Freedom to Read Week: Under the Hill

Under the Hill

Aubrey Beardsley, completed by John Glassco

Paris: Olympia Press, 1959

An elegant favourite, in both appearance and content, I've written about Under the Hill here and in my biography of John Glassco. There will be few words today... just some images of a work that was seized and destroyed by French authorities. This is one of roughly 1500 copies that escaped the flames.

Related posts:

Canada's Olympians (Part II)

Three Centuries of Piracy

A Dutch Treat

Freedom to Read Week: Generals Die in Bed (II)

The Ottawa Citizen, 2 June 1930

LONDON, June 2 – Slurs on British generals and attacks on the behavior of Canadian troops as set forth in the book by Charles Yale Harrison, "General's Die in Bed," are repudiated in the press today by Lieut.-Colonel Colin Harding of the Fifteenth Royal Warwickshire Regiment, who served in the First Canadian Division in France and was closely allied with the Canadians throughout the war.

He wants to know why the author should wait twelve years to smudge the memory of fifty-six thousand Canadians who lost their lives fighting for the British Empire and discredit the services of those who survived. As for the alleged looting of Arras, Col. Harding demands the author's authority for the incident, and also for the alleged shooting down of defenceless German prisoners in revenge for torpedoing of the hospital ship Llandovery Castle. The colonel thinks that such books show the necessity for censorship before they are offered to the public as they are calculated to provoke ill-feeling between nations and act as a deterrent to peace.

Freedom to Read Week: Generals Die in Bed (I)

The Ottawa Citizen, 30 May 1930

NEW YORK. May 30. – Charles Yale Harrison, youthful author of the book "Generals Die in Bed," is surprised at the storm which followed publication of the book in London. Mr. Harrison, who served with the 14th Battalion Royal Montreal regiment in France and Belgium in 1917 and 1917 [sic], thinks the critics who have held his book slandered Canadian troops are unjustified. The author is on the staff of the New York newspaper, Bronx Home News, in the capacity as he himself puts it of a "newspaperman, not a journalist."

He told the Canadian Press today he was surprised at reports that his book might be banned in Canada. It will be published here in June and arrangements had been made for publication in the Dominion.

"For me to sneer at the fighting qualities of the Canadian soldier would be to sneer at myself," he said. "I want it distinctly understood that the Canadian Expeditionary Force was the best fighting unit in the field. Vimy Ridge, Ypres, the Somme, Cambrai and Mons speak for themselves."

War in Real Light.

Referring to criticism that the book showed Canadian soldiers in an untrue light morally. Harrison held he tried to picture war "as it really happened – not as some spinster ladies thought it should happen. War is dirty, disgusting and the sooner the world realizes that modern warfare is a demoralizing business the better it will be for the world."

Harrison has been criticized for stating Canadian troops looted Arras. He maintained he is correct in this but stated that "realizing the circumstances under which the town was looted. I did not consider that this in any way reflected upon the heroism and courage of the Canadian troops."

His attention was called to an editorial in which the London Daily Mail terms the book "slanderous."

"It is," Harrison said, "but it does not slander the troops of the C.E.F. It slanders war – and it is about time that a little of false glory with which war is enmeshed is torn away."

Harrison, who managed a Montreal motion picture theater following his return from France, says he works on a small paper because he finds it gives him leisure for writing.

Freedom to Read Week: Episode

"A remarkable first novel about madness – its feelings, treatment and powers."

— Books of the Month 

"Filth and muck."

— Raoul Mercier, K.C.

On 17 February 1956, a bitterly cold day in Ottawa, the American News Company was found guilty of having in its possession for the purpose of distribution "obscene written matter, to wit: 117 copies of a book entitled 'Episode', written by Peter W. Denzer."

The distributor was fined $5000 ($42,500 today), roughly $43 ($356) for each and every copy of the 25¢ paperback. This absurd amount would be described in The Canadian Bar Review as "by far and away the heaviest penalty imposed for an offence of this nature in Ontario, and probably Canada." Meanwhile, Crown prosecutor Raoul Mercier, the future Attorney General of Ontario, was clicking his heels.

The Vancouver Sun, 18 February 1956 

Peter Denzer died earlier the month at the age of ninety; his friend Peter Anastas paid tribute with a very fine obituary. It's important to note, I think, that the author of Episode, a novel about a man's struggle with mental illness, had himself suffered. What's more, Peter Denzer had been an early defender and sympathetic champion of those struggling with mental health disorders.

Episode is, I suppose, somewhat autobiographical. Hugh MacLennan was an admirer of the novel. His biographer, Elspeth Cameron, describes it as a precursor to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I've yet to come across a negative review. Everything I've read about Episode indicates that it is both fascinating and important. And yet, Canadians who want to read Episode are out of luck. You see, while Episode, can be found in libraries throughout the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia, not a single Canadian library – public or academic – has a copy.

Those looking to place blame need only look to this little, little man:

 Raoul Mercier

1897-1967

Freedom to Read Week: Noir Canada

Noir Canada : Pillage, corruption et criminalité en Afrique

Alain Deneault, Delphine Abade and William Sacher

Montreal: Éditions Écosociété, 2008

Freedom to Read Week begins and the Lord's Day is darkening. We live now in a Canada governed by a party that equates 'opposition' with 'enemy'. When presenting legislation, our Minister of Public Safety accuses those who find fault of being in league with child pornographers.

A few days pass and the minister trips up, revealing that he has not read the bill. He is surprised by its contents.

A few more days pass and we learn that the government called upon the Department of National Defence to help wage war on those who sit across the aisle in the House of Commons. An hour passes and an even bigger scandal breaks.

The message is clear: Do not question the government.

While scientists are muzzled, for the most part we writers have had it pretty easy. True, the theatre critics in the Prime Minister's Office described an unread yet to be performed play as "glorifying terrorism", but that's as bad as it's got... so far. As Michael Healey might tell you, the chill is in.

Noir Canada is not our prime minister's hockey book, but it's entirely appropriate that he struts his stuff on the cover. For nearly four years, Barrick Gold pursued publisher les Éditions Écosociété, Alain Deneault, Delphine Abadie, and William Sacher, seeking to add six million Canadian dollars to its US$10.9 billion (2010) in annual revenues.

Here, I'll mention – and just mention – something known as a SLAPP, a strategic lawsuit against public participation. The reason I'm saying no more on the subject will become clear through reading Candice Valentine's 'Code of Silence', published in the November 2011 edition of The Walrus.

Late last year, Noir Canada was withdrawn from sale. The small Montreal press paid an undisclosed sum to the world's largest gold mining producer and the media looked the other way; Justin Bieber had signed a Hyundai for charity.

I imagine Barrick Gold's Board of Directors were satisfied.

Better to bury a book than to burn it. Flames attract attention.

Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Eight, Day 253

News today that may or may not contradict the hot tip our Prime Minister gave intrepid Jane Taber at his most recent Christmas party.

It would seem that the Stephen Harper hockey book is still without a home. Toronto Star entertainment reporter Greg Quill reports that "major Canadian publishers" are in a bidding war over the untitled work. According to the journalist, neither Douglas & McIntyre nor House of Anansi are involved. So, who does that leave? I dare say there is not one Canadian publisher that could afford the middle six-figure advance that "one non-bidding publishing insider" anticipates.

According to Westwood Creative Agency, which represents our prime minister, a meeting has been set for  the first of March. Might we expect the name of the lucky bride next month? Who knows. As I've written elsewhere, our prime minister does like to tease.

The publication date, we're told, will depend upon the publisher selected. As one who has penned a hockey book himself – under nom de plume – I recommend autumn publication. It's a no-brainer, really.

And I offer this to journalists, including Mr Quill, who make much of the fact that Stephen Harper is a member of the Society for International Hockey Research: Annual memberships can be bought by any old yob for thirty bucks.

Related posts:

Ignatieff's Ink and Harper's Hockey Book

The Harper Hockey Book Watch (Updated!)

Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Nine, Day 39
Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Nine, Day 222
Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Nine, Day 236
Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Nine, Day 237
Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Ten, Day 27
Harper Hockey Book Watch: Year Ten, Day 77
Harper Hockey Book Watch: Fin (et raison d'être)

On Lovingly Hand-Selected Recommendations

That they pretend to know me irritates. I write here of Alibris, the self-described "premier online marketplace for independent sellers of new and used books". For four years now they've pestered, prodded, poked and pushed, peppering my inbox with books they know I'll want. "We've lovingly hand-selected the following recommendations just for you", I'm told (emphasis theirs).

Here's one of their most recent picks:

Here's another that was chosen with me in mind:

Alibris add insult, describing this classic as a book I thought I'd never find:

And finally, there's this "book", which is actually a DVD:

Now, to be fair, the folks at Alibris have very little to go on. Our only contact took place back in 2008 when I purchased The Authentic Confessions of Harriet Marwood, an English Governess through their site. Faux-Victorian erotica penned by Montreal poet John Glassco, it says a great deal about Alibris that not a single Canadian title has figured in their four years of lovingly hand-selected recommendations. No poetry or porn, either.

Photo by Mary Elam

All this brings me to the Word Bookstore in Montreal, which launched its own website just last week. I've been a patron for nearly thirty years, first darkening the doorway as a fresh-faced university student.

These are just four of the many books owner Adrian King-Edwards has put in my hands over the years:

Memoirs of Montparnasse
John Glassco
Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1970

Inscribed and annotated by the author. Ex-libris Frank and Marian Scott.

Œuvres Illustrées de Balzac, volume 3
Honoré de Balzac
Paris: Michel Lévy Frères, 1867

Ex-libris John Glassco

The Beautiful and Damned
F. Scott Fitzgerald
London: Grey Walls, 1950

The Watching Cat
Pamela Fry
London: Davies, 1960

Inscribed by the author.

Every one purchased. The only times I've ever passed on a recommendation – a rare event – was when I already owned a copy of the book in question.

The good souls at the Word know me; they don't insult, they don't waste my time... and they're very generous with bookmarks.