Dancing with the Dragon As China Surges to New Heights, Can Canada Keep Step?
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Juggling with genes PAGE 6 $6.50 Vol. 21, No. 3 April 2013 Paul Evans Dancing with the Dragon As China surges to new heights, can Canada keep step? ALSO IN THIS ISSUE Kate Taylor Identity crisis at the museum Wesley Wark Treason for cheap John Burns, Ikechi Mgbeoji and more Writing aboriginal peoples back into Canada PLUS: non-fiction Michael Valpy on the spectre of grassroots racism + Ramsay Cook on Maclean’s and the imperial dream + Terry Fenge on Arctic sovereignty and the Nunavut agreement + Robin Fisher on Canadian anthropology’s New Zealand godfather + Douglas Wright on a post- WWI mathematical peacemaker + Florin Diacu on measuring the heavens fiction Merilyn Simonds reviews Blood Secrets by Nadine McInnis + David Penhale reviews Publications Mail Agreement #40032362 Husk by Corey Redekop Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to LRC, Circulation Dept. poetry Caitlin Elizabeth Thomson + Robin Richardson + Alice Major + Denise Desautels + PO Box 8, Station K Toronto, ON M4P 2G1 Leslie Timmins + Anne Swannell + Seymour Mayne + Dave Margoshes + Allan Peterkin Literary Review of Canada 170 Bloor St West, Suite 710 Toronto ON M5S 1T9 email: [email protected] reviewcanada.ca T: 416-531-1483 • F: 416-531-1612 Charitable number: 848431490RR0001 Vol. 21, No. 3 • April 2013 To donate, visit reviewcanada.ca/support EDITOR Bronwyn Drainie 3 Dancing with the 14 Early Illiteracy 20 Beverley Baxter in [email protected] Dragon A poem Empireland CONTRIBUTING EDITORS An essay Robin Richardson A review of Canada and the Mark Lovewell, Molly Peacock, Anthony Westell Paul Evans 14 What I have become End of the Imperial Dream: Beverley Baxter’s Reports ASSOCIATE EDITOR 6 Genes That Never through grief Robin Roger from London through War A poem Fade and Peace, 1936–1960, by POETRY EDITOR Alice Major Moira MacDougall A review of The Juggler’s Neville Thompson COPY EDITOR Children: A Journey into Ramsay Cook 14 Madeline Koch Family, Legend and the Genes A poem 22 The Nobel of ONLINE EDITORS that Bind Us, by Carolyn Denise Desautels, trans- Abraham Numbers Diana Kuprel, Jack Mitchell, lated by Norman Cornett Donald Rickerd, C.M. Susan Crean A review of Turbulent Times PROOFREADERS 15 Triolet for in Mathematics: The Life of 7 Home Invasion Rebecca Borkowsky, Beth MacKinnon, Afghanistan J.C. Fields and the History A review of The Inconvenient Amanda Miller, Heather Schultz, Robert A poem of the Fields Medal, by Simone, Rob Tilley Indian: A Curious Account Leslie Timmins Elaine McKinnon Riehm and of Native People in North RESEARCH Frances Hoffman Rob Tilley America, by Thomas King 15 April Surprise Douglas Wright EDITORIAL ASSISTANTS John Burns A poem Luca Da Franco, Prerana Das Anne Swannell 24 Magic Spheres 9 Pioneering DESIGN A review of Heavenly 15 Gravity James Harbeck Anthropology Mathematics: The A review of In Twilight and A poem ADVERTISING/SALES Forgotten Art of Spherical Michael Wile in Dawn: A Biography of Seymour Mayne Trigonometry, by Glen Van [email protected] Diamond Jenness, by Barnett 15 Multimedia Brummelen DIRECTOR, SPECIAL PROJECTS Richling A poem Florin Diacu Michael Booth Robin Fisher Dave Margoshes 25 Ideas under Glass PUBLISHERS 10 Northwest Passage Alastair Cheng 15 Ditty An essay [email protected] Hold ’Em A poem Kate Taylor Helen Walsh An essay [email protected] Allan Peterkin 28 Does Good Policy Terry Fenge BOARD OF DIRECTORS 16 When People Seem Make Good 12 Tobacco Blowback John Honderich, C.M., Most Alive Neighbours? 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ISSN 1188-7494 The Literary Review of Canada is indexed in the Canadian Literary Periodicals Index and the Canadian Index and is distributed by Disticor and Magazines Canada. April 2013 reviewcanada.ca 1 ESSAY Dancing with the Dragon As China surges to new heights, can Canada keep step? Paul Evans n the spring of 2008 an academic colleague biggest owner of U.S. treasuries. China remains the the late 1940s, the immigrants to Canada from bemoaned to me the absence of materials on largest destination for foreign direct investment greater China starting in the 1980s, the huge stu- ICanada-China relations that she could use in and is moving into the top ranks of outward invest- dent flow to Canada (some 68,000 are now regis- her teaching. There were a handful of books on the ors. One of its state-owned companies recently pur- tered in Canadian post-secondary institutions) and history of the relationship, occasional academic chased Calgary-based Nexen for $15.1 billion, the the occasional reverse flow of Canadian citizens to essays and think tank reports (mainly by the Asia biggest single investment ever made by a Chinese China and its periphery with our young people in Pacific Foundation of Canada), and a steady flow of firm. China was one of the last into and first out small but increasing numbers studying in China or, media and other punditry, but dry the desert was. of the financial crash of 2008, now accounting for in larger numbers, teaching English in China and What a change in five years. Academic books, about 40 percent of world growth. around East Asia. There is a pantheon of Canadian mainly in the form of edited collections, are flow- In diplomatic terms, China has emerged as a heroes in the relationship—Bethune and Dashan ing: we have memoirs by Canadians, including serious player in virtually every major international (aka Mark Rowswell, the television personality who Paul Lin and Brian Evans, on has become Canada�s cultural the front line of Sino-Canadian What should be our strategic response ambassador to China) among relations; virtually every major them—with significant fan clubs think tank across the country (the to global China? Should China be among sinophiles in Canada and Canadian International Council, far larger ones in China. the Canada West Foundation, the approached as a friend, strategic partner, Commercially, the eternal Conference Board of Canada, the lure of the Chinese market for Fraser Institute, to name just a ally, competitor, adversary or enemy? Canadian commodities and prod- few) has published one or more ucts has now morphed into some- reports focused on China�������������������������s rise and its implica- institution, sometimes a leader. It is difficult to think thing bigger and more complex: integration with tions for Canada with a heavy concentration on of a global issue ranging from global warming and China into global supply chains, China as a major economics and trade. Opinion pieces about China communicable diseases to trans-boundary water source of investment, tourists, labour, and techno- and Canada-China relations are ubiquitous, with management, cyber security and non- proliferation logical innovation and exchange. economics, democracy and human rights as their where the road to a solution does not now run Diplomatically, China has rarely been a top principal concerns. Even Norman Bethune has through Beijing. priority, except during occasional moments of made a comeback, compliments of a biography by The outpouring of words about global China Canadian engagement in Asian wars, as a recur- a former governor general.