My First Canadian Book of Lists List: Ten Lists That Have Aged Poorly (Featuring Barbara Amiel!)

Being the second post on

The First Original Unexpurgated Authentic Canadian Book of Lists. 

I read Barbara Amiel's columns in Maclean's through my high school years, doing my best to understand her points of view. By university, I understood fully, and yet I'd still read her. Friends and Enemies: A Memoir (Toronto: Signal, 2020) was last thing I read by Baroness Black of Crossharbour. In it, she writes this of husband Conrad Black's convictions on counts of fraud and obstruction of justice in the United States: "our only revenge would be to see our persecutors guillotined. I have worked out 1,001 ways to see them die, beginning with injecting them with the ebola virus and watching."

It was at that point that I stopped reading Barbara Amiel, and then stopped thinking about her. Still, she was top of mind in creating this list of lists:

TEN LISTS THAT HAVE AGED POORLY

1. THE 10 MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMEN IN CANADA

At first glance, THE 10 MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMEN IN CANADA seems a piece of fluff, particularly when compared to, say, THE 10 BEST CANADIAN COMMANDING OFFICERS IN CANADA'S MILITARY HISTORY, but I would argue it's the book's most noteworthy list in that it, more than any other, is a reflection of the time in which the Canadian Book of Lists was published.

Actually, no... The list is more a reflection of a time that had not long passed when married women were treated as appendages, rather than persons in their own right. List maker John Bassett does a disservice to  "MRS JOHN BASSETT, she of the "wonderfully expressive face," whose career as a broadcast journalist was well underway before the couple wed. I remember Isabel Bassett (née Macdonald) best as Minister of Citizenship, Culture and Recreation under Mike Harris and as CEO of TV Ontario. I knew her name, but not his. I at first confused John W.H. Bassett with John F. Bassett of Face-Off fame.

I am familiar with Julian Porter (and his father, Chief Justice Dana Porter). I've had the pleasure of meeting Mrs Julian Porter, whom I know as writer and publisher Anna Porter.

Is Mrs John Bassett's third place finish worthy of note? Perhaps not. The names appear to be presented in alphabetical order. Or is that just coincidence? After all, the first, Barbara Amiel, is clearly identified as "the most beautiful woman in Canada." 

Amongst Bassett's other contributions to the Canadian Book of Lists is THE 10 MOST OUTSTANDING CANADIANS, which is somehow comprised of one woman and fifteen men.

2. 10 INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT ESKIMOS AND INDIANS

One of only two lists with a First Nations focus, the other being THE TEN LARGEST NATIVE LINGUISTIC GROUPS IN CANADA, it serves to draw attention the book's most glaring flaw. And then we have this photo and caption:

Both are appended to 10 GREAT CANADIAN SPORTS ACHIEVERS, which acknowledges Tom Longboat as the greatest Canadian marathoner. It is the only photograph of a First Nations person in the entire book.

3. 10 GREAT CANADIAN QUOTATIONS ON WOMAN [sic]

Seven of the ten come from men, including one each by Stephen Leacock and Irving Layton:

In all fairness, Leacock's words come from 'An Appeal to the Average Man,' the preface to his 1926 collection Winnowed Wisdom, in which the economist and humorist takes far more swipes at the male sex than the female. The photo used in the Canadian Book of Lists does not feature in Winnowed Wisdom. Evidence suggests it was taken sometime after 1926. 

4. 10 CORPULENT CANADIANS

Judy LaMarsh is #1. She reappears eight lists later as the fifth worst dressed Canadian celebrity.

5. THE 10 MOST PREVALENT CANADIAN HANG-UPS

The first of five contributions from Dr Daniel Cappon, Professor of Environmental Studies at York University, on this list is "women who don't know that to do with themselves and menopause."

Doctor Cappon is best remembered today for Toward An Understanding of Homosexuality (Prentice-Hall, 1965), in which he writes that homosexuals do not exist, rather they are "people with homosexual problems."

6. BIRTHDAYS AND ASTROLOGICAL SIGNS OF 

10 FAMOUS CANADIANS

7. 10 WAYS TO FINANCE A CANADIAN MOTION PICTURE

Ten tips from Garth Drabinsky!

8. THE 6 MOST HATED FOREIGNERS IN

CANADIAN HISTORY

A list contributed by Paul Rutherford, Chairman on the History Department at the University of Toronto, it runs as follows: 

                    1. Satan
                    2. George Washington
                    3. Josef Stalin
                    4. William of Orange
                    5. Any Pope
                    6. Lord Durham

Of course, "Any Pope" throws the whole thing off. At time of publication, there had been 262 popes. This newly confirmed Anglican didn't hate any of them, not even John XII or Urban VI. In 1978, my teenage self  knew nothing of William of Orange or Lord Durham, but I did know quite a bit about Adolf Hitler.

In short, this is a list that would've seemed dated in 1939.

9. 10 PEOPLE MOST LIKELY TO INFLUENCE

THE COURSE OF EVENTS IN CANADA

Referenced in Monday's post, this Peter C. Newman list is most notable for the fawning admiration of Brian Mulroney. John Turner also features. Notably absent is then-current prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Very much a spent force in 1978, Trudeau would lose the 1979 election (while handily taking the popular vote), only to return nine months later, just in time to lead the federalist victory in the 1980 Quebec Referendum. The Charter of Rights and Freedoms and repatriation of the Constitution followed in 1982.

10. THE TEN HIGHEST TEMPERATURES EVER RECORDED IN EACH OF CANADA'S PROVINCES

Related posts:

My Canadian Book of Lists Lists: An Introduction

My Second Canadian Book of Lists List:
The 10 Most egregious Errors (with Timothy Findley!)

My Third Canadian Book of Lists List:
The 10 Biggest Contributors (Featuring Claire Wallace!)

Teamwork

Freedom for Fanny

Average Leacock for the Average Man

B is for the Bombardier Guide to Canadian Authors

My introduction to Canadian literature came in the pages of National Lampoon. No joke. Canada's writers weren't taught in the Montreal public schools I attended. The assigned reading for my Grade 10 English class featured Shane, The Pearl, Walkabout, The Chrysalids and, predictably, Lord of the Flies. Of these, my favourite was The Chrysalids, in part because it takes place in post-apocalyptic Labrador, as opposed to, say, nineteenth-century Wyoming.

So it was, just as I was preparing to shift my focus to the Australian Outback, that I bought the March 1978 issue of National Lampoon, featuring the first selection from The Bombardier Guide to Canadian Authors.

"Financed by the Bombardier Snowmobile Company," written by Ted Mann, Brian Shein and Sean Kelly, the format of the guide was simple: a brief entry, followed by a rating on a scale of zero to five skidoos.

The first to be so honoured was Margaret Atwood (one skidoo). This brief except provides a fair example of the guide's style:

She is best known for advancing the theory that America and Canada are simply states of mind, the former comparable to that of a schnapps-crazed Wehrmacht foot soldier and the latter to that of an autistic child left behind in a deserted Muskoka summer cottage playing with Molson's Ale cans, spent shell casings, and dead birds hung from the light fixture, who will one day become aware of its situation, go to college, and write novels. She is better known, among Margaret-watchers, for taking gross offense at the suggestion (in a crudely dittoed literary periodical) that she may have sparked an erection in a considerably more talented Canadian author who shall here remain nameless (see Glassco, John).

That last sentence would've been my first encounter with Glassco's name. The incident described is one that demanded particular care when writing A Gentleman of Pleasure. Rosalie Abella, the lawyer Ms Atwood hired to go after the "crudely dittoed literary periodical", now sits on the Supreme Court.*

And here's Glassco again in the entry for "Callahan, Morely":

As The Bombardier Guide to Canadian Authors, The Bombardier Skiddoo [sic] Guide to Canadian Authors, and, finally, The Bombardier Skiddoo [sic] Guide to Canadian Literature, the reference work appeared sporadically throughout 1978, then returned five years later. By that time, Grade 10 was far behind me and I was at university with two of Sean Kelly's kids. A coincidence worthy of Isabel Ecclestone Mackay (not covered), I suppose; much more predictable was the presence of Frederick Philip Grove on my reading lists. The April 1983 issue, marking the return of the guide, brought this well-timed entry:

The skidoo awarded Grove may have been an act of generosity. Sensitive Canadians all, the critics never left any writer empty-handed. Farley Mowat rated two snowshoes; Mazo de la Roche received two bags of cash. There was also some playing around with the skidoos, most notably the two awarded George Jonas and Barbara Amiel, "Canada's most formidable literary spouse-and-spouse team and toast of Toronto's propeller set" (see below).

Every bit as relevant as The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature, and at times just as funny, I've held onto my copies.

It's doing a bit of a disservice to reduce the guide to a list of ratings, but the following gives a good idea of its scope.

6½ 

Northrop Frye

6

Lady Flora Eaton

5

Émile Nelligan

Malcolm Lowry

Society of Jesus

4

Stephen Leacock

E.J. Pratt

Mordecai Richler

Lubor J. Zink

3

Ralph Connor

Robertson Davies

Timothy Eaton

John Herbert

Brian Moore

F.R. Scott

George Woodcock

2

John Buchan

Morley Callaghan

Bliss Carman

William Henry Drummond

The Four Horsemen

Robert Fulford

Louis Hémon

Archibald Lampman

Eli Mandel

James Reaney

Sir Charles G.D. Roberts

1½

Irving Layton

1

Margaret Atwood

Pierre Berton

Earle Birney

bill bisset

Louis Dudek

Alan Fotheringham

Hugh Garner

Oliver Goldsmith

Frederick Philip Grove

Guy F. Claude Hamel

Hugh MacLennan

Marshall McLuhan

Jay McPherson

Susanna Moodie

John Newlove

Marjorie Pickthall

Al Purdy

Duncan Campbell Scott

Scott Symons

Charles Templeton

George Bowering (one skidoo, one baseball bat)

John Buell (two skidoos, two crosses)

Leonard Cohen (two skidoos, one razor blade)

Octave Crémazie (one flag bearing a fleur de lys)

Mazo de la Roche (two bags of cash)

Thomas Chandler Haliburton (one horse-drawn skidoo)

Hugh Hood (five baseball gloves)

Pauline Johnson (one canoe)
George Jonas and Barbara Amiel (two skidoos, mating)

A.M. Klein (three skidoos, three Stars of David)

John McCrae (one skidoo, one cross)

W.O. Mitchell (one skidoo, two rocking chairs)

Lucy Maud Montgomery (one skidoo, one bonnet)

Farley Mowat (two snowshoes)

Robert W. Service (one skidoo drawn by three huskies)

Joe Wallace (one skidoo, one hammer and sickle)

J. Michael Yates (one skidoo, two snakes)

Scott Young (one broken hockey stick)

There never was an entry for Glassco.

* Shameless plug: Still more on the scandal is found in the brand spanking new Heart Accepts It All: Selected Letters of John Glassco, edited by yours truly.