SPRING 2009 Issue.Pmd
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I have always enjoyed picking up a copy of BC BookWorld and reading the latest review— until your most recent issue. Finding my mother in large relief on page 10 was the first shock. She was always a very private person. The fur- ther shock was the nasty tone of what should have been a review of Converse’s book but instead was a severely critical review of my grandmother’s character. You should have done your home- work. There were only five children in the fam- ily. Little House was torn down and a new house built. Janet is Capi’s daughter-in-law, not daugh- ter. Edith Iglauer wrote the article about Capi for Raincoast long after Capi died in ‘61. She died before her book was even published in B.C. Edith certainly never interviewed her. It is un- fortunate that Cathy didn’t mine some of Edith’s understanding gleaned about the “mysterious” Capi from her then-still-living children. It would have offered a fuller and more humane view of an incredible woman. It is also unfortunate she didn’t seek out some of the grandchildren such as your list of “10 Books to Celebrate myself who not only have living memories of time 150 Years” in BC BookWorld. I’ve had spent with Capi but also, in my own case, 47 years quite a bit of feedback from that men- of knowing my mother Joan who never once in You have really outdone yourselves tion, and appreciate being included, all that time spoke badly of her mother, and only this time. and in such good company. with love and longing for those many summers Usually I look through BC I read the article in BC Bookworld The photo you ran in BC up the coast. BookWorld while riding the ferry and about Cascadia, Douglas Todd’s book BookWorld was of biographer Evelyn Capi was fair, honest and kind. Reclusive, yes. have appreciated how you have po- on spirituality without religion in C. White, (Alice Walker: A Life), who Stern, yes. Ornery, no. She certainly did not hold sitioned B.C. writers against the back- B.C., with interest. chose the gravesite of former black her children captive, nor was she a monster. That drop of the landscape, as almost As a Christian, I can confirm that slave Sylvia Stark on Salt Spring Is- she was not a “Waterford Crystal kind of woman” frontier-type characters. There are the reviewer is correct to say that most land as her personal sacred place. I consider a compliment. I know of no other the usual motifs of home schooling, people here are not religious. That has Evelyn spoke at a book launch event woman who dared to do what she did. I have cabins on the coast and travel, in the certainly been my experience when at the gravesite, as did Sylvia Stark’s many wonderful memories of gathering firewood profiles that you have done of vari- talking about my faith in Jesus. It great-granddaughter Naidine off the beach for our evening in front of the very ous writers and their doesn’t mean of course that non-reli- Sims, who still lives on Salt large stone fireplace. My grandmother’s book has work. But the gious people don’t have spiritual feel- Spring. Evelyn said how been in print for 47 years, and, as you mention, cover of your win- ings. But I personally find it sad that amazing it was for her to be into its eleventh printing. It has been a bestseller ter issue says it all. Christianity is so alien to people in in the home of Sylvia’s de- for years. I have met many people over those years The image of Julie BC—if people could read the Bible, scendants on the night she who have read and loved her story, who keep a Angus captures they would see that it is the story of watched Barack Obama copy on board their boats and read it again every your narrative of the how God longs to save his people and accept the nomination for summer. Why, I ask, after she has been dead for B.C. writer as adven- offer them forgiveness and eternal life president of the United the same 47 years are you, and Cathy, concerned turer, close to nature, through Jesus Christ. By the way, I States, 150 years after with what kind of wood she burned in her fire- nearly savage, sexual, really like B.C. BookWorld freed slaves made their place? I find your article truly offensive. To call and evidently because Robin Arnfield way to Salt Spring to her a “piece of work” is an insult to my grand- of the work, intellec- Osoyoos build a new life. mother’s memory and to our family. I honestly tual. Your stories capture Star Weiss can’t believe I have read this in a magazine that the allure, and “lone S Victoria prides itself on supporting literary awareness in wolf” nature of creative Having finally got myself out of the B.C. work admirably. I might orchards after hauling 50 tons of ap- Capi, through her writing, is an integral part add that with some minor adjust- ples over Apple Mountain and sur- of our BC coastal heritage and in my view her ments, you could attract young peo- viving, with the help of plenty of horse own writing, for those who care to listen, offers ple into literature... I only wish that We were pleased to see one of our liniment, I came upon your issue with its own tribute to who she really was. local architects had an equally com- poets Justin Lukyn mentioned in the the lovely and powerfully arresting Roselyn Blanchet Caiden, pelling reviewer. Who’s Who, but Justin is not a coverage of the latest winner of the BA, RAc, granddaughter to William Summers “slightly cracked anthropologist of George Ryga Award for Social Aware- Muriel Wylie “Capi” Blanchet Cowichan Valley the everyday.” While there may be ness. We are absolutely thrilled with Victoria some cracked anthropologist tenden- it. Thank you for arranging for a spe- cies to Justin’s perspective, the press cial photo session with this year’s win- I always enjoy your publication. release, where the phrase comes from, ner, Leilah Nadir, and her child. Thanks for the excellent work you actually refers to Henry Pepper, the George Ryga would have been abso- do in highlighting B.C. books and fictional titular character. lutely delighted, too. And kudos to ! "# authors. Just wanted to say it was very Stefania Alexandru, your photographer. $# % & % ' ( nice to see my book Havens in a Hec- New Star Books, Ken Smedley, coordinator, tic World: Finding Sacred Places on Vancouver Ryga Centre, Summerland '45 )& " * +,--.--/0 & 1( ($ ())/ 23.0$#.2*# 4" ( 4052 ! " # $ % " &''# )"% ' () %"# 4 BC #)& " 6#7/--# $* (!% # BOOKWORLD &$( $" ( ($ 861.7-.3,-3 ) "# 1 )& :$ 1%6 * 9 1 !"#$" %$ 2 11 &$$&#'( #! :;1#)*+, #+*)""#< 1 % < :)" 17 & =#* &" 1."/$)0 1S $ !"#$$% GEORGE WOODCOCK LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD for an outstanding literary career in British Columbia W.P. KINSELLAW.P. KINSELLA BIBLIOGRAPHY: • Dance Me Outside (Oberon, 1977) • Scars (Oberon, 1978) • Shoeless Joe Jackson Comes to Iowa (Oberon, 1980) • Born Indian (Oberon, 1981) • Shoeless Joe (1982) • The Moccasin Telegraph (Penguin, 1983) • The Thrill of the Grass (Penguin, 1984) • The Alligator Report (1985) • The Iowa Baseball Confederacy (Collins, 1986) • The Fencepost Chronicles (Collins, 1986) • Red Wolf, Red Wolf (1987) • The Further Adventures of Slugger McBatt (Collins, 1988) • The Rainbow Warehouse (Pottersfield, 1989) with Ann Knight • The Miss Hobbema Pageant (Doubleday, 1989) • Two Spirits Soar (Stoddart, 1990) • Box Socials (HarperCollins, 1991) • The Dixon Cornbelt League (HarperCollins, 1993) • Brother Frank's Gospel Hour (HarperCollins, 1994) • The Winter Helen Dropped By (1995) • If Wishes Were Horses (1996) • Diamonds Forever (HarperCollins, 1997) • The Secret of the Northern Lights (Thistledown, 1998) • Magic Time (Doubleday, 1999) • Japanese Baseball & Other Stories (2000) • Ichiro Dreams: Ichiro Suzuki and the Seattle Mariners (Kodansha, 2002) SINCE 1995, BC BOOKWORLD AND THE VANCOUVER PUBLIC LIBRARY HAVE PROUDLY SPONSORED THE WOODCOCK AWARD AND THE WRITERS WALK AT 350 WEST GEORGIA STREET IN VANCOUVER . PHOTO SAWCHUK LAURA W.P. Kinsella and Barbara Turner Kinsella of Yale, B.C. celebrated their tenth anniversary in March. FOR MORE INFO SEE WWW. ABCBOOKWORLD. COM & !"#$$% ESTATE OF RICHARD HARRINGTON/COURTESY OF STEPHEN BULGER GALLERY pair of legends-to- be crossed the bor- 1 1 $ der from Wyoming and wrote The Legend in the fall of 1934. of Pan Phillips and now Diana Phillips has emerged with Beyond the Chilcotin. AThey weren’t exactly Butch The new memoir gives short shrift to Cassidy & the Sundance Kid, Pan Phillips’ first two marriages, but picks up steam when her mother, but both were charismatic ! , is hired to cook for the men, born to be wild. Home Ranch in 1944. After she meets her new employer Pan Phillips for the had lost his sav- first time in Quesnel, they make the six- ings during the 1929 stock market crash day, 180-mile journey on horseback, and befriended P Pan Phillips (Harbour $34.95), they ing World War II when supplies and along with Betty’s newborn son, Ken (not Q , a gregarious storyteller. would have frozen to death were it not manpower were scarce. Pan’s son). Hobson, the son of an American naval for the hospitality of a neighbour who It didn’t hurt that Hobson included The pair soon became a couple. hero, could write—having attended invited them to winter under his roof. his recurring vision of a beautiful blonde Diana Phillips was born in July of 1945, Stanford University—but it was Phillips, In the spring they crossed the woman to break the solitude.