Candace Savage: Art lessons from birds PAGE 16 $6.50 Vol. 25, No. 1 January/February 2017 Sarah Jennings ALSO IN THIS ISSUE Extreme Ausma Zehanat Khan & Monia Mazigh makeover Speaking while Muslim Emily M. Keeler Will the multibillion-dollar Dinner-plate nationalism renovation of Parliament Hill Lev Bratishenko create a vital new capital, Environmentalism’s or a spectacular great blind spot members-only club? PLUS: Ronald Wright on an indigenous history of London + Patchen Barss on citizen scientists + Anita Lahey on memoir-poems + Rohinton Medhora on the future of think tanks + Graham Fraser on bilingualism + Amy Lavender Harris on sex and the city Publications Mail Agreement #40032362 Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to LRC, Circulation Dept. PO Box 8, Station K Toronto, ON M4P 2G1 New from University of Toronto Press Yakuglas’ Legacy SickKids The Art and Times of Charlie James The History of The Hospital for Sick Children by Ronald W. Hawker by David Wright Charlie James, also known by his ceremonial name Yakuglas, was a From a local hospital serving premier carver, painter, and activist underprivileged children in the Ward from the Kwakwaka’wakw First Nation to a world-leader in pediatric care, of British Columbia. This beautiful the growth of SickKids is an essential and poignant book with 123 colour part of the history of medicine in illustrations examines the life and art of Canada. Charlie James. Naamiwan’s Drum Dictionary of Cape Breton The Story of a Contested Repatriation of English Anishinaabe Artefacts by William J. Davey and by Maureen Matthews Richard MacKinnon Naamiwan’s Drum follows the Dictionary of Cape Breton English, the remarkable story of the repatriation first regional dictionary devoted to the of a water drum and other island’s linguistic and cultural history is artefacts that were given away by a a fascinating record of the island’s rich Canadian museum to an American vocabulary. Anishinaabe group that had no family or community connections to the collection. Leading the Modern Dancing Boys University High School Males in Dance York University’s Presidents on Continuity by Zihao Li and Change, 1974–2014 With the author’s reflections on edited by Lorna R. Marsden his own journey as a professional Leading the Modern University provides dancer woven throughout, Dancing a rare viewpoint of how five successive Boys examines the largely unknown university presidents individually challenges of adolescent males in and collectively contributed to the dance. development of York University. Also available as e-books at utppublishing.com Literary Review of Canada 170 Bloor Street West, Suite 706 Toronto ON M5S 1T9 email: [email protected] reviewcanada.ca T: 416-531-1483 • F: 416-944-8915 Charitable number: 848431490RR0001 To donate, visit reviewcanada.ca/support Vol. 25, No. 1 • January/February 2017 EDITOR IN CHIEF Sarmishta Subramanian [email protected] MANAGING EDITOR 3 On Feminism, Islam and 19 The Muse Wore a Low-Cut Blouse Michael Stevens W.P. Kinsella’s posthumous book reveals a writer Civil Liberties in an Era of Fear ASSISTANT EDITOR Ausma Zehanat Khan in conversation with more cynical than his famous baseball novel Bardia Sinaee might suggest Monia Mazigh ASSOCIATE EDITORS Norman Snider 6 Survival of the … Noblest? Judy Stofman, Beth Haddon Why environmentalism is failing 20 Going It Alone POETRY EDITOR Moira MacDougall Lev Bratishenko The marvellous, singular, doggedly strange pas- sion of citizen scientists COPY EDITOR Madeline Koch 8 Into the Heart of Empire Patchen Barss A history of London through the eyes of CONTRIBUTING EDITORS indigenous travellers 22 Sex and the City Mohamed Huque, Molly Peacock, Ronald Wright Finding queer identities in Montreal and Toronto Robin Roger, Anthony Westell Amy Lavender Harris ONLINE EDITORS 10 Extreme Makeover Diana Kuprel, Jack Mitchell, What kind of capital city will a multibillion- 23 Not Unmarried Donald Rickerd, C.M. dollar renovation of Parliament create? A poem PROOFREADERS Sarah Jennings Richard Sanger Al Carter, Heather Schultz, Robert Simone 11 No Sense of an Ending 24 Grief and the Attentive Poet RESEARCH A poem In memoir-tinged poems about dementia and Rob Tilley Kieran Egan autistic children, we encounter the world outside DESIGN ourselves 14 The Gastronomical Us James Harbeck Anita Lahey ADVERTISING/SALES Does Canada really need a national cuisine? Michael Wile Emily M. Keeler 26 Wonk Friendly [email protected] What to expect from our think tanks DIRECTOR, OPERATIONS 15 it’s a sane thing Rohinton Medhora A poem Michael Booth Tannaz Taghizadeh 29 Double Vision DEVELOPMENT OFFICER A former language commissioner on the future Erica May 16 Beauty and the Accidental of bilingualism ADMINISTRATOR In watching birds, a writer fnds solace, and Graham Fraser Christian Sharpe lessons for the creative life PUBLISHER Candace Savage 32 Letters and Responses Helen Walsh Paul Litt, Anthony Westell, George [email protected] 17 Last Travels Elliott Clarke, Paul Wells, John Taller- BOARD OF DIRECTORS A poem Passer George Bass, Q.C., Tom Kierans, O.C., Anna Wärje Don McCutchan, Trina McQueen, O.C., Jack Mintz, C.M., Jaime Watt 18 Meanwhile, in Another Part of the ADVISORY COUNCIL Story Michael Adams, Ronald G. Atkey, P.C., Digressions, odd patterns and puns animate Q.C., Alan Broadbent, C.M., Chris Ellis, Emma Richler’s oddball novel Carol Hansell, Donald Macdonald, P.C., C.C., Grant Reuber, O.C., Don Rickerd, Liz Harmer C.M., Rana Sarkar, Mark Sarner, Bernard Schif, Reed Scowen POETRY SUBMISSIONS For guidelines, please see reviewcanada.ca. LRC design concept by Jackie Young/INK Founded in 1991 by P.A. Dutil Te LRC is published 10 times a year by the Literary Review of Canada Charitable Organization. Cover art and pictures throughout the issue, unless otherwise indicated, by Josh Holinaty. ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION RATES Individuals in Canada $56/year plus GST/HST. Josh Holinaty is an illustrator whose works include public art commissions and book, magazine and newspaper (Libraries and institutions in Canada $68/year plus illustrations. Some of his clients include Te New York Times, WIRED, Red Bull and Te Globe and Mail. Originally GST/HST.) 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All rights, including translation into other languages, are reserved We acknowledge the fnancial Funding Acknowledgements We acknowledge the assistance by the publisher in Canada, the United States, Great support of the Government of the OMDC Magazine Fund, Britain and all other countries participating in the of Canada through the Universal Copyright Convention, the International an initiative of Ontario Media Copyright Convention and the Pan-American Copyright Canada Periodical Fund of Development Corporation. Convention. Nothing in this publication may be repro- the Department of Canadian duced without the written permission of the publisher. Heritage. ISSN 1188-7494 Te Literary Review of Canada is indexed in the Canadian Literary Periodicals Index and the Canadian Index and is distributed by Disticor and Magazines Canada. an Ontario government agency un organisme du gouvernement de l’Ontario January/February 2017 reviewcanada.ca YOU’LL EAT THIS UP Speaking in Cod Tongues: A Canadian Culinary Journey By Lenore Newman, foreword by Sarah Elton “Humorous and intellectual, “A fascinating culinary tour.” poignant and celebratory, Janis Thiessen, Food Historian, theoretical and poetic . University of Winnipeg, and author enchanting.” Irena Knezevic, of the forthcoming Snacks: A Food Security Scholar, Carleton Canadian Food History University 2 reviewcanada.ca Literary Review of Canada INTERVIEW On Feminism, Islam and Civil Liberties in an Era of Fear Ausma Zehanat Khan in conversation with Monia Mazigh n the west, the past year AZK: Well, as you may know, was marked by a rise in racial there was a 67 percent spike in Iintolerance, xenophobia and hate crimes against American a divisive politics about identity. Muslims in 2015, the highest in As a populist streak blazes its any period since 9/11. We’re also way through North America and seeing specifc, gendered violence Europe, Muslims in particular are because the hijab makes a Muslim feeling its efects. woman a readily identifiable Ausma Zehanat Khan and target. I think people have been Monia Mazigh have, in their writ- emboldened by the campaign ing and their academic work, rhetoric, and certainly by the out- explored questions about cultural come of the election. identity, human rights, feminism For some time now, I’ve had and faith. a sense of being besieged—not Khan, formerly the editor in just me personally, but all minor- chief of the ground-breaking ity communities—and I’ve rou- Muslim Girl magazine, has long tinely engaged in self-censorship been at the forefront of creating to adjust to it. For example, am public space for Muslim women I comfortable wearing a headscarf and girls. A British-born Canadian, on my own porch, as I normally she holds a PhD in international do if I want to sit outside and read human rights law, and has worked the Quran in Ramadan, or pray- as an immigration lawyer and ing in my house with the blinds taught at universities in Toronto open? Te answer to both those and the United States, where she questions is no.