Description
Book SynopsisFirst full-length investigation into Canadian literary medievalism as a discrete phenomenon. The essays in this volume consider what is original and distinctive about the manifestation of medievalism in Canadian literature and its origins and its subsequent growth and development: from the first novel published in Canada written by a Canadian-born author, Julia Beckwith Hart's St Ursula's Convent (1824), to the recent work of the best-selling novelist Patrick DeWitt (Undermajordomo Minor, published in 2015). Topics addressed include the strong strain of medievalist fantasy itself in the work of the young-adult author Kit Pearson, and the longer novels of Charles de Lint, Steven Erikson, and Guy Gavriel Kay; the medievalist inclinations of Archibald Lampman and W.W. Campbell, well-known nineteenth-century Canadian poets; and the often-studied Wacousta by John Richardson, first published in 1832. Chapters also cover early Canadian periodicals' engagement with orientalist medievalism; and works by twentieth-century writers such as the irrepressible Earle Birney, the witty and intellectual Robertson Davies, and the fascinating and learned Margaret Atwood.
Trade ReviewMedievalism in English Canadian Literature from Richardson to Atwood is not only a rare, but also valuable contribution to medievalist studies in the context of Canada and Canadian literature. * Studia Anglica Posnaniensia *
While a collection such as this clearly has importance for other scholars studying either medievalism more widely, or the specific writers examined, it also offers some perceptive insights into medieval or quasi-medieval models and motifs that helped to shape Canadian social and cultural institutions, particularly during the formative decades of the Dominion, from parliamentary architecture to the physical and intellectual construction of universities. These insights are nicely and concisely brought together by Toswell and Czarnowus in their well-written Introduction. -- British Journal of Canadian Studies
Table of ContentsIntroduction: English Canadian Medievalism - Jane Toswell and Anna Czarnowus "Men of the North": Archibald Lampman's Use of Incidents in the Lives of Medieval Monarchs and Aristocrats - David Bentley "Going Back to the Middle Ages": Tracing Medievalism in Julia Beckwith Hart's St. Ursula's Convent and John Richardson's Wacousta - Agnieszka Klis-Brodowska John Richardson's Wacousta and the Transfer of Medievalist Romance - Anna Czarnowus A Canadian Caliban in King Arthur's Court: Materialist Medievalism and Northern Gothic in William Wilfred Campbell's Mordred - Brian Johnson Orientalist Medievalism in Early Canadian Periodicals - Laurel Ryan The Collegiate Gothic: Legitimacy and Inheritance in Robertson Davies' The Rebel Angels - David Watt Earle Birney as Public Poet: a Canadian Chaucer? - Jane Toswell "That's what you get for being food": Margaret Atwood's Symbolic Cannibalism - Dominika Ruszkiewicz Lost in Allegory: Grief and Chivalry in Kit Pearson's A Perfect, Gentle Knight - Cory Rushton Remembering the Romance: Medievalist Romance in Fantasy Fiction by Charles de Lint and Guy Gavriel Kay - Sylwia Borowska-Szerszun Medievalisms and Romance Traditions in Guy Gavriel Kay's Ysabel - Ewa Drab The Medieval Methods of Patrick DeWitt: Undermajordomo Minor - Michael Fox
