’s for ten years before her seen other people wearing my clothes. I have.” There are moments of terror and despair, but also death in 2011. In her mother’s memory, Hepburn Home, briefly, for my own mother 20 years ago acceptance, when the chasm of memory suddenly has written a short first novel,Flee, Fly, Flown, in was the Cardinal Care Nursing Home in North opens and swallows up something as small as the which she imagines precisely how her mother’s Carolina. My mother’s mind was quite sound, but ability to read a clock. mind might have worked, and, I imagine, what she after a series of small strokes she was unable to Hepburn’s tone is light, nothing tragic happens, might have wanted more than anything else—to get speak or dress herself. She too lost control of her but the book is upsetting. Its unblinkered, matter- out of the nursing home. Hepburn’s protagonists, wardrobe; one day I went to visit her and she was of-fact portrayal of a truly demented road trip is Lillian and Audrey, two elderly, spirited women wearing what would have been in her own eyes, and more literal than literary, its prosaicness a too sharp mine, a costume—an ill-matched skirt and blouse rendering of what many among us fear more than Marian Botsford Fraser is a writer and broadcaster with a fluffy bow unlike anything she had ever anything else, the loss of our minds and freedoms living in Toronto. worn or owned. There is a continuum from such as we too age.
18 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada Prodigies under Pressure A deft introduction to the savage sport of music competition. Deborah Kirshner
to be there. Losing is the threat of annihilation, and replace the simile or metaphor, and the prose The Blue Guitar disappointing their families and teachers, whose vibrates. Ann Ireland vicarious needs are palpable, is unimaginable. They Toby is a maverick, a self-made virtuoso Dundurn Press must win. They must be the one in the spotlight (rare with few exceptions, Glenn Gould being 254 pages, softcover accepting the award with that studied, modest bow. one of them) who emerges from nowhere: gay, ISBN 9781459705876 They must become the new muscle on the stages of motherless, culturally impoverished, with a difficult the world, their performance having redefined, like aging father and a brother with whom he has little a gymnast with an impossible routine, the latest in common. Playing the guitar is Toby’s only access here is a story about Rostropovich, standard for “best.” to himself, the only way he is released, and, like the great Soviet cellist, who, suffering from But even if they win there is no guarantee of many artists, he is a victim of the manic schedule of Tthe consequences of jet lag and vodka, fell a concert career. It could be that after only a few anxiety. His breakdown in Paris had been the result asleep during the long orchestral introduction of bites of hotel fare they will be tossed into the has- of not sleeping or eating for weeks. the Dvorak Cello Concerto in front of an audience of 3,000 Japanese. Brother Felix found him slumped Miraculously, half a bar before his Ireland’s sensitivity to the workings over a chair, passed out … entrance he woke up and had enough the object was to re-hydrate, presence of mind to turn to the of the mind in performance and the re-salinate, orchestrate potassium, conductor and say: “It vas so-o bew- electrolytes and urine production. ti-fool, play it again.” eccentricities of pre-concert rituals is He’d lost his way … forgotten the Performance mishaps are part remarkably accurate. basics: eat, drink, sleep. of the biography of every concert artist and they are what inform the Toby is as wound as the wire story of Toby Hausner, the main character of Ann been pile and spend the rest of their working lives on his guitar but Ireland does not unstring him Ireland’s latest novel, The Blue Guitar. He suffers in the uncelebrated corridors of a conservatory and he cannot do it himself. She gives us a pencil a breakdown on stage in an important Paris or in an orchestra section, periodically being drawing of what should be a full colour portrait. guitar competition. Lapses from a seasoned and called out of their cells to judge the latest “best” He is a closed, hidden figure whose voice (albeit loved performer are not only forgiven by their at one of these competitions. Here their triumph a clever one) is too ordinary, too much like audiences but welcomed: they are the “if” factor of is remembered and they can bask in an old glory. everyone else’s, and we miss the kinks, the wild a live performance and an oddly intimate gesture, a And although they know better, sitting in the judge’s tropism of an outré mind. The only character comforting reminder that the infallible artist up on seat now, they must quantify artistry by reducing who bursts out of the page is the juicy, slightly the stage is, after all, human. But breaking down in a performance to its individual components and corrupt Cuban judge, Manuel Juerta: a thick slab of a competition is a different matter. score for technique, style, interpretation and sloppy, complicated humanity, who lives the way Toby Hausner, a dreadlocked, you-ain’t-heard- the marketability of the player. It is the stretch of music should be played, improvisatorially, with a nothin’-yet musical sensation whose electric possibility, the new limits they have to look for, not capacity for pleasure and pain, open to the moody style undid his competitors and mesmerized his the tête-à-tête conversation between interpreter transmissions from an inspired source. audiences, takes eleven years to get back into and composer. Human frailty has no place in this The Blue Guitar is not a character study or an the ring after the Paris debacle, the ring being an arena. The game is meant to do the opposite: to investigation into the nature of genius. Ireland’s international competition in Montreal. Since his conjure the “inhuman.” interests are in the ride to the stage and in lifting collapse Toby has been in and out of institutions The Blue Guitardeftly captures the tempo and the curtain from its romantic gauze. And here and has come to lead a private, quiet life with the climate of these competitions. Ireland’s story of she succeeds. For the uninitiated the novel is an middle-aged Jasper, the doctor who rescued him, Toby, who pits himself (he is almost over the hill) excellent introduction into the savage sport of playing out his solitary genius for an amateur guitar against a cast of teenagers and a middle-aged music competition and raises questions about choir he conducts. Now he is Muhammad Ali back housewife, holds all the drama of the event. As the state of the art: how these competitions have in gloves after rehab. part of her research, Ireland must have spent informed our standards of performance and what Competition is an ethos that has seeped into time backstage attending one of these week- we have come to expect of them, note-perfect every pore of our culture. In the world of classical long tournaments, because her sensitivity to renderings that are prepackaged, safe, somewhat music, a competition is almost the only way for a the workings of the mind in performance and the anonymous displays of crafted showmanship. Too young artist to launch a career. These competitions, eccentricities of pre-concert rituals is remarkably often, though, they lack spontaneity and do not so anathema to art, have come to take on the accurate: “Left hand zigzags up the fretboard, transport us from the click-click dictates of time quality of the Olympics. Today they are brutal, right fingers roll. Bit of a march thing happening into the arms of a single transcendent moment. one–shot, life-or-death performances delivered … Cresting the opening movement of the bolero, Ireland’s story brings to mind the great under enormous pressure and so over-rehearsed jack it up a notch. No one plays this piece so fast Canadian pianist Janina Fialkowska’s lament about that many have seen blood. The stakes are high. Not and lives.” the whole industry, that too many times the best just the players’ future but their self-worth rests on Equally remarkable is Ireland’s ability to make does not win. But the winners are the ones who this outcome. They have forfeited their childhoods the many characters in the alternating stories grace our stages. of Toby and Jasper, written in a kind of literary Toby is the best artist, the best navigator of the Deborah Kirshner is a professional violinist and syncopation, distinct by giving us just enough soul, but he has tripped over the bars and that ghost has been in the ring. She is also an award-winning description so that, unlike a Tolstoy novel where is still following him. Luckily for us, Glenn Gould writer. Her most recent book is a novella, Mahler’s you can literally lose count, it does not overwhelm. never had to go through these hoops. Very likely he Lament (Quattro Books, 2011). She has a gift for the verb, unexpected sparks that would not have won.
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 19 The Cultural Queen of Canada How the country’s most famous writer balances creation and celebrity. Suanne Kelman
225,302 followers on Twitter to the Margaret Atwood and the Labour of campaign. That is impressive, but the Literary Celebrity last time I checked—May 20, 2013— Lorraine York Paris Hilton had 10,820,568. University of Toronto Press Appropriately then, York takes 220 pages, softcover a characteristically Canadian ISBN 9781442614239 modest approach. Her focus is not the phenomenon of Margaret Atwood, cultural n the final chapter of icon, but the labour that Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from went into creating that Ithe Goon Squad, set in 2022, iconic stature—specifically, social media have transformed Atwood’s own labour. This is many familiar terms into what a scholarly examination of the book calls “word casings,” what Atwood did to become so that “democracy,” “story,” a cultural colossus, at least “real” and “friend” require here at home. quotation marks to signal irony. So York analyzes In the context of Egan’s book, Atwood’s stable of assistants, this makes sense: one of the editors and agents in terms of characters has a social network of industrial relations. Consulting 15,896 “friends.” unpublished material from Should Egan’s dystopian Atwood’s archive (Atwood made vision prove accurate, the word arrangements to archive her work “celebrity” will surely join the other astonishingly early), she pores word casings. Lorraine York, the over the writer’s efforts to promote Senator William McMaster Chair both her own work and the causes in Canadian Literature and Culture she espouses. She discusses Atwood’s at McMaster University, repeatedly insights about remuneration for cultural acknowledges the word’s protean meanings work and her activism to improve the lot in Margaret Atwood and the Labour of Literary of other writers. She dissects Atwood’s late Celebrity. Indeed, it is the crux of the book, which but passionate embrace of modern technologies: was born out of a dismissive remark by Toronto Atwood, who still writes books in longhand, has councillor Doug Ford. When Atwood raced to the become a regular Tweeter and the inventor of the defence of the city’s libraries, he told the press: model of a writer who has crafted a presence that LongPen, a device for signing books by remote “I don’t even know her. If she walked by me, not only increases her sales, but also gives her connection. I wouldn’t have a clue who she is.” The CanLit über- some clout in the political arena to support the arts Above all, York tries to grapple with the core area star is the politician’s nobody. and the environment. With the possible exception of tension for the famous—the conflict between So York revisited territory already somewhat of Pierre Berton, no Canadian author has worked the actual person Margaret Atwood—a woman familiar from her Literary Celebrity in Canada, as diligently and shrewdly to create and maintain with a family, friends and, above all, a vocation published by the University of Toronto Press in celebrity status. as a writer—and the public persona that celebrity 2007. Atwood merited a chapter in that work, but York does not mention it, but such a study demands. apparently one was not enough. should be particularly timely now, when anyone One useful reminder, somewhat buried under Now the very idea of literary celebrity, especially can self-publish online. When everyone owns a detail in this volume, is the extraordinary arc of in Canada, may strike you as improbable. York takes printing press, it can only become more difficult Atwood’s career. In the 21st century, it is easy to pains to justify her topic. In Literary Celebrity in to attract readers—making celebrity ever more forget that the poet Peggy Atwood did not start out Canada, she starts with the assertion that Canadian important. as Margaret Atwood, Cultural Queen of Canada writers have never been more visible, although I will return to the theme of what we talk and the English-speaking Dominions beyond the scholars have neglected their public profiles in about when we talk about celebrity. But for now Seas, Defender of the Arts. In the 1960s, the idea favour of their texts—leaving a convenient vacuum let’s simply note that York is under no illusion of Canadian culture was largely the dream of a for her to fill. In this volume, Atwood provides a that Margaret Atwood’s fame is at the level of distinctly raffish crowd, attracting little attention Paris Hilton’s or Gwyneth Paltrow’s. Nonetheless, outside the confines of CBC Radio. The fact that we Suanne Kelman is an author and broadcaster when Atwood set out to fight planned budget can now refer to the canon of Canadian literature and the associate chair of journalism at Ryerson cuts to Toronto’s libraries in 2011, the occasion without ironic quotation marks owes more to University. of Doug Ford’s slur, she was able to alert her Atwood than to any other person.
20 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada Along the way, Atwood has made herself famous Admittedly, the demands of the market often celebrities’ lives were by definition public property. and at least relatively rich. That is obviously one of have unfortunate effects on art. But for better That is one reason why it is important to ask the reasons that York wrote this book. As Lord Black or worse, any perceived gulf between art and what we mean when we talk about Atwood’s used to remind us so often, Canada suffers from commerce is shrinking rapidly in our time. Look at celebrity. How can one word embrace the renown a bad case of Tall Poppy syndrome. We get snippy the world of visual arts. Thanks to Pablo Picasso and enjoyed at one end by Margaret Atwood and at the when fellow citizens get too big for their britches. Salvador Dali—never mind Andy Warhol and Jeff other by Lindsay Lohan and Jessica Simpson? Let’s put this more baldly than York does: a lot of Koons—the world has pretty well lost the idea that It is not just a question of scale, of the size Canadians really hate Margaret Atwood. artistic integrity depends on starving in a garret. of Atwood’s image next to the vast imprint of Take for instance, Margaret Wente’s list of Nor is the intrusion of commerce into art a new Brangelina and Justin Bieber and David Beckham. “7 Things You Can’t Say in Canada,” assembled for phenomenon even in Canadian publishing. York Those are the people who are actually famous the Reader’s Digest Canada Online. The statement may be too young to remember the first Seal Book for achievement, however disproportionate the “Margaret Atwood Writes Some Awful Books” leads Award in 1977. The winner, Aritha Van Herk, gamely resulting rewards. There is another vast stratum of the list. Wente claims that “nobody is more feared.” climbed a rickety ladder to sign a facsimile cheque, people who are famous for doing almost nothing— She concludes: which was printed as a giant billboard. Moreover, famous for being famous. any woman named Judith—the title of the winning They are not an entirely new phenomenon. There is no such thing as a bad review of a novel—was entitled to a free copy. Hucksterism and Helen of Troy does not seem to have done much Margaret Atwood book in Canada. That’s too literature are old friends. beyond looking good. But the 21st century is the bad, because many of her books are tedious Most of my university students would see Golden Age of random fame. Think back a couple and unreadable, full of tortuous plots and nothing wrong with an author peddling T-shirts for of months to Charles Ramsey, the neighbour who unpleasant characters. Why will no one say her own profit, never mind for the worthy causes helped to rescue three girls kept captive for years in so? Because we’re grateful that she’s put us on that Atwood’s spin-offs fund. They are already Cleveland, Ohio. One of his interview clips (“Dead the global map. And because if they do, they’ll approaching the world of Goon Squad; they do not giveaway! Dead giveaway!”) was set to music and never work in this country again. necessarily distinguish between art and the market. posted on YouTube. Within two weeks, that video To my mind that is not a positive development, but had received 13,220,854 visits. This is nonsense. Canada’s literary world is it is already in place. His fame will fade fast, of course, especially after not the monolith that Wente the news about those domestic imagines. Yet York sometimes The fact that we can now refer to the violence charges. But some highly seems to suffer from the same unappealing figures have exhibited paranoid delusion. She spends canon of Canadian literature without surprising staying power. The a great deal of time defending checkout line in supermarkets Atwood’s reliance on the hidden ironic quotation marks owes more to shuffles along under the baleful labour of others—agents, editors, gaze of the dreaded Kardashians assistants—as if it were inherently Atwood than to any other person. (Kim, Khloe and Kourtney), a immoral. Here is a quotation: “The family that can actually make you major reason why relatively little attention has Still, you may be so interested in either Atwood nostalgic for the Gabor sisters. TV channel surfers been paid to the workings of the celebrity culture or celebrity theories that you will choose to read run the risk of encountering the ubiquitous Honey industries is their own complicity in silenced this book. Take note that anyone but masochists or Boo Boo, the wannabe preschool beauty pageant labour.” York seems to assume that her readers professors would be wise to leave the first chapter queen—the Shirley Temple de nos jours, minus will automatically condemn a writer who draws until the end or to skip it altogether. You can test the talent, the looks, the sunny disposition and the on the services of editors and researchers and an your tolerance for its rhythm and vocabulary by charm. Readers of this journal probably would not agent (actually more than one) and even a personal choosing quotations at random, such as this one: recognize three quarters of the tabloids’ current assistant. Is there really a school of thought on “As Su Holmes and Sean Redmond point out in celebrities, a motley collection of the winners and industrial relations that wants the names of all their introduction to Framing Celebrity, this need casualties of reality and talent shows, attention- those supporting workers on the book’s cover with to retain the specificity of celebrity in various areas hungry socialites, alcoholic and anorexic and drug- the author’s? Only an academic could feel such of study is a matter of balancing the discourse of addicted actors and musicians. wonder that a commercial relationship, such as celebrity with the locality of that discourse’s Most of them will not enjoy much more than the the one between author and agent, could also be a performance.” 15 minutes Andy Warhol promised us all, of course, friendship. The rest of us are used to shades of grey. If you decide to proceed, be warned that whether they have achieved celebrity or had it There is also a very Canadian prudery about words such as “imbrication” and “impellate” thrust upon them. Fame requires hard work over books’ dual identity as cultural artifacts and crop up later in the book as well, although there the long haul—although the effort does not always marketable commodities. York anticipates censure are straightforward passages that avoid such pay off. In this ocean of shlock culture, Atwood is of an author who tweets and performs and tries constipated, academic prose. The tortured style can entitled to enormous credit for managing to finesse to safeguard her image, who even sells T-shirts on feel like someone playing hopscotch while lugging the demands of the market and the media while still her website for The Year of the Flood, although all around a ball and chain. It underlines the paradox producing books. proceeds go to environmental non-governmental of devoting 200 pages to a close analysis of the Ah yes, the books. Politically engaged though organizations. York goes to considerable trouble woman whose office sports the message “Wanting she is, surely Atwood is more concerned about to reassure readers that these activities are to meet an author because you like his work is like the survival of her work than her public image. not necessarily corrupt. York’s target audience wanting to meet a duck because you like pâté.” And that is the great irony here. Atwood may be a apparently believe that writers should live on art Still, you can find some new information and celebrity, and one who sells a lot of books, but she and air. provocative ideas here. In particular, York provides and her CanLit colleagues are losing the war. In the The fact that the same distaste for books as a fascinating details and analysis of Atwood’s use June issue of the LRC, Michael LaPointe lamented commodity shows up in some of Atwood’s fiction of technology. The LongPen—that remote signing the neglect of Canadian writing in our schools. (mostly her earlier novels, I notice) might be device—struck me at the time of its invention Add to that the evaporation of so many Canadian adequate justification for a scholarly article, but simply as a clever gimmick to cut down on travel publishing houses, the industry’s fixation on mega not, for most readers, an entire book. for time-pressed writers. But York is right to sellers and the general decline of reading, and Outside the academy and the Occupy tease more meaning out of it, to examine the fan’s you can see a future when the words “Canadian movement, very few people believe that art is desire for contact and the question of the celebrity’s literature” and possibly even “book” will require pure and commerce is filthy and never the twain aura. ironic quotation marks. shall meet. For every Gwendolyn MacEwan or Al In fact, I would have liked to see more discussion The important point here, it seems to me, is that Purdy, resolutely ignoring the bourgeois benefits of of what York calls the author’s “body,” of that question Atwood’s hard work to become a cultural icon—a a healthy bank balance, there is a Thomas Hardy, of fame’s aura. Celebrities used to have glamour, a celebrity—is anchored in an unparalleled body of diligently studying copyright law before signing his magical quality that gleams in the distance but work. You do not have to like all of it—it is hard to first contract—or a Margaret Atwood, signing with dissipates in close-up. Something—probably TV— imagine a reader who would. But art is long and an agent long before her earnings could justify the has changed that. The sense of distance is being life—never mind fame—is brief. Atwood’s celebrity commission. replaced by a growing sense of ownership, as if is a sideshow; I am going back to her books.
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 21 Are Book Burners Always Villains? The ethical quagmire of censoring “difficult” literature. Rinaldo Walcott
It is intriguing, in light of these Dear Sir, I Intend to Burn questions, that the U.S. publishers Your Book: found the title of the novel a An Anatomy of a Book Burning problem. Hill is clear that the Lawrence Hill American publishers themselves University of Alberta Press did not find the title offensive, 33 pages, softcover but rather were concerned about ISBN 9780888646798 how the title would affect sales. Therefore, Hill reports that, with little time to think through the still vividly recall the problem of the title, he changed CBC World at Six report it to Someone Knows My Name Ion the 2011 event that was for U.S. publication. Indeed, it is scheduled to occur in Oosterpark, the question of sales that might Amsterdam. The report was on be the most disappointing aspect of a planned burning of Lawrence this entire sordid episode of a book- Hill’s enormously popular The cover burning and the aborted book Book of Negroes, that is, its Dutch burning in Amsterdam. translation, by an activist named Of course, publishers publish Roy Groenberg, leader of a group books to make money and writers known as the Foundation Honor write for their living, so the question and Restore Victims of Slavery in of book sales is germane to both. Suriname. The burning did not take However, I want to suggest that Hill’s place, although Groenberg publicly quick fall for his U.S. publisher’s burned a photocopy of the book’s concerns about sales, given the title, cover. Dear Sir, I Intend to Burn Your reveals much about this story. What Book: An Anatomy of A Book Burning is Lawrence have a copy of the book assigned as a part of their do sales have to do with good art? And if the title of Hill’s response to the provocation from Groenberg, curriculum, demonstrating how precious the tale the book held important historical, social, cultural, received by email, from which he takes the title the book holds has come to be to some readers. artistic and indeed ethical meaning, why change of this long essay. It is Hill’s coming to terms with The enormous popularity of the book on Canadian the name for sales? Would readers not eventually the intention to burn his book and his working soil is evident both through its sales and especially discover this important story regardless of initial out of his relationship to such acts of censorship. in the aftermath of the popular book competition sales? What role would critics and reviewers play in Indeed, Hill seeks to do more in the essay than cast Canada Reads. In fact, the popularity and ubiquity explaining the title? It is precisely at this point that the event as merely one of censorship and instead of the book make the controversy over its title in the a larger set of questions about the culture industries seeks to make some kind of relationship with his Netherlands an interesting intervention concerning present themselves. If changing the title had more provocateur, thus transforming him into more of why similar concerns or questions were not raised to do with sales than to do with the artistic, cultural an interlocutor in the essay. Hill’s response to the in the Canadian context, given the book’s far- and political impact of the title and the book and potential book burning aims to make sense of why reaching impact here. the kinds of conversations and education the the reception of his book based on its title might In the aftermath of the Netherlands story one original title could and might entail, why change it? have triggered such a reaction in the first instance. begins to wonder about what kinds of conversations Indeed, Hill does not fully address those kinds of But the essay is also a reflection on Hill’s work in Hill had with his Canadian publishers about the questions in his essay. anti-censorship circles and as an articulator for novel’s title? Did he and his publishers simply The essay locates itself in a long tradition of an anti-racist and socially just world. assume that Canadians would have no problem correctly reminding readers about the multiple The Book of Negroes was first published in with the title, as appears to have been the case? pitfalls of book censorship. But Hill is historically Canada in 2007 and has reportedly sold more than Did they discuss the transposition of The Book minded and thoughtful enough to not just produce 600,000 copies in Canada alone. Hill has won a of Negroes title from the actual 18th-century anti-censorship arguments outside of other histori- number of major awards for the novel, and it has document to the 21st-century book as just one of cal concerns. He presents the ethical dilemmas of been widely celebrated as telling an important story several layers of authenticity underlying the novel? racist literature as a backdrop to working out how and also crucially pointing readers to the actual Did they think about whether black Canadians he comes to his positions on anti-censorship. By history from which the novel draws its material. might be offended by the title? From all accounts, recounting his family’s very active involvement Indeed, I have had conversations with people who at least in Hill’s essay, it does not appear that he in the civil rights movement in the United States insist that each child in a Canadian school should himself or his Canadian publishers asked any of and Canada, Hill plots the quagmire of censor- the above questions. For me that might be the most ship as ethically difficult terrain, but he does it in Rinaldo Walcott is a professor of black cultural interestingly untold part of this story—was there a smart and sentimental fashion. Indeed, it is the studies at Ontario Institute for Studies in Education any consternation about the book’s title among its civil rights family narrative that makes Hill’s posi- at the University of Toronto. Canadian publishers? tion on censorship a difficult and admirable one.
22 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada He is forced to work out a thoughtful relationship protest says something about a group’s ability to be a method of signalling the ways in which forms of to difficult literature, especially literature meant to heard in other contexts. This is not to say that book global anti-blackness now circulate, making little demean and harm, alongside a position that does burning is fine, but rather to point to the different difference from one country to another in how not call for its banning but rather for its vigorous ways in which different communities have access poor black people are housed or policed, what intellectual and political engagement. Hill has been to intervening in the public sphere and having their kind of employment (if any) they have access to a part of such debates prior to his encounter with views accorded some space for consideration. From and so on. Different countries, same conditions. his Amsterdam interlocutor. Thus in some ways, the persistence of Zwarte Piet to a Dutch magazine’s Groenberg’s protest, faulty as it was, draws on given his thoughtfulness, it is surprising that he did reference to pop star Rihanna as a “niggabitch,” a similar impulse even if we would disagree on not meditate on the relationship between titles and to black people being beaten up and arrested for political methods. sales in his essay. protesting Zwarte Piet, the field of black or rather Hill’s response in Dear Sir, I Intend to Burn Your But American marketing decisions aside, let’s anti-black representation in the Netherlands is one Book opens more questions for me than it resolves. return to the main event. The email from Amsterdam that is already saturated with negativity. Indeed, Once the discussion is routed back to Canada, is one less interested in the art of the novel or even it seems safe to venture a guess that, much like in one begins to ask whether Canadian publishers the story of the novel and one more characterized Canada, I doubt that the Dutch publishers would even imagine a black reading public the way by what the title signifies about unreconciled have given any thought to how black and other that the American publishers did. Are Canadian histories of black peoples’ enslavement and the non-white Dutch people might have responded to publishers too steeped in the myths of a Canada still lingering evidence of such histories in the the title when acquiring the rights to publish the that is not troubled by the legacy of transatlantic Netherlands and beyond. Indeed, the desire to book. In such cases do writers have to think through slavery to imagine such a reading public? What burn the book is framed through the unreconciled these minefields for themselves? Hill’s essay, by kinds of conversations are editors, publishers and histories of Dutch involvement in the African taking Groenberg seriously, begins to approach book marketing people having with their writers slave trade. The place where the copies of the such a question. about these kinds of concerns in the Canadian book’s covers were eventually burned in the park When I see the words Het Negerboek on the marketplace? Are there any people working at such is freighted with symbolic historical significance— page as a non-Dutch reader and speaker, but as levels in the Canadian publishing industry who “next to a monument commemorating the victims someone who has lived all my life in the zone of understand and have the expertise and professional of Dutch slavery.” the Americas, the first association I make with it respect to raise these questions? And, again, why Indeed, this is a war of symbols between author, visually is “nigger.” To my eyes there is something in did black Canadians not respond similarly to their publisher and Roy Groenberg. But it is important those letters that speaks a history of concealment of Dutch kin? Is it that black Canadians do not think to suggest that Groenberg was probably not just the ways in which language has been central, if not that their concerns could be heard? Is it that such speaking for himself. The admirable aspect of Hill’s foundational, to the unmaking of black peoples’ a startling black Canadian success as Hill’s is so essay is his attempt to complicate his response humanness. Unlike Roy Groenberg, I believe such seldom witnessed that making such a noise might to Groenberg’s provocation by thinking seriously words must remain with us, not buried, because seem embarrassing? about the desire to burn the book and the ways in I think those words act as reminders of the terrible It seems to me that the issues opened up are far which he and Groenberg might agree on a number things we have done and continue to do even when beyond the ones of censorship, as important as that of issues pertaining to post-slavery black life. It is the words have been banished. The ideas behind is. The issues all strike deeply at book publishing such openness on Hill’s part that makes me term those words can still get a Trayvon Martin shot to in Canada, black communities and an imagined Groenberg his interlocutor and not merely an death. It is precisely why in my own scholarship public that appears not to include black people as antagonist. I have come to use the term “global niggerdom” as readers. Since Hill takes seriously Groenberg’s intervention, he is forced to work out why such a response to his book might have been possible in the first instance. To be clear, Hill remains ONE YEAR, throughout the essay a staunch believer in anti- censorship practices. Nonetheless he must wrestle BECOME AN TEN ISSUES C with the fact that the Dutch, like white Canadians, have sought to downplay their role in transatlantic slavery, if not attempt to make it disappear altogether. Indeed, Canada’s feat of submerging its relationship to and its benefits from transatlantic LRC SUBSCRIBER! slavery deep in the national consciousness has been so successful that raising its spectre almost always seems in bad taste. For the Dutch it is the By Mail, send form to: Name Suite/Apt same, but with overseas colonies and a figure such Street City as Zwarte Piet, the Christmas “dark face” figure Literary Review who scares bad children, the deep involvement of Canada Province/State Country of the Dutch in one of the most horrific abuses of PO Box 8, Station K Postal/Zip Code Email human history rears its head at least once a year, Toronto, ON Phone Fax not to mention the many formerly colonized M4P 2G1 arriving at the doors of the “motherland.” Hill declares an intimate and ongoing commitment To Subscribe online, Payment Options: Bill Me! Cheque Enclosed! Charge Me! to both the Netherlands and Canada, recounting visit reviewcanada.ca/ If Paying By Credit Card: Card Number his many trips and, importantly, his first trip to sub2013 (Visa or Mastercard Only) the Netherlands as a young man. Thus he feels the Expi Expiry shock of Groenberg’s intervention as emotionally surprising, given that he thought conversation Si Signature and debate would be more suited to the national CONTACT US: temperaments of both places. But it is indeed the Email / INDIVIDUALS LIBRARIES / INSTITUTIONS tangled and unresolved histories of slavery and contemporary anti-black racism that complicates literaryreview@ National Rate: $56 + tax National Rate: $68 + tax how texts are received, valued and understood to cstonecanada.com ON, NB, NL: total $63.28 ON, NB, NL: total $76.84 be representative or not of various communities. It Phone / PE: total $63.84 PE: total $77.52 is precisely because Hill’s novel entered into a field 416 932 5081 NS: total $64.40 NS: total $78.20 where contestation over a very limited set of black Fax / Rest of Canada: total $58.80 Rest of Canada: total $71.40 representations is available that, in my view, his 416 932 1620 International Rate: $98 novel elicited such a response in the Netherlands. International Rate: $86 Having to resort to burning a book as a form of
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 23 Black Power in Montreal The ideas, leaders and pain behind the Sir George Williams riot. Frances Henry
of 1968 and organized largely by black West Indian a racially motivated event. (It was left to the late Fear of a Black Nation: university students. This event was well attended Lincoln Alexander to raise that point.) Race, Sex and Security in Sixties Montreal by some of the most important international “Black The Black Power movement in the United States David Austin radical and nationalist figures of the time.” From found a home in Montreal, especially among leftist- Between the Lines former pan-Africanist philosophical mentors oriented black students, academics and ideologues, 260 pages, softcover such as C.L.R. James, Kwame Nkrumah and most of whom were from the Caribbean. The ISBN 9781771130103 others, the congress moved to the new generation Caribbean presence and the organization of symbolized largely by Stokely Carmichael and his the Caribbean Conference Committee by “exiled” associates. The latter’s speech emphasizing the Caribbean intellectuals are given a great deal of here is an iconic Canadian image plundering of African and African-derived culture credit for the political education of students and that many remember but most know and the significance of the Black Power movement other readers. The writings of the New World Group Tvery little about. It shows a blizzard of galvanized the huge audience and concentrated and their New World Quarterly played a critical computer cards (remember those?) pouring out their attention on black consciousness. The role in educating the black student leadership, as the windows of the Computer Centre of Sir George congress emphasized the international nature of did the writings of C.L.R. James and other black Williams College in downtown Montreal in the the black struggle. In his concluding chapter, Austin left-oriented intellectuals. Their conferences during winter of 1969. Those millions of lost cards and a makes the key point that black internationalism the 1960s attracted most of the student leaders who roomful of destroyed computer equipment worth transcends the boundaries of the nation-state; in were later to lead the Sir George Williams protest. about $2 million were the physical manifestations fact, blacks have always thought of themselves as These conferences, and especially the black writers of a 14-day protest by black conference, reverberated students who felt that their There was a degree of antagonism between throughout Jamaica and would claims of racism against one also prove influential in the of the SGW faculty were being older Canadian blacks and the newer Black Power protest in Trinidad ignored. Taking part in the in 1970. Austin notes that all protest were famous figures migrant generation, largely because of their these major events were highly such as Anne Cools, now a gendered: with few exceptions, Canadian senator, and the late political philosophies and ideology. all participants were men. Roosevelt (“Rosie”) Douglas, He frequently contends who went on to become the prime minister of being part of a “stateless nation comprising both that black history and politics are often excluded Dominica. Fear of a Black Nation: Race, Sex and continental Africa and its diaspora.” However, from the dominant narratives that have shaped Security in Sixties Montreal, a new book by David this attempt to relate black protest to historical Canadian society. He also notes that even the Austin, revisits this unique and unsettling story processes creating a sense of statelessness and ideological left, including American historian and and paints a portrait of the intellectual elite of internationalism could have been developed major ideologue Eugene Genovese, has paid only Montreal’s black community who spearheaded the and given more prominence than a mere few lines marginal attention to these black movements. This protest. of text. work therefore is also aimed at demonstrating that The 1960s was a period of social and political The second event was the so-called Sir black-led events in Montreal in the 1960s “played a turmoil in several areas of the world including George Williams Affair, in which black students, critical role in this historic moment.” the city of Montreal in which a small community identified as radicals, protested a professor’s The book also pays considerable attention to of black people—primarily English speaking and of alleged discriminatory grading by occupying the Quebec nationalism. The exclusion of blacks— varied historical backgrounds—lived. Increasing new computer centre and destroying a mainframe except for stereotypical racial descriptions in immigration, including substantial numbers computer. The author concentrates less on the MacLennan’s Two Solitudes—is singled out for of students mainly from the English-speaking actual day-to-day events of the protest (which attention because it demonstrates that blacks and Caribbean, added to the growing population. lasted from January 29 to February 11, 1969) and sometimes their culture, although visible, were (Today, the majority of blacks in Montreal and more on the personal and political differences acknowledged in neither the English-speaking Quebec are French-speaking immigrant Haitians among the protesters. For example, Austin notes minority community nor the French majority in and their children, but their presence was not that there was a degree of antagonism between Quebec. Nationalistic narratives in Quebec do not yet very noticeable at that time.) It is those black older Canadian blacks and the newer migrant include blacks or the aboriginal population despite anglophones and their politics in Montreal generation, largely because of their political the fact that the discourse of race has shaped during the ’60s that are the focus of this book. The philosophies and ideology. Their competition Canada’s early history, so that racial categories are emphasis is on the two major events that marked for women, especially white women, is also “present in absentia” while government, politicians a “historical turning point” highlighting “many of mentioned. Despite differences and schisms, the and others promote a “neutered narrative of the pressing issues of today—issues of race, gender, event mobilized anti-racism sentiments among multiculturalism and inclusion.” Discourses and security.” The first of these was the Congress of the students, struck a blow at the complacency framing Quebec’s intellectual history include Black Writers held at McGill University in October of Canadians and demonstrated that the Liberal emphasis on anti-colonialism especially because government did not have “an effective program of the influence of Black Power on Pierre Vallières Frances Henry, professor emerita of anthropology at or analytical tools to help its politicians and as well as the profound treatises on the Negritude York University, has written and edited many books functionaries understand the incident.” Then Prime of Césaire and Fanon. In fact, the struggle of French on racism in Canada, including four editions of The Minister Pierre Trudeau said it was a provincial Canadians within Canadian society often describes Colour of Democracy: Racism in Canadian Society matter, but in the Quebec National Assembly— their condition as that of “white niggers.” The (Nelson, 2009). Her most recent volume is Racism which did not debate it—Premier Jean Lesage made notion of Quebec servitude was encapsulated by in the Canadian University: Demanding Social only a passing reference to its cost. Members of their appropriation of this term. Justice, Inclusion and Equity (University of Toronto Parliament expressed fear and a potential backlash The impact of racism on the black population of Press, 2009). from the Caribbean but did not understand it as Montreal is very briefly described in one chapter
24 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada of Austin’s book provocatively titled “Être et Noir— value system of Canadian society. Perhaps the Being and Blackness,” which begins by citing the author might have taken greater care to describe day-to-day racist experiences of the diverse black or discuss his methodology and the terms used in people in that city as recounted to a Senegalese greater detail. magazine journalist. Since not all those cited in As I mentioned above in referring to the the article complained of racism, the author agrees discussion of black “statelessness,” there are some $85.00 Hardcover that interracial relations at the time were changing other examples of powerful ideas and theories 776 pages 978-1-55458-625-7 but were also quite complex. Some further analysis of explanation for black protests that are simply $29.99 might have helped the reader understand these mentioned and then not developed or even used Film and Media complexities. in the text. For instance, in the introduction there Studies series The main problem I find with this otherwise is a very brief discussion, citing several well-known worthwhile book is that it lacks the social everyday writers, about the effects on blacks of the “afterlife” context in which racism is experienced. Apart from or how slavery contributed to their limited life this brief discussion I’ve cited, which simply quotes opportunities. Yet this important proposition is a magazine article, the author himself appears to merely noted but not really applied as the text have made no effort to discuss racist experiences continues. Another example are the concepts, DADA, Surrealism, and the with the people he talked to in preparation for this also in the introductory section, of “biosexuality” Cinematic Effect book. Racism becomes a word without experiential and “biosexual politics,” which are defined as the R. Bruce Elder referents. There is extensive discussion of the “primeval fear of Blacks that is based in slavery and “This is that rare book that casts the early- perspectives of major thinkers such as C.L.R James, colonialism and the recurring need to discipline twentieth-century avant-garde in a very new light.” Stokely Carmichael and the Black Power movement and control Black bodies.” This concept is presented – Rudolf Kuenzli, director, International Dada and some of the important intellectuals then living primarily to convey the idea that there is an almost Archive, University of Iowa or visiting Montreal for extended periods of time “primordial” fear of blacks and blackness associated such as Lloyd Best and others. The book more with historical rebellion and protest. It provides than provides the intellectual, philosophical and a rationale for the state, in the form of the RCMP sociopolitical background that motivated the Sir and other forces of authority, to take strong action George Williams group of students. What is lacking such as the surveillance of black political groups in is the sociocultural and institutional milieu in Montreal. The fear of blackness and the reaction $39.99 Paper Canadian society and especially in Montreal to to that fear is further discussed in Chapter 9, in 219 pages which most of these students came as immigrants. which some important literature is cited, but the 978-1-55458-935-7 Film and Media Some were, in fact, socialized in Canadian schools reader must wait until almost the end of the book. Studies series where they must have experienced many of the Biosexuality or the general fear of the black body is elements of Canadian culture and its values. The very well presented and documented in the social words Austin quotes from his interviewees tell science literature and it could have been cited in us very little about who they are, what they have the introductory chapter when the concept is first experienced and how they feel about living and raised. As it is, this very brief beginning section trying to adjust to Canada; instead we hear a great could well be misconstrued and misunderstood by deal about their philosophies and radical ideas. readers not overly familiar with this literature, and Two Bicycles: The Work of Jean-Luc The author has read widely and many sources are the power of the argument could be lost. Godard and Anne-Marie Miéville quoted, but they are mainly confined to theoretical This book is about the beginnings of the politics Jerry White treatises and, often, literary voices. Totally absent of race that is a “central part of the prevailing social, Examines the work that Jean-Luc Godard did with is any discussion of how racism, in its attitudinal, economic, and political hierarchy that shapes our Anne-Marie Miéville, spanning films, television behavioural and institutional forms, affected daily lives.” It is therefore an important contribution series, and videos. Special attention is paid to the the experiences of the students and that of their to the understanding of black life in Canada because ways they used video equipment to explore a friends, parents and neighbours. Austin seems to it presents a nuanced and intensive examination of “workshop” idea for their production company, have forgotten that in the first place, the protest the black philosophies, ideologies and values that and the ways Swiss culture influenced their col- sprang from a racist allegation against a Sir George permeated a critical time in Quebec and specifically lective project. Williams professor. Racism is what this protest was in Montreal’s history. Little has been written about all about. To round out his intellectual perspectives this period and its black history, and therefore this on the actions of the students, the social science book is welcome and will be useful not only for literature—now very extensive—about racism students and scholars but for the informed general in Canadian society and the many forms it takes public as well. It lacks, however, a more balanced should at the very least have been summarized and analysis and understanding of the phenomenon $48.99 Paper described. of racism especially as it functions in Canadian 436 pages Another weakness of this work is that Austin society. Readers still need to know about the 8 b/w illus. 978-1-55458-905-0 does not clearly explain his methodology. It fundamentals of racism because the discourse of the Environmental appears based primarily on discussions he held denial of racism is still so powerful in this country. Humanities Series with knowledgeable people and interviews with It especially permeates the middle and upper some participants in the protest as well as members levels of the institutional structures of this society and leaders in the black community then and now. despite the lip service paid to equity regulations We are not told how many or given an indexed list and other means regulated by our “multicultural” of persons. There is sometimes little distinction legislation, policies and practices. As well, Canada made between what someone has written and what has an international reputation as a multicultural he or she has stated in an interview. and diverse country where protests, riots and other Ecologies of the Moving Image: Austin is strongly committed to a narrative manifestations of inequity do not often occur. While Cinema, Affect, Nature approach both in his methodology and his attempts that may be true, racism is expressed in a myriad Adrian J. Ivakhiv to explain the narratives and master narratives that of ways in this country and there are constant This book presents an ecophilosophy of cinema: an govern Canadian society. But this creates a problem reminders of the pain and humiliation that blacks, account of the moving image in relation to the lived for the reader, because toward the end he expounds other racialized persons and aboriginal peoples ecologies–material, social, and perceptual rela- on the Canadian “master narrative,” which must still endure. tions–within which movies are produced, con- has and continues to exclude blacks. Thus the Blacks and other racialized people who have sumed, and incorporated into cultural life. empirical methodology of exploring the narrative— experienced racism in their day-to-day lives WILFRID LAURIER UNIVERSITY PRESS meaning participants’ memories and stories of a perhaps do not need further enlightenment about Available from your favourite bookseller or call 1-800-565-9523 (UTP Distribution) sociopolitical event—becomes conflated with the this evil and ubiquitous aspect of modern social www.wlupress.wlu.ca master narrative used to describe the dominant reality. Whites certainly do. facebook.com/wlupress | twitter.com/wlupress
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 25 From Zlín to the Royal Society One of Canada’s leading political scientists tells his own story. Hugh Segal
political science journal (the International Political Most important for his many fans, students, A Life of Learning and Other Pleasures Science Review) as he is debating at the Trilateral colleagues, friends and associates at home in John Meisel Commission, bicycling to the market or regulating Canada and abroad, that environment shaped Wintergeen Studios Press Canada’s broadcast industry. John Meisel makes the kind of Canadian Meisel became and resulted 424 pages, softcover “renaissance man” seem too limiting a term. And in an amazing insight that has radiated from his ISBN 9780986547331 there is a difference between a renaissance man academic and policy work ever since. Having seen and a dilettante. In Meisel’s case, as this book the world at its worst and having been spared reveals, there are threshold work, inquiry, research great sorrow or suffering by good fortune and cademics, especially those whose and hard thinking underlying his intellectual shrewd, hard-working parents, his growth into an writings and research have had genuine facility with political, sociological and public policy outstanding student and academic is recounted Aimpact on events and decisions, are disciplines. with a mix of humility, humour and good-natured sometimes burdened by an understandable, if While he is a man of academic and political scorn toward the unerringly self-reverential. This vaguely irritating, conceit. They will, if they attempt analysis, in this happy endeavour Meisel is also is a writer who takes his work and duties seriously, an autobiography, conflate events in their life a remarkable colourist and warm-hearted social builds conscientious due diligence into his teaching with the huge historic trends or cataclysms that commentator. His life chapters are not only and academic research, and elevates public service occurred during their period in history. Some interesting chronologies of events in his youthful into an art form, but, at the same time, manages to will even connect their personal chronological and eventually his more mature years—first eschew the temptation to see a terribly important pilgrimage with some greater person when using a mirror to global significance—or at least try. Reading this book is like having a long shave. This separates Meisel from Politicians and business leaders, many an academic of his era (as not to mention self-appointed lunch with Dr. Meisel in a Prague café. well as politicians, journalists and cultural icons, also fall victim business leaders) who, should to this conceit. But John Meisel, originally from growing up in eastern Europe, migrating across the a mirror be placed on their desk, might never go Vienna and a Canadian since 1942, is too superb a globe as the son of a Bata Shoe executive, finally to lunch. John Meisel would go to lunch, in the raconteur, too thoughtful an academic, too graceful ending up in Canada and building an academic sense of sharing, teaching, learning and growing— and humble a writer even to be tempted by this all and cultural life—but also rich pastiches of the with students, intellectuals, political leaders, too common self-indulgence. social mores and social frames through the times in neighbours, artists, musicians and everyone else Instead, A Life of Learning and Other Pleasures which he passed. The journey you are on as a reader he came across in a life journey that embraces is more of a warm and inviting train ride through is that of a veritable pilgrim’s progress through the experiences of great breadth and depth. many stages of a remarkable life. It is replete travails and risks of World War Two, life in exotic John Meisel’s tale runs from Zlín (the epicentre of with adventure, discovery, danger, achievement, Mediterranean and Caribbean locales, a company the Bata empire in Czechoslovakia) to Casablanca, departures and arrivals in truly fascinating times town in middle Ontario, the ivy-covered walls of from Haiti to Batawa in southeastern Ontario, to and places. It is a history, literature review, academe, federal, provincial and cultural policy Queen’s, Yale, China and often back to Quebec. geopolitical analysis, and personal and family politics and the world of international social and Reading this book is like having a long lunch with story all in one. And where others would use self- political research—with many interludes of great Dr. Meisel in a Prague café, where he links up preening, Meisel uses humour and incandescent music, fascinating gatherings, interesting people, creating the Quebec seminar at Queen’s in the humility. He is author, train conductor and controversies and events. 1960s, chairing the International Studies Council, remarkably engaging tour guide all at the same At a time today, when the social responsibility helping the Atlantic Council get started in Canada, time. of large corporations and some governments is creating the genre of academic study of elections For all his modesty, though, Meisel is a Canadian very much in doubt, looking back through Meisel’s and political parties in Canada, while urging the to be seriously reckoned with. A political scientist retelling of how, in the 1930–50 period, the Bata Trilateral Commission to reflect on the poor and by training, he has chaired the CRTC and presided Shoe Company worked tirelessly to protect its dispossessed. over the Royal Society of Canada and the Canadian employees from the Nazi onslaught—one of whom A Life of Learning and Other Pleasures takes us Political Science Association during his long career. was John’s father—and the ensuing world-wide unassumingly through how John Meisel became His use of scholarly networks and learned journals, travels a young John along with his sister and the national treasure he is, simply by being a which he often edited both in Canada and around parents endured (not all of which were pleasant decent, hard-working, youthful immigrant who the world, built bridges of understanding across or without drama) underlines not only how made Canada better almost from the moment of English and French divides at home and throughout fortunate the author was, but also how decent and his arrival. His autobiography is a journey through the Cold War world internationally. He is as much courageous the Bata Shoe Company family was. time and intellectual growth to maturity. It is a at home playing the violin (in the early Kingston This story alone renders the entire book worth the compelling anthology of events, times, people, Symphony Orchestra), advising premiers (Ontario’s time it takes to read it. The mix of overarching work writings and perceptions that shaped and changed Robarts and Quebec’s Lesage) and building a global ethic and focus on quality and value within a frame the life of one of Canada’s greatest political of humanity and internationalism appear to have scientists and intellectuals. Hugh Segal, a Conservative senator from Ontario shaped much of Meisel’s student, academic, public, To meet or chat with Meisel is to be touched (Kingston-Frontenac-Leeds), has chaired the Senate professional and cultural life. Everything from his by a grace, intellect and decency that is anything foreign affairs and anti-terrorism committees. A grip on languages, his approach to hard work and but common. His memoir is the wonderful senior fellow at the Queen’s School of Policy Studies his commitment to humane and inclusive values explanation, both humble and deeply informative, and a member of the National Security Working seems to have flowed from the quite extraordinary of how and why John Meisel became who he is. It is Group at Cranfield University in the United corporate and social environment within which he a great read. Kingdom, he makes his home in Kingston, Ontario. grew up.
26 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada Chilling Lessons A First Nations chief recalls years of suffering at St. Joseph’s Mission school. Laura Robinson
do, and move this country forth to truly reconcile wild onions, to name a few foods packed with They Called Me Number One: Secrets and the past. Part of that is the implementation nutrition. But they had to be careful. If nuns or Survival at an Indian Residential School of treaties, the implementation of the United priests caught them they were strapped for eating Bev Sellars Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous “poison.” Talonbooks Peoples, and the true understanding of the Royal In order to survive, children learned to never 227 pages, softcover Proclamation. All of this needs to be done in the challenge authority, always to obey and even to ISBN 9780889227415 spirit of truth and reconciliation.” question what came naturally to them. When Yet so many Canadians do not know what the Sellars learned to tell time she was punished; a nun treaties represent, or that Canada finally signed did not believe she should have the right to know t is a long four days in May in Williams the UN declaration but has not acted on it, or what time it was. When they knew something was Lake, British Columbia. Survivors of St. Joseph’s that the Royal Proclamation should be playing a wrong—like the brutal beating of children while IMission Indian Residential School have come role today in land claims and other disputes. And all others were forced to watch—they could do together jointly for a commemoration project and where are the non-Native people at the truth and nothing, even when those children were siblings the Truth and Reconciliation or cousins. Not surprisingly, when Commission on Indian residential Sellars and a friend went to schools. Shawn Atleo, National Where are the non-Native people at the the Williams Lake Stampede as Chief of the Assembly of First twelve-year-olds in the summer, Nations, is present for the truth and reconciliation hearings? neither of them or the many other unveiling of a memorial to those First Nations or non-Native people who survived “the Mission” and the many who did reconciliation hearings? How will they hear these there came to the aid of a First Nations girl named not. Walking where the schoolyard once was means ugly yet powerful stories? How will they reconcile a Margaret when white men in a pick-up truck tried walking on unmarked graves. Children simply past they have yet to even recognize? to kidnap her. She screamed for help while fighting disappeared. Sellars’s well-written, comprehensive and them off. Luckily she was able to break away and Somehow on day three, Atleo looks both haunting book is an excellent place to begin, and run just as two more men were getting out of the refreshed and exhausted on the plane to Vancouver, I hope it becomes mandatory for high school vehicle. where he will transfer to Winnipeg and attend classes. It is written with intelligence, in a clear, Sellars argues that the soul-destroying “lessons” Elijah Harper’s funeral. The death of Harper concise manner so students who care at all about of residential school robbed First Nations people of (another residential school survivor) at age 64 from Canada will be moved. Sellars takes us to a time the ability to make life-saving decisions of their own. complications from diabetes mirrors First Nations before she is born, when a French immigrant Constantly being told they were wrong—even when communities everywhere, sadly accompanying impregnated “an Aboriginal woman named Mary, they were right—gave them a deeply entrenched the many tales of death told at the Williams Lake but abandoned her and would not acknowledge feeling of worthlessness. It follows, then, that commemoration and in Bev Sellars’s They Called the baby as his.” That baby was John Baptiste, after watching generations of white people who Me Number One: Secrets and Survival at an Indian Sellars’s great-grandfather. Sarah Baptiste would had come to “save” them savagely beating their Residential School—which was her assigned be his daughter and Sellars’s “Gram”—the woman friends and family members, they would sense that identity and what she had to answer to for seven who raised her, loved her deeply, taught her life- trying to rescue Margaret would somehow harm years at the Mission. She was one who survived, saving traditions, but had no power when her them all. That the pavilion First Nations people and knew, even before pen met page, she would tell granddaughter was taken away from her. Baptiste were relegated to during the stampede was called the stories of that evil place from 1961 to 1967 when spoke the Dakelh (Carrier) language, but would “Squaw Hall” speaks volumes in this land known numbers replaced human beings. only allow English to be used in her cabin as she for the Highway of Tears. Those who survived the schools often barely wanted to protect her children and grandchildren Such chilling stories are told with conviction and reach the age where they could be considered against the punishments meted out if they spoke it a matter-of-factness by Sellars. She would go on, elders and then die, as Harper did, well before the at residential school. after bearing three children who, she says, changed national average age of 80.7. Bodies and spirits Loss of language was one of the ways the Oblates everything in a life-affirming way, to earn a degree so badly beaten and brutalized in childhood are committed cultural genocide at the Mission, where in history and political science, to get a law degree forever vulnerable. I ask Atleo how he is able to Sellars says emotional, physical and sexual abuse and to become chief of Soda Creek First Nation, in continue as he leaves one memorial to the dead of children was the norm. They were fed (and interior B.C. As chief she challenged the RCMP, who for another. He is visibly moved by what he just force fed) rotten food that completely lacked in she says were responsible for many of the beatings attended, but resolute. nutritional value. She writes, “Junie had made the First Nations people endured. Residential school “When we say no to something as Elijah mistake of scraping her food directly off the plate taught them it did not matter if they had committed Harper did about the Constitution,” he answers, into the garbage can. A nun saw her and made her no crime—those in authority were allowed to do “we also need to say yes to something else. Yes to dig the food out of the garbage and eat it. Of course, whatever they wanted. Her book comes out just reconciliation—yes to the process that is going the food was now mixed with other garbage. Junie months after Human Rights Watch issued the to recognize what truth and reconciliation seek to sat there crying and gagging, trying to get the food report “Those Who Take Us Away: Abusive Policing down.” and Failures in Protection of Indigenous Women Laura Robinson has covered First Nation issues The children were always hungry and so, when and Girls in Northern British Columbia, Canada.” for 23 years. Her play, Niigaanibatowaad: allowed to go for walks in the surrounding hills, Indeed, the shadows cast by residential schools and FrontRunners, on long-distance runners in would forage for the foods they knew so well from the colonial legacies they left are long. Let none of residential school is now a National Film Board family traditions—alec (kinnikinnick berries), seg us ignore them and let all of us be part of the truth film. wouh (rosehips), white berries, soap berries and telling and reconciling.
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 27 Grey Owl’s Wife A new biography brings this fiercely free spirit to the fore. Sophie McCall
Gleeson’s book shows that Anahareo, from her means of support. Anahareo was not arrested, Anahareo: A Wilderness Spirit earliest life onward, was a rebel who, in her own but teacher Wilna Moore convinced Anahareo to Kristin Gleeson words, “wasn’t cut out to follow a conventional place her second daughter, Anne, in a Salvation Fireship Press life.” When she was about eleven, her beloved Army residence and, later, to allow a Euro- 284 pages, softcover grandmother became too frail to look after her. Her Canadian, Calgary-based family to adopt her. As ISBN 9781611792201 aunt, who emphasized chores, rules and school, Gleeson explains, although Moore, along with the took over her upbringing. Anahareo began skipping authorities, expressed sympathy for Anahareo in school, paying a school friend 35 cents to complete her difficult circumstances, their judgements and lthough the name of Grey Owl is still her homework and hanging out in the forests. She actions were grounded in assumptions about moral well known, the name of Anahareo, his met Grey Owl at age 19 when she was working and racial superiority. AAlgonquian/Mohawk wife who played as a waitress at a resort. She decided to forego an Gleeson’s book shows that while Anahareo’s a key role in his transformation from trapper to education in Toronto at Loretto Abbey (a convent image was continually threatened by dominant spokesperson for the wilderness, is not. Popular school that was to be paid for by a wealthy tourist images of the “squaw” and the “Indian Princess,” fascination with Grey Owl’s strange tale of inventing whom Anahareo had met at the resort) and instead as was common for many aboriginal women of her an aboriginal identity for himself, even though he to accompany Grey Owl into the bush to help with time, she never missed an opportunity to use the was born and raised in Hastings, England, has long his work as guide and trapper. Even though they media to her advantage to create a more complex overshadowed her story. Kristin Gleeson’s new had separate cabins, her unchaperoned stay with picture of herself. Following the revelation of Grey book, Anahareo: Wilderness Spirit, brings into focus Grey Owl for several weeks resulted in a 30-year rift Owl as a “fraud” and bigamist at the time of his the life and works of this complex, independent from her family in Mattawa. death in 1938, and in spite of her own struggle to woman, her bravery in confronting and overcoming In later years, Anahareo continued to forge an come to terms with this new information, Anahareo the social stigmas of her time, and the role she independent life for herself, most notably through did what she could to set the record straight. In played in advocating for conservation and animal her pursuit of prospecting for gold. Prospecting 1940 she published a memoir, My Life with Grey rights in Canada. was an unusual though not unheard of occupation Owl. Possibly because she had been instructed by Using detailed archival and genealogical for a woman at the time. Gleeson provides some Grey Owl’s publisher to make no mention of the research as well as interviews with some of fascinating accounts of Anahareo’s adventures on controversy over Grey Owl’s origins, she grew to Anahareo’s relatives, Gleeson brings forward new the prospecting trail, far from Grey Owl, her home intensely dislike it and took to ripping out the first information on Anahareo’s family background. and her young daughter, Shirley Dawn, who lived chapter from library copies across the country. Her mother, Mary, was an Algonquin woman from with a Euro-Canadian family while Anahareo was Thirty years later, with the help of her daughter the Pikwàkanagàn First Nation on Golden Lake away, sometimes for months. Shirley Dawn, Anahareo meticulously rewrote in Ontario, and her father, Matthew, whose father Gleeson shows that Anahareo was influential in the book, taking ownership over the voice and was Mohawk and mother Algonquin, had family Grey Owl’s decision to abandon his profession as perspective, and publishing the bestseller, Devil in roots reaching back to Mohawk territory in and a trapper and become a defender of the rights of Deerskins: My Life with Grey Owl, in 1972. In 1975 around Oka, Quebec. Anahareo was born Gertrude small, fur-bearing animals. It was Anahareo who a play, Life and Times of Grey Owl, which drew on Bernard in 1906 in Mattawa, Ontario. When she convinced Grey Owl to keep two orphaned beaver material from her book, was staged in Toronto, was four years old her mother died, and Anahareo kits whose mother was drowned by his trap. These representing her as sexually promiscuous. During was raised by her grandmother on her father’s were the first pair of beavers whose hilarious antics the dress rehearsal to which she had been invited, side, Catherine Papineau Bernard, an Algonquin would become the mainstay of his performances she jumped onto stage and closed the legs of the woman. Catherine, who was born in 1833 in Oka, and writings. However, as much as the couple actress, who was wearing a short skirt (Anahareo was raised in a convent where she spoke French shared a love of travel, animals and living in the rarely, if ever, wore a skirt, preferring her breeches exclusively. She married a Mohawk man, John wilderness, their relationship was frequently and prospector’s lace-up boots). Bernard Nelson, whose parents disapproved of the stormy. In the early days, their drinking parties Anahareo’s lasting legacy, along with her marriage, causing the couple to leave the commun- led on occasion to Grey Owl playing deadly games wonderful books, is the work she did on behalf of ity. Gleeson’s book demonstrates how Anahareo, such as shooting a cigarette out of Anahareo’s animals and wilderness preservation. Well after despite growing up far from her ancestral territor- mouth, or one or the other throwing knives. Later Grey Owl’s death, she continued to advocate for ies, maintained her connection to her Algonquin on, when he began writing full time, days and the causes she believed in by writing letters, giving and Mohawk roots, particularly through her grand- nights would pass in silence, punctuated by his lectures, speaking to the media and showing films. mother’s teachings about plants, medicine, family frequent outbursts of irritability; meanwhile she In 1979, she was honoured with the prestigious history, sewing, beading, tanning and other crafts. became increasingly lonely, bored and longing for Order of Nature by the International League for Anahareo’s flair for making clothes is evident in adventure. Animal Rights, and in 1983 she was inducted into photographs of her and Grey Owl in their fashion- There is no doubt that Anahareo was someone the Order of Canada. She died two years later, just ably cut and intricately decorated jackets, mocca- who defied the social norms of her time; and yet, after her 80th birthday. sins and her signature riding pants. following the end of her marriage in 1936, she Gleeson’s accessible, thoughtful biography, with became more vulnerable to the social controls that numerous photographs of the timelessly stylish Sophie McCall is a professor in the English particularly affected aboriginal women. When she Anahareo, will appeal not only to readers interested Department at Simon Fraser University. She is left Grey Owl, she was pregnant. At that time, as in aboriginal women’s and Canadian history, but working on a new edition of Anahareo’s Devil in a result of government legislation and pressures also to those attracted to the lives of independent, Deerskins, to be published by the University of from the church, police were authorized to arrest free-spirited people who make their own history. Manitoba Press. aboriginal single mothers who had no visible
28 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada From Confederacy to Confederation The American Civil War and the making of Canada. Christopher Pennington
establishes from the outset what was Blood and Daring: How Canada at stake in the Civil War for millions of Fought the American Civil War people, all while explicitly recognizing and Forged a Nation the moral righteousness of the Union’s John Boyko cause. He writes at length about the Knopf cruelty and inhumanity of slavery in 368 pages, hardcover the South, and it will be appalling ISBN 9780307361448 reading for those who have never really explored the subject. The sheer savagery of the physical abuse of eaders with a fondness slaves, their constant fear of sudden, for well-crafted narrative permanent separation from their Rhistory will be sure to enjoy loved ones, and the mental anguish Blood and Daring: How Canada of facing a life of constant pain and Fought the American Civil War and hopelessness is all made starkly Forged a Nation, the fourth book evident, as is the absurdity of the by Toronto historian John Boyko. Southern legal system, which branded The story unfolds in the midst of an Anderson a thief following his escape extraordinary historical event, the because he had, the law said, stolen American Civil War, and is filled with all manner touched on the impact of the Civil War upon the himself. It is galling and upsetting, but makes for an of fascinating individuals from both sides of the British North American colonies, while another emotionally engaging start to the book. Canadian-American border. Boyko is a very capable book, Ridgeway: The American Fenian Invasion From this poignant beginning Boyko pans storyteller, not only when discussing diplomacy and the 1866 Battle That Made Canada by Peter out to a broader view of North America in the and grand strategy, but also in the way he manages Vronsky, centres on the largest of the Fenian Raids. 1850s and early 1860s, deftly providing the reader to pull the reader down to the ground level and More such books may well be in the works, given with a summary of the outbreak of the Civil War. show the war from the perspective of six historical that the 150th anniversary of Confederation is He focuses too on the rising diplomatic tension figures, or “guides,” as he describes them, whose approaching fast. If a renewed debate about the between the United States and Great Britain at exploits collectively make up the backbone of Blood origins of Canada emerges as a result, then Boyko the time, which stemmed largely from the latter’s and Daring. has made a valuable early contribution to it. position of neutrality (which implicitly, albeit As he did in his third book, on Canadian prime Never on such a broad scale has anyone pulled not officially, recognized that the Confederacy minister R.B. Bennett, Boyko has a tendency to together a narrative history of how the Civil War was a functioning state). The writing here is quite overreach when striving for dramatic effect. He affected the British North American colonies and evocative, and some of the images Boyko crafts— occasionally neglects to devote sufficient attention their inhabitants. Boyko has made it gripping by for example, that of President Abraham Lincoln to important figures and events, and some scholars focusing not only on politicians such as George standing on the roof of the undefended White will lament the absence of primary sources from the Brown and John A. Macdonald—marvellous House, nervously watching Confederate armies United States or Quebec. But Boyko is a brave man subjects in their own right, to be sure—but also massing across the Potomac River—linger well after for even attempting to write about such an epic on lesser-known figures such as John Anderson, the page has been turned. The guide for this chapter subject in 300-odd pages, and on the whole he has a Missouri slave who escaped to Canada and is William H. Seward, Lincoln’s secretary of state, succeeded admirably at telling a truly momentous then desperately fought extradition for a murder whom Boyko rather hyperbolically denounces as and captivating story. committed while fleeing his owner, and Emma “viperous,” “rapaciously ambitious” and “one of First, it must be said that Boyko could hardly Edmonds, an expatriate New Brunswicker who the most dangerous men in the world.” Seward did have settled upon a topic of more inherent interest, disguised herself as a man and served as a nurse want to annex British North America, as did many at least from the perspective of those who enjoy and secret agent for the Union. Each of the six northern American politicians in the 19th century. Canadian history. This one is a real gem, and chapters has one of these guides, and the focus on But he was also a responsible statesman, as one that is only recently starting to recapture each individual succeeds in making the narrative Boyko acknowledges in his discussion of Seward’s the attention of historians. Much of the existing more personal and visceral than a strict diplomatic handling of the 1861 Trent crisis and his loyalty scholarship on the immediate pre-Confederation or military history would. to Lincoln, who would not have countenanced era has gone stale with age, but it should be noted Boyko’s decision to build his first chapter on the military action against Great Britain or its colonies. that two important biographies, Richard Gwyn’s story of Anderson is brilliant. The reader may not know what to make of this guide John A: The Man Who Made Us and David A. The brief introduction acknowledges that there as a result, but on the whole the chapter effectively Wilson’s Thomas D’Arcy McGee, have recently are many points of view about the causes of the Civil explains, in sharp and fast-moving prose, what was War, but, in the end, Boyko observes, “one always happening in the United States and how the British Christopher Pennington is a manuscript editor at returns to slavery.” It was the great evil of American government positioned itself in response. the Dictionary of Canadian Biography and is the society, an unrelieved horror for generations of The third chapter, which focuses on the author of The Destiny of Canada: Macdonald, suffering and desperate people. By concentrating involvement of British North Americans in Laurier and the Election of 1891 (Penguin, 2011). his attention on the story of a single slave, Boyko the Union and Confederate armies, opens with
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 29 a wonderfully memorable passage about the intrigue occurring north of the border, is the guide majority” support to pass, when this was actually unvarnished realities of warfare. “An army on in this chapter, and a well-chosen guide he is. only an informal convention tried by the Reform- the move is a magnificent and horrible beast,” For all Boyko’s attempts to create dramatic rouge administration from 1862 to 1864. Boyko’s Boyko writes; “it eats and drinks and defecates tension, however, he cannot hide the fact that most use of Brown and Macdonald as guides implicitly and fornicates … the beast is both hunter and of the Confederate efforts to disrupt the Union war and unjustly demotes George-Étienne Cartier to hunted, existing to kill while offering itself up to effort from Canada fizzled, even the infamous St. secondary status, although he controlled more votes be slain.” The guide for this chapter is an inspired Alban’s Raid of 1864, which created major problems than Macdonald in the 1860s and was instrumental choice: Sarah Emma Edmonds, a young woman for British diplomats because southerners had in bringing the wary province of Quebec into from New Brunswick who ran away from a cruel launched their abortive assault from Canadian soil Confederation, thus making him at least an equal father, found work in the United States and felt and found refuge there afterward. Here, for the only partner at the head of the three-man Great Coalition. compelled to sign up for duty in the Union army time, Boyko’s narrative lags a bit as it moves from one D’Arcy McGee receives a thorough treatment, at the outbreak of war as a male nurse named unsuccessful confederate plot to the next. As always, but none of the Maritime politicians get much Franklin Thompson. She witnessed firsthand the however, he still manages to paint the big picture attention, and Charles Tupper and Leonard Tilley unimaginable horrors of Civil War battlefields, with success, and as the war moves toward its are almost incidental figures. In fairness, it must be risking her life and tending to mangled men, all conclusion he shifts his focus to Confederation. He acknowledged that Boyko did not set out to write while concealing her gender, even from a fellow overstates things slightly with the concluding remark a blow-by-blow history of Confederation: he has New Brunswicker for whom she had feelings that that because of the threat of American annexation, instead explored the impact of the Civil War and the she could not express without revealing her true “Canada and the Maritimes had to reinvent looming threat of the United States, on British North self. When he was killed, she mourned alone. themselves to save themselves,” but he has generally Americans during this period. But some readers She then became a spy for the Union, employing set the stage effectively for the book’s last act. may find that after bringing them up to the critical numerous clever disguises—including that of a The fifth and sixth chapters focus on moment, Blood and Daring spends too little time on woman—to conduct operations behind enemy Confederation, although the end of the Civil War, the creation of the Dominion of Canada itself. lines. Her story is incredible, and one little known Lincoln’s assassination and the 1866 Fenian raids Boyko elects to conclude the book not with a even to Canadian historians (she does not, for into British North America feature prominently as sweeping interpretation of the meaning of it all, example, have an entry in the generally exhaustive well. The two guides are George Brown and John A. but with a summary of Anglo-Canadian-American Dictionary of Canadian Biography). Boyko returns Macdonald, both of whom are discussed at length relations after Confederation and a look at the lives to her often in his narrative about Canadians and earlier in the book and are therefore well known to of each of his guides after the Civil War. He does Maritimers who became participants in the war, the reader by the time they appear here. It is good offer this colourful description of Canada as it was while describing the reasons why they did so to see Brown getting due credit for kick-starting when the conflict had ended: (overwhelmingly on the Union side) and noting the process of Confederation, as most popular and many nefarious ways in which ordinary people scholarly material relating to the subject in recent Canada emerged from the war unified in its were wooed into enlisting. Along the way Boyko years has tended to exalt Macdonald at the expense un-American political and social values, led navigates the reader through the Civil War as far as of everyone else (an exception is the 2011 CBC- by a determined and visionary leader, secure the Battle of Gettysburg, the infamous high-water produced movie John A: Birth of a Nation, in which in its heritage and bristling with the power of mark of the Confederacy. the title character is a bit of a jerk, but Brown comes its potential. A full description of the battle itself, and in par- off as a selfless visionary). Boyko offers a glowing ticular Pickett’s Charge, opens the fourth chapter assessment of both men that is mostly deserved but This goes a bit too far, perhaps, given that ethnic in vivid fashion. Boyko devotes it to documenting occasionally over the top, as when he speculates that and religious lines, as well as differing attitudes the attempts of Confederates, sensing that the Macdonald actually timed his legendary drinking toward the United States, would continue to bitterly tide was turning against them, to utilize British binges for his own political benefit. The trouble divide Canadians in the late 19th century. But that is North America as a safe haven and base for attacks here is not what Boyko has covered, but what he a story for another book. In its general contours, and against Northern states. Canadian readers may be has left out. For readers without a background in its conclusions about how British North America shocked by the extent to which some British North in the subject, he has not delved into the murky experienced and was changed by the Civil War, John Americans, especially in cities such as Montreal depths of mid 19th-century Canadian politics far Boyko’s Blood and Daring is both skilfully presented and Saint John, welcomed the southerners openly enough to make everything easily understandable. and historically sound. It is above all a compelling and even supported their efforts. A North Carolin- Occasionally—only occasionally—he has muddied piece of narrative history, one that ought to appeal ian named Jacob Thompson, whom the Confed- the waters with small errors, for example when greatly to Canadian and American readers with erate government assigned to take charge of the he states that legislation had to have “double even a passing interest in the subject.
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30 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada A Neglected Royal The Edward of Prince Edward Island finally gets his due. Michael Taube
unknown to the Hanoverians.” These skills would and become the first Royal to set foot on U.S. soil Prince Edward, Duke of Kent: serve him well in his royal duties. in 1794. Father of the Canadian Crown Edward also had weaknesses, including Edward’s central contribution to Canada Nathan Tidridge dalliances with the fairer sex. King George, occurred during his six-year posting in Halifax. Tid- Dundurn Press who grew weary of his son’s exploits, sent him ridge writes that if he “became the commander-in- 288 pages, softcover to Gibraltar in February 1790—where he was chief of the Nova Scotia and New Brunswick forces, ISBN 9781459707894 accompanied by Julie de St. Laurent. Edward had Prince Edward would have considerable influence originally “dispatched his valet to Europe to locate a in the military development of the Maritimes.” After female companion who could relieve his loneliness he spent a successful stint in the West Indies, Hali- istory has a tendency to surprise on the Rock,” and she became his mistress. While fax became the perfect vehicle to help increase his even the most astute observers and Tidridge acknowledges “there certainly was a stature. King George consented, thereby allowing Hexperts. Ludwig van Beethoven might physical dimension to this mission,” he was “more Edward and Julie to live at The Lodge, a beautiful have been working on a tenth symphony, based concerned with finding a companion than simply estate owned by Nova Scotia’s lieutenant governor, on the controversial weaving of sketches by a lover.” Julie would “prove to be a stabilizing John Wentworth. musicologist Barry Cooper. Two University of force in Edward’s life” throughout his Canadian Fearing a French invasion over “reports Mississippi Medical Center colleagues, Ranjan travels. They would part when the “family dynasty that New England timber was being harvested Batra and Ken Sullivan, discovered their state had [was] at stake” and the royal dukes were obliged to build French warships,” Edward told royal never officially notified the United States archivist “to produce legal offspring,” but Julie “would be engineer Captain James Straton “to draw up plans that it had ratified the 13th amendment to abolish financially supported by the Duke until his death.” to transform the settlement into British North slavery. (This historical oversight was corrected in The prince only served in Gibraltar six months America’s premier military complex.” This included February 2013.) Meanwhile, Nova Scotia’s 155-year- due to health problems in the hot Mediterranean renovating Fort George, constructing the Prince of old coat of arms was only recognized as a provincial weather. This situation provided the perfect entrée Wales tower and welcoming 550 Maroons into the flag in May 2013 due to some solid detective work to Edward’s arrival on Canadian soil. Contrary to port city. Many Maritimers were appreciative of his by eleven-year-old Regan Parker on a school popular belief, he “was not sent to Canada against efforts. In particular, Charlottetown’s legislature project. his will, but actually requested his posting to voted to change its name to Prince Edward Island These examples demonstrate that our historical Quebec.” According to a December 1790 letter to his on November 29, 1798. This honour remains “the knowledge occasionally needs some fine tuning. father, Edward wrote: greatest monument to Edward’s presence on the Which brings us to Nathan Tidridge’s impressive continent.” new book, Prince Edward, Duke of Kent: Father of I petition that if it does not interfere with Edward returned to his beloved England in the Canadian Crown. The author identifies Edward your commands for other Regiments in 1800. He disliked the harsh Canadian weather and as “one of the most honoured among our forgotten your service, you will allow me to be sent in had constant health issues. Regardless, Canada historical figures” in Canada’s formative years. the Spring with mine to any part of North maintained a special place in his heart. He worked Of interest, Tidridge includes himself in a “list America which you may chuse [sic] to hard to ensure Charles-Michel de Salaberry was of authors who have not given the Duke of Kent, appoint; allowing me, if it means with your recognized as “the hero who saved Lower Canada.” or his companion of twenty-seven years, Julie de approbation, to prefer Canada. He exchanged correspondence with his Loyalist St. Laurent, the attention they deserve.” In doing friend Jonathan Sewell, who wanted a united British so, the missing component in a vital chapter of In Tidridge’s view, the “idea that a prominent North America “centred on a powerful Crown with Canada’s genesis, growth and development has member of the Royal family would have lived in provincial officers appointed by the governor finally been unearthed for all to see. Canada—in Quebec no less—at a crucial point general and largely independent of the local Edward was born on November 2, 1767. He in its formative history, and participating directly in assemblies.” For his part, Edward preferred a two- was the fifth child of King George III and Queen that formation, is a notion that most Canadians province model, “one encompassing the Canadas Charlotte. More to the point, Edward was the are surprised to learn.” Which makes the fact that and the other the Maritimes,” to unify the country fourth son of a monarch who ruled for more than Edward held a status equivalent to an asterisk from sea to sea to sea. 50 years (a few of them in a state of madness). in Canadian history for centuries all the more The Canadian Confederation ultimately created Although never destined to sit on the throne, he puzzling. four provinces. Edward’s daughter, Victoria—who was an impressive member of the Royal Family. Prince Edward, Duke of Kent therefore sets started fifth in the line of succession, but moved up Tidridge notes that “Edward, with the exception out to adjust the muddled historical record of the rapidly due to a sudden rash of deaths in the House of the Prince of Wales, was considered the most forgotten Royal. Tidridge’s clear, concise writing of Hanover—ruled during this time. It is therefore of intelligent of the brothers.” He was a “self-professed style and stellar research skills reveal an individual great significance that Lord Durham’s Report on the liberal” who could “carry conversations on a variety who was actively engaged in Confederation rather Affairs of British North America directly mentions of topics if given the chance.” As well, “unlike his than a silent participant. Edward “employed the Edward. Moreover, the fact that his name “was brothers, Edward also knew when to keep his Crown as a great unifier.” Two royal historians being evoked to his daughter in an appeal to unite mouth shut and had a capacity for quietness largely pointed out he was the first individual to use “the the colonies of British North America … places term ‘Canadian’ to refer to both the French and the Duke of Kent at the very heart of Canada’s English inhabitants of the country.” He travelled constitutional development as a unified state.” Michael Taube is a columnist for The Washington through Upper Canada and Lower Canada, dealing Canada’s first prime minister, Sir John A. Times and a former speechwriter for Prime with prominent figures such as John Graves Simcoe Macdonald, famously called Victoria the “Queen of Minister Stephen Harper. He holds a master’s degree and Lord Dorchester. He met with First Nations Canada.” It therefore makes sense that her father, in comparative politics from the London School tribes, earning the honorary title “Chief-Above- Edward, should also be acknowledged as the father of Economics. All-Other-Chiefs.” He would later leave Quebec of the Canadian Crown.
July/August 2013 reviewcanada.ca 31 Letters and Responses
Re: “Eating and Surviving,” by Jennifer has an ever rising price (the rich-poor concern), Ferrygate. Surrey Six. Saltchuk. Insite. The Interior. Clapp (May 2013) and production and sale are increasingly global, The Coq. The VAG. The Cultch. The Drive. ennifer Clapp’s review of Sarah Elton’s not local. There are patents and subsidies at play, We need guidebooks if we want to live here and JConsumed: Sustainable Food for a Finite Planet and the North-South disparity is ever present understand our history and challenges, the kind of addresses the crucial concern of feeding an ever- (dramatically expressed by the recent land grabs). books that lay this place open the way the stump growing humanity (“expected to reach 9 billion In other words we’re addressing the issues of a cedar tree lets us see and count and measure by 2050”). It considers many of the vital concerns of business and price on a world scale. How can the accretive rings of history. influencing this issue—climate change, pollution, the regulations of national governments regulate So I was delighted that the June issue of the environmental concerns, the Green Revolution, global actors? I found Clapp’s review too kind to LRC contained reviews of several books about fair trade, organic production and energy Elton’s book; the glass is half empty. different aspects of British Columbia. efficiency. The heart of Clapp’s review relates to Barry Riddell Geoff Meggs and Rod Mickleburgh’sThe Art of the two foci of Elton’s work: the human scale of Kingston, Ontario the Impossible: Dave Barrett and the NDP in Power, production and the industrial food mechanism. 1972–1975 revisits the politics of this province This reader was enthralled! The essay continues a Re: “B.C. Notebook” (June 2013) during three years of change so rapidly spun that lengthy tradition of research and theory, beginning ritish Columbia is a quirky slice of geography. the pace overtook good intentions and unravelled with the horseman of the Book of Revelations, BThis is a province that resists quick assessment that era’s NDP government. Without this book, we through Thomas Malthus, Amartya Sen, the United or summary, requiring informed explication to risk forgetting why B.C. NDP leader Adrian Dix’s Nations, and many others. both outsiders and insiders. People seem to be recent campaign slogan was the anything-but- However, there was a fundamental concern happier here, or madder, more intense, or more incendiary “Change for the Better: One Practical aroused by what was missing. It was as if Clapp’s laid back. Fortunes may still be made here from Step at a Time.” review was from a “glass half full” perspective— modest starts, but political careers seem to end Jan Drabek’s Vladimir Krajina: World War II that with several interventions (especially by more often in tears here than appears to be the Hero and Ecology Pioneer reminds us that many government), the food supply situation with great case in other provinces. of the people who have come to B.C. from the difficulty will eventually be solved. But the main B.C. even has its own vocabulary, terms that greater world have had fascinating histories and actors in the food supply (other than by self- those in the know brandish with aplomb. SPI. experiences. University of British Columbia botany production) are agribusiness conglomerates. Food TFL. DTE. ALR. Kits. Poco. Gateway. Islands Trust. professor (and war hero) Krajina understood better than many who were born here that we have been entrusted with an extraordinary natural setting, one that none of us can afford to take for granted. Thinking Forward Human Happiness, by Brian Fawcett, parses a family, ordinary only to the extent that any family Recent pieces from The 40th Anniversary is ordinary, striving for and in part achieving Max Bell Essays and Lectures: enduring happiness in B.C.’s central interior. Journeywoman: Swinging a Hammer in a Man’s World describes author Kate Braid’s experiences as one among a tiny minority of B.C.’s women carpenters. Her book reminds us of the singular virtue that might most characterize the people who live here—tenacity—and of the strange fact that sometimes challenging and demanding environments are where one most becomes oneself. Anne Giardini May 2013 June 2013 Vancouver, British Columbia Demand Better Smarter School Reform Re: “What’s Happened to CanLit?” by Why the usual debates over energy supply, The (rare) innovations that can help Canada’s Michael LaPointe (May 2013) from wind to oil sands, distract Canadians K-12 students do better. from our greenest opportunities. t is an unnerving reflection on Michael Ben Levin ILaPointe’s most interesting essay on the dif- Professor, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education Michael Cleland ficulties of teaching Canadian literature in schools Principal, Cleland Dunsmuir Consulting that if Canadian novels were omitted entirely from such teaching (classical foreign novels could be used instead: Hemingway et al.) and the Canadian To read these essays, and for more information on this series, visit curriculum limited to poems and short stories, the http://reviewcanada.ca/mbforty difficulties he outlines would vanish entirely. Royce MacGillivray Presented by: Romford, England
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32 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada GRIPPING SUMMER READS that you'll never forget
WINNER 2013 ABORIGINAL HISTORY BOOK PRIZE THE CANADIAN RANGERS WINNER 2013 CLIO PRIZE – BC A Living History CANADIAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION P. Whitney Lackenbauer For more than six decades, this dedicated STANDING UP WITH GA’AXSTA’LAS group of citizen-soldiers has quietly served Jane Constance Cook and the Politics of as Canada’s eyes, ears, and voice in isolated Memory, Church, and Custom coastal and northern communities. Drawing Leslie A. Robertson and the Kwagu’ł Gixsam on official records, interviews, and partici- Clan pation in Ranger exercises, Lackenbauer Robertson and Cook’s descendants draw on reveals why the Rangers have evolved into a oral histories and textual records to create a flexible, inexpensive, and culturally inclusive nuanced portrait of a high-ranked woman, way to promote sovereignty and security. a cultural mediator, devout Christian, and $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2453-8 | paperback Aboriginal rights activist. FORTHCOMING AUGUST 2013 $39.95 | 978-0-7748-2385-2 | paperback
WHERE HAPPINESS DWELLS WINNER 2013 CLIO PRIZE – PRAIRIES A History of the Dane-zaa First Nations CANADIAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION Robin Ridington and Jillian Ridington in collaboration with elders of the Dane-zaa First HUNGER, HORSES, AND Nations GOVERNMENT MEN At the request of the Doig River First Nations, Criminal Law on the Aboriginal Plains, 1870-1905 anthropologists Robin and Jillian Ridington Shelley A.M. Gavigan present a history of the Dane-zaa people This illuminating book paints a vivid portrait based on oral histories collected over a half of Aboriginal defendants, witnesses, and century of fieldwork. These powerful stories informants whose encounters with the not only preserve traditional knowledge for criminal law and the Indian Act included future generations, they also tell the inspiring both the mediation and the enforcement story of how the Dane-zaa have come to of relations of inequality. succeed and flourish in the modern world. $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2253-4 | paperback $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2296-1 | paperback
LIVING INDIGENOUS LEADERSHIP PARTIES, ELECTIONS, AND THE Native Narratives on Building Strong FUTURE OF CANADIAN POLITICS Communities Edited by Amanda Bittner and Royce Koop Edited by Carolyn Kenny and Tina Ngaroimata This volume provides the first account Fraser of the political upheavals of the past two This collection showcases innovative research decades and speculates on the future and leadership practices from diverse nations of the country’s national party system. and tribes in Canada, the United States, and It documents how parties and voters New Zealand. The contributors use story- responded to new challenges in the most telling to highlight the distinctive nature of tumultuous period in Canadian political Indigenous leadership, which finds its most history, and how the Conservative Party's powerful expression in embodied concepts 2011 election victory represents a new such as land, story, ancestors, and elders. political era. $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2347-0 | paperback $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2409-5 | paperback
ACTION AND REACTION IN THE THE STRUGGLE FOR CANADIAN WORLD SYSTEM COPYRIGHT The Dynamics of Economic and Political Power Imperialism to Internationalism, 1842-1971 Thierry de Montbrial Sara Bannerman A major contribution to international Set against the backdrop of Canada’s relations theory and winner of the 2002 development from a British colony into a Georges Pompidou Prize, this first English middle power, this book reveals the deep edition offers the necessary keys to decrypt roots of conflict in the international copyright the international system in the 21st century system and argues that Canada’s signing by providing a multidisciplinary framework of the Berne Convention for the Protection of to understand the complexities of the post- Literary and Artistic Works can be viewed in the Soviet international system, a system that is context of a former British colony’s efforts to multipolar, ideologically heterogeneous, and find a place on the world stage. highly unstable. $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2405-7 | paperback $34.95 | 978-0-7748-2473-6 | paperback
Available from fine bookstores near you Order online at www.ubcpress.ca Order by phone 1.800.565.9523 (UTP Distribution) Follow us on Twitter @UBCPress www.ubcpress.ca SUMMERLeacoc FESTIVALk JULY 23-28, 2013 AUTHORS ◦ BOOKS ◦ READERS OPENING NIGHT - JULY 23 Host Mark Kingwell, Jowita Bydlowska and Steven Heighton CARTOON CULTURE - JULY 24 Isaac Bickerstaff (aka Don Evans) and Mike Eddenden POETRY - JULY 25 Marty Gervais, Ian Williams and Jan Zwicky HUMOUR SHOWCASE - JULY 26 Host Terry Fallis, Lorne Elliot Andrew Kaufman and Jan Zwicky ME, MYSELF & I - JULY 27 Roger Bell, Sherry Lawson and Charlie Wilkins FANTASY EVENING - JULY 27 Julie Czerneda, Ed Greenwood and Lesley Livingston PADDLE-IN SUNDAY - JULY 28 Charlie Wilkins, Little Ship of Fools RODNEY FROST: HIMSELF An Exhibition of Automata, Kinetic Art, Whirligigs and Whatchamacallits
THE Leacock aSSOCIATES
PARKS, RECREATION & CULTURE MARIPOSA BAND (detail): ARTHUR G. RACEY - 1912 G. RACEY ARTHUR BAND (detail): MARIPOSA
Leacock Museum National Historic Site, Orillia, Ontario, Canada
Tickets & Info: 705.329.1908 ◦ leacockmuseum.com
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