LABOUR AND LITERATURE IN THE ‘WEST BEYOND THE WEST’ by Mark Diotte Master of Arts, Simon Fraser University 2006 Bachelor of Arts, Simon Fraser University 2003 A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in The Faculty of Graduate Studies (English) The University of British Columbia (Vancouver) March 2012 © Mark Diotte 2012 Abstract The literature of British Columbia and the study of labour therein have been largely ignored in academic criticism. I address this deficiency by foregrounding labour in the prose literature of British Columbia as well as the significance of British Columbia literature itself. My introductory literature review demarcates the field, situates the authors and texts I take up, and points to the general importance of such a study. Chapter two begins by analyzing the male-dominant labour narrative in Bertrand Sinclair’s The Inverted Pyramid and Roderick Haig-Brown’s On the Highest Hill and Timber —each focused on the theme of logging. Rather than an overarching argument, the section on Sinclair addresses many concepts, including Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of fields, a connection between environmental conservationism and loggers, and a cooperative economic model that opposes capitalism. Likewise, in Haig-Brown I focus on his treatment of danger in the logging industry, the oft-forgotten history of Canada’s national parks, the way that language connects people to nature, and the presence of homosocial and homosexual relationships in logging. My project shifts in chapter three from logging to orcharding and from novels to three works of creative non-fiction by Harold Rhenisch: Out of the Interior: The Lost Country , Tom Thomson’s Shack , and The Wolves at Evelyn: Journeys through a Dark Century . Operating out of a site of tension and contradiction, Rhenisch resists what he sees as the dominant discourses in the Interior of British Columbia. In my fourth chapter I return to novels but move from a study of manual labour to white collar labour. Here the phrase “white collar” becomes an analytical lens to view labour stratification, exploitation, authorship, sexism, and agency in Douglas Coupland’s JPod , Robert Harlow’s Scann , and Jen Sookfong Lee’s the end of east . In chapter five, I conclude by using Daphne Marlatt’s novel Ana Historic as a way to reflect on the positions of chapters two through four. Marlatt’s criticism of male dominant conceptions of history and patriarchal systems of power illuminates the texts I have taken up and reveals possibilities for further analysis, debate, and discussion. ii Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................ ii Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... iii List of Figures ..................................................................................................................v Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................... vi Dedication ....................................................................................................................... vi 1. Introduction ..................................................................................................................1 “Digging Up” The Literature of British Columbia .......................................................3 Aggregates and Chapters ..........................................................................................27 Paths Not Travelled .....................................................................................................40 2. Literary Representations of the Logging Industry: The Novels of Bertrand Sinclair and Roderick Haig-Brown .........................................................54 Bertrand Sinclair ..........................................................................................................61 The Field of Power in The Inverted Pyramid .......................................................66 Rod Norquay .............................................................................................................72 Shifts in Realism ......................................................................................................79 Sinclair’s Economic Vision .....................................................................................90 Roderick Haig-Brown ..................................................................................................96 Dangerous Conditions and National Parks ..........................................................99 Haig-Brown and the Environmental Text ...........................................................116 Friendship and Homosexuality in Timber ..........................................................130 Reflections on the Logging Industry in Literature .................................................138 3. Discourses of Resistance: The Object of the Interior in the Creative Non-Fiction of Harold Rhenisch ..............................................................................150 Education and Rural Alienation...............................................................................164 Selling the Interior ......................................................................................................175 A Discursive Place-Based Identity ..........................................................................193 Reflections on the Resource Economy ..................................................................206 4. Literary Representations of White Collar Labour ..........................................215 Douglas Coupland’s JPod ........................................................................................221 Tactics of Resistance ............................................................................................232 Robert Harlow’s Scann .............................................................................................243 Jen Sookfong Lee’s the end of east .......................................................................262 Power and Oppression Within the Family ..........................................................270 Reflections on White Collar Labour ........................................................................277 iii 5. Conclusion: Refractions through Daphne Marlatt’s Ana Historic .............282 Ana Historic : A New Angle on the Logging Narrative ..........................................285 Daphne Marlatt, Harold Rhenisch and the Inscription of History .......................301 Ana Historic and White Collar Labour ....................................................................310 Concluding Remarks .................................................................................................316 Works Cited ..................................................................................................................320 iv List of Figures Figure 1: Logs being loaded onto rail cars. ...............................................................102 Figure 2: A logging crane about to load a log onto a rail car. ................................103 Figure 3: A yarder using a skyline to bring logs to the landing. .............................104 Figure 4: An example of a wooden spar, steel rigging, and donkey engine loading logs onto a waiting flatcar. ............................................................105 v Acknowledgements Thank you, first of all, Sherrill Grace, for being an inspiring role model and supporting me every step of the way. Your constant and consistent support and attention to detail made this project possible. Thank you also to Chris Lee for showing me the moments where realism both succeeds and fails as well as for helping me out of various, and many, theoretical quandaries. Thank you to Margery Fee for catching my mistakes, being a lateral thinker, and always making suggestions that kept me excited to be doing what I was doing. It was an honour to have the support and insight of Dr. Misao Dean, Dr. Bob MacDonald, Dr. Glenn Deer and Dr. Ralph Sarkonak during my Final Oral Examination. My dissertation has become better through their questions and suggestions. I am indebted to Laurie Ricou for the idea of a dissertation on labour. Both BC Studies and Canadian Literature have supported me in the project by allowing me to write reviews and learn more about the province of British Columbia. Everyone in the Special Collections division of the library deserves credit for helping me find the information I needed. A special note of gratitude goes to David Stouck for putting me on the path of the literature of British Columbia during my undergraduate years as well as for introducing me to masculinity studies. Thank you also to Geoff Madoc-Jones for introducing me to Peter Trower whose poetry started me writing. I have great appreciation for the University of British Columbia English department for funding my research and for SSHRC who supported the fourth year of this study. Finally, I thank my dedicated friends and colleagues, Genvieve Gagne-Hawes, Sarah Crover and Mike Borkent for listening and for providing much needed respite from work at our Friday summits. Dedication vi To Laura, first and foremost, for enduring, and hopefully enjoying at times, this path less travelled, and for making all the difference. This dissertation could not have been