from La Voix d'un exile: première et seconde année
Louis Fréchette
1868
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A JOURNEY THROUGH CANADA'S FORGOTTEN, NEGLECTED AND SUPPRESSED WRITING
Judd came slowly down the walk. Myra saw the little woman timidly draw him aside, heard her speak. "... I was thinking about Pat," the woman faltered, begging the fevered eyes that looked down at her now. "Pat used to play the fiddle you know. But is was only for the old-time squares and the likes of that. He couldn't play jazz.... And he was a very good man really.... Well, you remember how it happened. That time his car hit the bridge he was... he was coming home from playing that French wedding party... but he was a good man, really.... Don't you think?...."As I say, we've seen characters like Jurd before in American literature. His kind may feature in Caldwell, but I haven't read Caldwell. While I haven't encountered anyone like him in any other Canadian novel, I'm sure they're there somewhere.
The old woman dared say no more. She didn't have to.
Judd said, "Playing the fiddle for the lust of the flesh, Sister? And for a pagan wedding?" He shook his head slowly, with a terrible finality. "The wrath of ou God is an awful thing, Sister. An awful thing!"
"When a lad is mature in his body and not in his mind, he's likely to get a lot of urge that could be mighty dangerous to an attractive girl like you. especially when he's strong."Judd's warning appears in The Praying Mantis, but not in The Pillar of Fire. It wasn't until I read it that I realized Matt was an adult; the shorter version somehow had me thinking he was an adolescent. News Stand Library was never known for its editing – authors were lucky if their names were right – but I can't really blame the nameless for the
It's a common lament that Hopwood winners don't keep on writing. The idea is that the novel, or play, or series of poems with which they won their awards somehow ended rather than began something. Their art was an attempt to impose order on hitherto clashing elements in their own experiences. It was, in short, autobiographical, autocathardic, and, alas, artistically suicidal.Objects: One of News Stand Library's more competent productions, The Pillar of Fire enjoyed just one printing. I bought my copy in 2012 from bookseller and poet Nelson Ball. Price: C$25.00.
– A.M. Eastman, Quarterly Review, August 7, 1954
SPRING WAKING
A snowdrop lay in the sweet, dark ground.
"Come out," said the Sun, "come out!"
But she lay quite still and she heard no sound;
"Asleep!" said the Sun, "no doubt!"
The Snowdrop heard, for she raised her head,
"Look spry," said the Sun, "look spry!"
"It's warm," said the Snowdrop, "here in bed."
"O fie!" said the Sun, "O fie!"
"You call too soon, Mr. Sun, you do!"
"No, no," said the Sun, "Oh, no!"
"There's something above and I can't see through."
"It's snow," said the Sun, "just snow."
"But I say, Mr. Sun, are the Robins here?"
"Maybe," said the Sun, "maybe";
"There wasn't a bird when you called last year."
"Come out," said the Sun, "and see!"
The Snowdrop sighed, for she liked her nap,
And there wasn't a bird in sight,
But she popped out of bed in her white night-cap;
"That's right," said the Sun, "that's right!"
And, soon as that small night-cap was seen,
A Robin began to sing,
The air grew warm, and the grass turned green,
"'Tis Spring!" laughed the Sun, "'tis Spring!"
from The Shining Ship and Other Verse for Children
Isabel Ecclestone MackayToronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1918
Gordon dried his hands on a linen towel. "Who was at the door?"Did you catch that... "he said carefully"?
"The girl, the one who was here last week."
"Girl?"
"Ruby MacCormick."
"Well," he said carefully. "What did she want?"
"She's still here."
"Oh."
"She wants a room. She's moving. I was just trying to find a place for her to go."
Elaine believed that Gordon could have been a real doctor if he had more initiative, or if he'd met her earlier in life, so that she could have supplied the initiative. As it was, when they met, Gordon was already a dentist, and even Elaine's considerable powers couldn't make him into anything else. Their marriage had been coloured by Elaine's bile-green feeling that she had been cheated, that Gordon should have been a real doctor because she herself had all the attributes of a perfect doctor's wife.At the end of the day, Hazel returns to the house she shares with her unemployed cousin, her simple-minded brother, and his petite pregnant wife. Ruth, the cousin, goes on about household finances and the suit she'll wear when presenting herself before the School Board. Ruth wants to teach again.
In this classic noir tale of blurred guilt and flawed innocence, a cynical lawyer uncovers the desperate lives of a group connected only by a gruesome murder.And here's the description of Beast in View, the novel that followed Wives and Lovers:
Hailed as one of the greatest psychological mysteries ever written, Beast in View remains as freshly sinister today as the day it was first published.Now, compare with that for Wives and Lovers:
A sincere compassionate novel about the complications of married life, and the love, loathing, pain, loyalty, disappointments and friendship that grow out of marriage.What makes Wives and Lovers like other Millar novels is that characters are key. What makes it so interesting is that criminal acts are always a possibility. Lives become unstable, desperation takes hold, jealousy and pettiness rear their ugly heads, and the reader braces for violence that never comes.
He said he'd like to take a little trip.Object: A 553 page trade-size paperback, comprised of Vanish in an Instant, Wives and Lovers, Beast in View, An Air That Kills and The Listening Walls, along with a brief Introduction by Tom Nolan. The Master at Her Zenith is the first third volume – though first to be released – in Syndicate's Collected Millar. I purchased my copy last September. Price: C$19.99.
"To San Francisco again?" Elaine said with sweet irony.
"What do you mean, again?"
"I only mean that you seem to have had such a gay time there a couple of months ago."
The Globe & Mail, 19 November 1955 |
(cliquez pour agrandir) |
Did I mention that there's a new story by K.D. Miller? Well, there is!Marianne ApostolidesMax BeerbohmLeone BranderJim ChristyJason DicksonDeborah DundasAndre ForgetStephen FowlerPascal GirardEmily KeelerRichard KemickDavid MasonDilia NarduzziSarah NevilleSuzannah ShowlerBardia SinaeeBruce Whiteman
Heath, Sex and Birth Control Percy E. Ryberg, M.D. Toronto: Harlequin, 1952 |
"Do you remember, Jack, when first you came, in Italy, that night, at Amalfi, when we sat on the piazza of the palazzo?"Leacock's is a "problem play". The term is no longer used, but the situation at the heart of it all will be familiar to today's reader. These eyes have seen something of it in Edith Wharton, Henry James and select episodes of The Edge of Night from my childhood.
She is looking rapturously into his face.
Mr. Harding says that he does.
"And that day at Fiesole among the orange trees, and at Pisa and the Capello de Terisa and the Mona Lisa. Oh, Jack, take me away from all this; take me to the Riviera among the contadini, where we can stand together with my head on your shoulder just as we did in the Duomo at Milano, or on the piaggia at Verona. Take me to Corfu, to the Cappo Santo, to Civita Vecchia, to Para Noia, anywhere —"
Mr. Harding, smothered with her kisses, says, "My dearest, I will, I will."
Any man in the audience would do as much. They'd take her to Honolulu.
The photographer rolled a machine into the middle of the room and crawled into it from behind.That said, the five pieces collected under the title "Parisian Pastimes" seem barely to have aged at all. Here's Leacock on the French child:
He was only in a second – just time enough for one look at me – and then he was out again, tearing at the cotton sheet and the window panes with a hooked stick, apparently frantic for light and air.
Then he crawled back into the machine again and drew a little black cloth over himself. This time he was very quiet in there. I knew that he was praying and I kept still.
When the photographer came out at last, he looked very grave and shook his head.
"The face is quite wrong," he said.
"I know," I answered quietly, "I have always known it."
The child, I was saying, wears about two hundred dollars worth of visible clothing upon it; and I believe that if you were to take it up by its ten-dollar slipper and hold it upside down, you would see about fifty dollars more. The French child has been converted into an elaborately dressed doll. It is altogether a thing of show, an appendage of its fashionably dressed mother, with frock and parasol to match. It is no longer a child, but a living toy or plaything.The final piece, "Homer and Humbug – An Academic Suggestion", should be considered one of Leacock's greatest hits. I don't often laugh when reading – Fran Leibowitz, who I think is funnier than just about anyone, leaves me silent – but I did at this:
Even on these terms the child is not a success. It has a rival who is rapidly beating it off the ground. This is the Parisian dog. As an implement of fashion, as a set-off to the fair sex, as the recipient of ecstatic kisses and ravishing hugs, the Parisian dog can give the child forty points in a hundred and win out. It can dress better, look more intelligent, behave better, bark better – in fact, the child is simply not in it.
An ancient friend of mine, a clergyman, tells me that in Hesiod he finds a peculiar grace that he doesn't find elsewhere. He's a liar. That's all. Another man, in politics and in the legislature, tells me that every night before going to bed he reads over a page or two of Thucydides to keep his mind fresh. Either he never goes to bed or he's a liar. Doubly so: no one could read Greek at that frantic rate: and anyway his mind isn't fresh. How could it be? he's in the legislature. I don't object to this man talking freely of the classics, but he ought to keep it for the voters. My own opinion is that before he goes to bed he takes whisky: why call it Thucydides?Why indeed?
Largely drawn from his columns for Canadian Notes & Queries and entries in his popular blog by the same name, Brian Busby’s The Dusty Bookcase explores the fascinating world of Canada’s lesser-known literary efforts: works that suffered censorship, critical neglect, or brilliant yet fleeting notoriety. These rare and quirky totems of Canadiana, collected over the last three decades, form a travel diary of sorts – yet one without maps. Covering more than 250 books, peppered with observations on the writing and publishing scenes, Busby’s work explores our cultural past, questioning why certain works are celebrated and others ignored. Brilliantly illustrated with covers and ephemera related to the titles discussed, The Dusty Bookcase draws much needed attention to unknown writing worthy of our attention, and some of our acclaim.I'd like to thank publisher Dan Wells and editor Emily Donaldson for their faith in this collection. I'd also like to thank the many readers, writers and booksellers who have shared my enthusiasm during this eight-year journey without maps. Rest assured, it will continue.