BOOK AND FILM REVIEWS Writing the Body in Motion: flawed, and tragic sports hero Terry A Critical Anthology on Sawchuk, an NHL goalie depicted Night Work: The Canadian Sport Literature in Russell Maggs’s Sawchuck Poems. Angie Abdou and Jamie Dopp, Sports literature offers narratives editors that endure beyond the rink, mat, or pool; most selections discussed in the Edmonton: Athabasca University 2018 248 $34 99 book examine the condition of being Press, . pp. paper. human. They are relevant literature, exploring themes that enable readers to Tyree McCrackin University of Alberta “read themselves” into the story, whether or not they are athletes. For example, Cory Willard takes a close look at how riting the Body in Motion, edited by Thomas Wharton’s Icefields “explores W BC writers and literary scholars the commodification of the natural Angie Abdou and Jamie Dopp, is an world as he charts Byrne’s journey into introduction and literary companion for the embodied experience of place” (71), readers wishing to delve into Canadian something that will resonate with readers sports literature. The book is an asset observing a similar commodification to those who “want strong academic of wilderness in regions of British essays to assign to their students, as Columbia. Willard’s analysis serves as examples of the critical analysis of sport an accompaniment to Icefields, aiding literature” (3). The editors have curated readers in unravelling the complexity of eleven critical chapters that deal with Wharton’s award-winning novel. original stories about diverse sports Sport can be a powerful metaphorical such as mountaineering, wrestling, tool, and the genre of sport literature and swimming, thereby attending has the potential to explore the human to the scope and breadth of sport condition. It can serve as both a literature in Canada. These chapters are microcosm and a pressure cooker, rich and varied, from Cory Willard’s allowing for a complex and honest ecocritical approach to alpinism in exposition of greater literary themes – Thomas Wharton’s Icefields to Paul as the chapters in Writing the Body in Martin’s examination of the enigmatic, Motion explore. For example, Gyllian bc studies no. 203, Autumn 2019 147 148 bc studies Phillips’s chapter on Angie Abdou’s Geoff Powter’s thirty-year career. The novel The Bone Cage explores the author’s book guides the reader through his treatment of the hero myth, a common life’s journey as he explores mountains trope in sports fiction. Phillips looks at and mountain life, enriched by his own the novel’s alteration of the triumphant reflections and personal development hero-athlete figure seen in the story of (12). As a former editor for Polar two Olympians pushed by training to the Circus magazine and the Canadian brink of bodily deterioration as Abdou Alpine Journal, Powter’s incorporation subverts the hero theme. of twenty-six pieces of mountain The authors anthologize secondary adventures, tragedies, conflicts, and sources for use in postsecondary fulfillment portrays mountains as classrooms and share works that stand cultural and environmental landscapes as exemplary critical analyses of sport moulded by the people and animals literature. They have also produced a within them. collection that is relevant to the lives With an emphasis on physical of readers as it enables them to see pursuits in Canada’s mountains and the themselves anew through the challenges Himalayas, Powter carefully incorporates of sport and movement. The book stories of exploration with stories of contributes to the genre of sports conflict and tragedy to draw the reader literature as it is sure to engage readers into the inner world of those seeking both inside and outside an academic refuge within mountains through a setting. It guides students and interested physical connection. Returning from the readers towards a deeper understanding eight-thousand-metre peak of Manaslu, of essential works in Canadian sport Powter realizes that his mountain world literature by helping to unlock the feels different from the busy popular complexities of these texts. Many readers hiking trails below that are full of “people will find themselves making a beeline from the other world” (68). Those outside to their nearest bookseller to purchase this mountain life see the beauty of the gems of Canadian sport literature that large mountains and miss the conflicts they have discovered by reading this and tragedies caused by mistakes and fascinating anthology. arrogance. Powter draws attention to issues specific to this mountain world Inner Ranges: An Anthology – where climbers are injured or killed of Mountain Thoughts and because of carelessness, an unending desire to reach high places, the pursuit of Mountain People fame, and a lack of human compassion. Geoff Powter While reflecting on this, he states: “The big mountains aren’t always the most Victoria, BC: Rocky Mountain noble of places” (67). Books, 2018. 360 pp. $22.00 paper. Historically, treacherous and inaccessible peaks were valued as Michelle Murphy University of Alberta masculine spaces that only some could conquer. Glaciers and valleys became demasculinized areas that were easier nner Ranges: An Anthology of achievements than the high-altitude IMountain Thoughts and Mountain climbs that were completed mostly People is a collection of mountain- by men (Reidy 2015, 163–64). Other inspired pieces written throughout narratives seek to contest this idea of Book and Film Reviews 149 “heroic masculinity” (Bayers 2003, 1–2). Searching for Tao Canyon Powter challenges the value of physical achievements through his examination Pat Morrow, Jeremy Schmidt, of the mountain world. He acknowledges and Art Twomey his own desire to reach high places but Victoria, BC: Rocky Mountain argues that such desire should not come Books, 2018. 184 pp. $30.00 cloth. at the price of safety. Powter’s pursuit of mountain climbing Andreas Rutkauskas has led to his exploration of other aspects University of British Columbia of mountain cultural and environmental Okanagan landscapes; he eventually “became just as interested in the walk to a climb as [he] was in the climb itself” (94). His earching for Tao Canyon, the investigation into the deaths of wild Soutcome of decades of exploring horses in central Alberta showcases a previously uncharted slot canyons in “hidden” aspect of mountain life that the American Southwest, is dedicated is filled with contestation and outrage. to the accomplished photographer, While some believe that these horses glacier geologist, and conservationist damage the ecosystem, others argue Art Twomey, who was instrumental in that their populations are maintained by the formation of the Purcell Wilderness large predators and that there is limited Conservancy. It is therefore fitting evidence to indicate that they displace that advocacy for the preservation of game animals (102). Earth’s remaining wild spaces is at the Powter’s collection of pieces is an forefront of this compact volume, which intriguing examination of the thoughts integrates wistful text with photographs and lives of those connected to the by Twomey and his friends Pat Morrow mountains. Drawing on his experiences, and Jeremy Schmidt. he weaves together a collection of Engaging with a historic kinship stories – the result shows Powter’s between photography and wilderness personal evolution within the mountain conservation, Tao Canyon’s narrative landscape. The strength of his story is points to the fine balance between the sharp contrast of the physicality of raising environmental awareness and mountains with his own self-reflection attracting greater numbers of tourists and transformation as a result of time to remote destinations. Twomey spent within these landscapes. The recognized this prospect after one of stories portray the evolution of those his images of a slot canyon appeared in who seek out these places for physical the 1974 Sierra Club Wilderness Calendar, achievement and pleasure and who leave subsequently changing the nature of that with a deep appreciation of, and respect site inexorably. In the book’s main text, and admiration for, mountains. titled In the Jaw of the Dragon, Schmidt References laments the loss of landscape in the wake of infrastructural projects such as Bayers, Peter L. Imperial Ascent: Mountain- eering, Masculinity, and Empire. the Glen Canyon Dam, and its epilogue Boulder: makes direct reference to the rescinded University Press of Colorado, 2003. Reidy, Michael S. “Mountaineering, Mascu- protection of a sizable portion of Bears linity, and the Male Body in Mid-Victorian Ears National Monument in Utah. Britain.” Osiris 30 (2015): 158–81. On a humbler scale, Schmidt recounts transporting a gopher snake in order to 150 bc studies provide the reptile with a more suitable and Twomey’s text and remarkable home, only to return a week later to find it photographs question the ethics of dead. No matter how well intentioned our visualizing fragile landscapes, and give actions may be, any human intervention us pause to consider terrain threatened in these delicate ecosystems may have by climate change, increased population dire consequences. Deliberate then is the density, the extractive industry, and our author’s choice to erase all geographic, desire to get off the beaten track. traditional, or established place names in an effort to preserve the sense of mystery and adventure involved in discovering Chasing Smoke: A Wildfire these canyons. Tao Canyon is first and foremost a book Memoir of photography, and its visuals present an Aaron Williams alternative to the cliché image of a slot canyon as decidedly abstract, devoid of Madeira Park, BC: Harbour people, and fundamentally lacking any Publishing, 2017. 192 pp. $22.95 paper. sense of scale. Morrow, Schmidt, and Robert Scott Twomey’s photographs concentrate on University of Colorado Boulder the experience of being present in these majestic places, including the difficulties of hauling four-by-five-inch large-format hasing Smoke is a memoir centred camera equipment through water-choked Con Aaron Williams’s account of passageways and rappelling with heavy being a wildland firefighter in British kit into ink-black canyon mouths.