The Year's Work in Canadian Poetry Studies: 1979

     The following is a hand-list of criticism on English-Canadian poetry published in 1979. Journal articles have been summarized or abstracted, according to the requirements imposed by the nature of the material. Full length studies and interviews have also been included.


PRE-CONFEDERATION

Bentley, D.M.R. "Thomas Cary's Abram's Plains (1789) and Its 'Preface."' Canadian Poetry, no. 5 (Fall/Winter 1979), 1-28.

Influences acknowledged in the "Preface" are shown in analysis of the poem to result in use of "picturesque conventions, stock diction, and historical reference to confer order, familiarity and significance on the landscape of Quebec." The constructive aspect of the heroic couplet is seen to reflect a sense of building, which in turn illuminates the civilizing power that British mercantile presence had bestowed upon Quebec in the thirty years since Wolfe's victory.

MacDonald, Mary Lu. "George Longmore: A New Literary Ancestor." Dalhousie Review, 59:2 (Summer 1979), 265-285.

A reconstruction of the life/poetic career of Longmore (Quebec, 1793 South Africa, 1867), putative author of The Charivari, "Tecumthé" and other works while stationed at Montreal Garrison 1829-1824, and one of the earliest "Canadian-born poet[s] to publish in English Canada."

_____. "Some Notes on the Montreal Literary Scene in the Mid-1820's." Canadian Poetry, no.5 (Fall/Winter 1979), 29-40.

Discusses the personalities and circumstances surrounding publication of the Canadian Magazine and Canadian Review, suggesting that these periodicals were vehicles for local publishing rather than a stimulus for it.


CONFEDERATION

Bentley, D.M.R. "Pan and the Confederation Poets." Canadian Literature, no. 81 (Summer 1979), 59-71.

The goat-god Pan is a "potent image" of the poet, of Nature, and of human nature for the poets of the Confederation period.

Burns, Robert Alan. "Crawford and the Indians: Allegory in The Helot." Studies in Canadian Literature, 4:1 (Winter 1979), 154-161.

The dialectic between "white" European and "red" Indian mythologies which informs much of Crawford's work appears also in The Helot, in which the Spartan who corrupts the helot with wine may be seen as the British Canadian playing on the Indian's susceptibility to alcohol.

Cook, Ramsay. "Neglected Pine Blasters." Canadian Literature, no. 81 (Summer 1979), 95-108.

Two political satirists of the late nineteenth century, T. Phillips Thompson and John Wilson Bengough, were omitted from The Blasted Pine. Some of their work deserves to be better remembered. A small anthology of their poems follows.

Davies, Barrie. Introduction to At the Mermaid Inn: Wilfred Campbell, Archibald Lampman, Duncan Campbell Scott in "The Globe" 1892-93. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, [1979], vii-xxi. (Literature of Canada: Poetry and Prose in Reprint series, 21.)

Details circumstances of composition and interrelationships among Lampman, Campbell and Scott in their journalistic contributions to the Toronto Globe, February 1892-July 1893, placing in an historico-cultural context their discussions of Canadian politics and society.

Doyle, James. "Canadian Poetry and American Magazines, 1885-1905." Canadian Poetry, no.5 (Fall/Winter 1979),73-82.

As Confederation poets were forced "to look southward to the periodicals of Boston and New York for editorial and critical acceptance," they became entrapped in the "schoolroom poet" conventions of the "genteel tradition."

Jackel, David. "Roberts' 'Tantramar Revisited': Another View." Canadian Poetry, no.5 (Fall/Winter 1979),41-56.

In extension and qualification of an article by William Strong in Canadian Poetry, no. 3 (Fall/Winter 1978), Jackel examines the metrics, structure, and image patterns of "Tantramar Revisited," suggesting that the poem's inconclusiveness may derive from "a sense of dislocation" brought about by Roberts' move to the "metropolis."

Kelly, Catherine. "In the Listening World: The Poetry of Duncan Campbell Scott." Studies in Canadian Literature, 4:1 (Winter 1979), 71-94.

In many of his poems, Scott conveys a perception of "present, unseen, larger life." Transcendence is experienced in terms of "dynamic light and its natural effect in the human soul, joy."

Mezei, Kathy. "Lampman among the Timothy." Canadian Poetry, no. 5 (Fall/Winter 1979), 57-72.

Mezei sees Lampman's changes from "millet" to "timothy" in revision as emblematic of movement from his "English masters" to a Canadian "sense and spirit of place." Timothy becomes a symbol of "the complex mix of wilderness, cultivation and the Old World that was Canada."

_____. "Lampman and Nelligan: Dream Landscapes." Canadian Review of Comparative Literature, 6:2 (Spring 1979), 151-165.

Hopes for a post-Confederation Arcadia of the spirit led these poets "to present the landscapes of their souls in images that sing of self and place," Lampman working from visions of the external world (into reverie) and Nelligan from the intensity of childhood into gardens of idyll or nightmare.

Steele, Charles R. "The Isolate 'I' (Eye): Lampman's Persona." Essays on Canadian Writing, no.16 (Fall/Winter 1979-80), 62-69.

The structural coherence provided by a first-person voice places the focus upon the shaping imagination of the poet himself, while creating in Lampman's poetry a sense of "non-Transcendental" distance from the natural world.

Tierney, Frank M., ed. The Crawford Symposium. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1979. (Reappraisals: Canadian Writers series.)

A collection of biographical and critical essays with a preliminary checklist of the writings of Isabella Valancy Crawford.


MODERN

Barber, Marsha. "An Interview with Dorothy Livesay. A Room of One's Own, 5:1/2 (1979), 13-34.

Bentley, D.M.R., and Michael Gnarowski, introd. "Three Documents from F.R. Scott's Personal Papers." Canadian Poetry, no. 4 (Spring/Summer 1979), 73-119.

Bentley and Gnarowski provide a short introduction to three previously unpublished Scott documents, including an address on "Modern Poetry," a discussion of the "Oxford Study Group on Christianity and Industrial Problems," and a transcript of a taped discussion among Scott and three former Preview editors.

Brewster, Elizabeth. "The I of the Observer: The Poetry of F.R. Scott." Canadian Literature, no.79 (Winter 1978), 23-30.

Scott's persona, or "I," is complex, adopting a variety of poetic stances and is much concerned with the "eye" of mode of seeing.

Burke, A.  "Raymond Knister: An Annotated Checklist." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 16 (Fall/Winter 1979-80), 20-61.

"Checklist" of [Dorothy Livesay's] Publications." Room of One's Own, 5:1/2 (1979), 124-125.

Darling, Michael E., ed. "On Poetry and Poets: The Letters of W.W.E. Ross to A.J.M. Smith." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 16 (Fall/VVinter 1979-80), 78-125.

These letters (from 1944 to 1962) suggest the breadth of Ross' knowledge of both "traditional" and contemporary poetry and point to particular influences upon his own work.

Devanney, Burris. "Kenneth Leslie: A Biographical Introduction." Canadian Poetry, no. 5 (Fall/Winter 1979), 83-104.

_____, Sandra Campbell, and Domenico Di Nardo, comps. "Kenneth Leslie: A Preliminary Bibliography." Canadian Poetry, no. 5 (Fall/Winter 1979), 105-116.

Djwa, Sandra. "A.J.M. Smith: métaphysique et squelettes blanchis." Ellipse, 22 (1978),98-106.

Like Eliot and others of his generation, Smith turned to the metaphysical poetry of the seventeenth century for a model of articulated faith in the face of contemporary dissolution.

_____. "F.R. Scott." Canadian Poetry, no.4 (Spring/Summer 1979), 1-16.

A survey of Scott's career and of his political and poetic development in the year of his eightieth birthday.

Edel, Leon. The Wordly Muse of A.J.M. Smith." University of Toronto Quarterly, 47:3 (Spring 1978), 200-213.

Edel sees "private myth made public" in the poetry of Smith, creating an "aesthetic Canada" with essential poetic restraint. The orderly anthologist is seen as counterpart to the poet of the guarded lyric, celebrating "festive or ceremonial moments" with "articulate neatness."

Givens, Imogen. "Raymond Knister — Man or Myth?" Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 16 (Fall/Winter 1979-80), 5-19.

Knister's daughter reconstructs the circumstances surrounding the poet's drowning in 1932, citing passages from her mother's diary to refute what she feels are distortions of Knister's life and death in Dorothy Livesay's Memoir.

Hutcheon, Linda. " 'Snow Storm of Paper': The Act of Reading in Self-reflexive Canadian Verse." Dalhousie Review, 59:1 (Spring 1979), 114-128.

It is important to an understanding of Canadian poetry to realize that it is as "self-reflexive," i.e. concerned with the processes of reading and writing, as is all other modern literature. Klein, Page, Ondaatje, Atwood and Avison all exhibit this preoccupation in a variety of ways. A close analysis of Avison's "Snow" is also included.

_____, and Alain Goldschlager. " 'Out of the Pulver and Polished Lens': A.M. Klein as Wordsmith." Canadian Poetry, no. 4 (Spring/Summer, 1979), 52-64.

A close reading of Klein's series of verses on Spinoza.

Keitner, Wendy. "Gustatson's Double Hook." Canadian Literature, no. 79 (Winter 1978), 44-53.

Gustafson draws upon two separate sources of imagery, Canadian nature and European art, to create two distinctive poetic styles. In his most recent phase, however, he has grown toward a synthesis and a "repatriation" of themes and style.

Ember, J.M. "A.M. Klein's Meditation on Life." Journal of Commonwealth Literature, 13:1 (August 1978), 1-18.

In "The Cripples," Ant of the Pulver and Polished Lens" and The Second Scroll, we can trace three phases of the debate on faith and despair which pervades Klein's work.

_____. "Margaret Avison: Power, Knowledge and the Language of Poetry." Canadian Poetry, no. 4 (Spring/Summer 1979), 29-44.

Avison's understanding of language as the vehicle of the rational imagination has been made more complex by her "dumbfounding" Christian conversion. She must "learn to read a new testament," written in the paradoxically wordless language of God's knowledge and power.

_____. "Margaret Avison's Portrait of a Lady: 'The Agnes Cleves Papers."' Concerning Poetry, 12:2 (Fall 1979), 17-24.

An analytical discussion of the "Agnes Cleves Papers," considering the building of a persona through recollective reconstruction of experience.

Maduakor, Hezzy. "Narcotics and the Irrational: An Interpretation of E.J. Pratt's The Witches' Brew." Journal of Commonwealth Literature, 14:1 (August 1979), 18-27.

The Witches' Brew has been ignored or misunderstood by critics. Although both comic and "extravagant," the poem reflects Pratt's tragic view of life, addressing itself to the demonic, both in nature and in man.

Mallineon, Jean. "Retrospect and Product: P.K. Page." West Coast Review, 13:3 (February 1979), 8-11.

Page's movement from "rhetorical embellishment" toward "austerity nuance" is traced with attention to an increasing participation of the personal "I" her poetry.

Maduator, Eli. "Masks of Criticism: A.J.M. Smith as Anthologist." Canadian Poetry, no. 4 (Spring/Summer 1979), 17-28.

A discussion of the contribution of Smith's many anthologies of Canadian poetry to standards of criticism.

Manabridge, Francis. "A Delicate Balance: Craft in Raymond Souster's Poetry." Canadian Poetry, no. 4 (Spring/Summer 1979), 45-51.

Souster's poetry has received mixed reactions, but close attention to his work supports favourable criticism. Despite a narrow poetic range and modest technical accomplishment, Souster achieves a "delicate ironic poise" in his best work.

Namjoshi, Suniti. "In the Whale's Belly: Jay Macpherson's Poetry." Canadian Literature, no. 79 (Winter 1978), 54-59.

The poems of Macpherson's collection, Welcoming Disaster, seem simpler and more "familiar" than those of The Boatman, but the former contain a further dimension in their exploration of the underworld of night mare.

Oliver, Michael Brian.: "Elizabeth Smart: Recognition." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 12 (Fall 1978), 106-133.

By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept is "an apocalyptic poem, a rewriting of the Bible in the tradition of William Blake." It claims precedence for perfect love over all other human emotions and concerns.

Pearce, John. "Fried Eggs and the Workings of the Right Lobe: An Interview with P.K. Page." Quarry, 28:4 (Autumn 1979), 30-42.

In an autobiographical interview, Page discusses her own sense of the creative process in the relationship between real and imagined worlds. Speaking of particular poems, she reveals gestation and compositional influences.

Pettigrew, Damien. "Interview with Ralph Gustatson." CV II, 4:2 (Spring 1979), 26-30.

Pollock, Zailig. "A Response to Michael Taylor's 'Snow Blindness."' Studies in Canadian Literature, 4:1 (Winter 1979),177-179.

Pollock defends Francis Zichy's reading of the opening lines of Avison's "Snow" as a response to what is actually there, not to what a preconception has led him to think should be there. The discussion is continued by Robert Lecker in "Exegetical Blizzard" (SCL, 4:1 (Winter 1979), 180-184) and Francis Zichy in "A Response to Robert Lecker's 'Exegetical Blizzard' and Michael Taylor's 'Snow Blindness"' (SCL, 4:2 (Summer 1979), 147-154).

Popham, E.A. "A.M. Klein: The Impulse to Define." Canadian Literature, no. 79 (Winter 1978), 5-17.

Klein's novel, The Second Scroll, provides an examination of poetic alternatives which parallels the transition in themes and techniques evident in The Rocking Chair. Here Klein moves from traditional Jewish themes and modes of expression to a concept of the poet as definerator of a new culture.

Precosky, Donald. "Frank Prewett, a Canadian Georgian Poet." Studies in Canadian Literature, 4:2 (Summer 1979), 132-136.

While in England during World War I, Prewett met Siegfried Sassoon, and through him Lady Ottoline Morrell and her friends. His verse reflects the characteristic pessimism of the Georgian poets.

Preston, Michele. "The Poetry of P.K. Page: A Checklist." West Coast Review, 13:3 (February 1979), 12-17.

Ricou, L.R. "Into My Green World: The Poetry of Miriam Waddington." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 12 (Fall 1978), 144-161.

The metaphor of plant growth is central to Waddington's poetic vision. A "passionate, convinced, robust, determined innocence" pervades her strongest poetry, which bears comparison with the work of Theodore Roethke.

_____. "Miriam Waddington: A Checklist 1936-1975." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 12 (Fall 1978), 162-191.

Rooke, Constance. "Approaching P.K. Page's 'Arras."' Canadian Poetry, no. 4 (Spring/Summer 1979), 65-72.

A close reading of Page's visionary poem.

Siemens, Reynold. "Archetypal Bovinism in Willows Revisited" CV II, 4:1 (Winter 1979), 40-41.

A number of poems in Hiebert's Willows Revisited celebrate the cow, an important figure in Western Canada's cultural heritage.

Sullivan, Rosemary. "A Size Larger than Seeing: The Poetry of P.K. Paged Canadian Literature, no.79 (Winter 1978), 32-42.

Page's susceptibility to image is both strength and vulnerability, as she herself recognizes in her constant effort to reach to a vision of the informing structure beyond mere "seeing."

Waddington, Miriam. "The Function of Folklore in the Poetry of A.M. Klein." Ariel, 10:3 (July 1979), 5-19.

Klein's complex use of elements of Jewish folklore in his early poetry illustrates the function of the artist in articulating the "ideology of the collective" in an individual voice.

Whitney, Joyce. "Death and Transfiguration: The Mature Love Poems of Dorothy Livesay." Room of One's Own, 5:1/2 (1979), 100-112.

Traces Livesay's evolution from a "hesitancy before life" found in youthful love lyrics to acceptance of natural cycles which give rhythm to the later love poetry.

Wilson, Jean. "Introduction [to the Dorothy Livesay Issue]: Travelling Lives." Room of One's Own, 5:1/2 (1979), 5-12.

Woodcock, George. "Sun, Wind, and Snow: The Poems of Dorothy Livesay." Room of One's Own, 5:1/2 (1979), 46-62.

Discusses the range of Livesay's work during the course of her career, pointing to her "poetic honesty" as reflection of the self in the search for personally meaningful truths.


CONTEMPORARY

Bed, Virgins "One Poet in Two Parts: A Study of Hans Jewinski." University of Windsor Review, 14:2 (Spring/Summer 1979), 16-24.

Human duality is suggested thematically in the observer/participant situations of Jewinski's poetry and reflected stylistically by tiered narrative structures held in a "productive" tension.

Blazek, Douglas. "Touched with Wonder." Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 65-66.

Thibaudeau's poetry is a "sophisticated vehicle carrying simple, earthy events."

Bowering, George. "Given This Body: An Interview with Daphne Marlatt." Open Letter, ser. 4, no. 3 (Spring 1979), 32-88.

In this lengthy and detailed interview, Marlatt discusses literary influences, the importance of a "sense of place," and the structural and thematic interrelationships of prose and verse forms in her work.

_____. "Starting at Our Skins: An Interview with Frank Davey." Open Letter, ser. 4, no. 3 Spring 1979), 89-181.

A lengthy interview exploring Davey's activities as poet, editor and academic critic. Davey discusses his conception of the extended "serial poem," which focuses evolving responses to "areas of engagement." The interview also contains Davey's wide-ranging comments on the current

_____. "The Poems of Fred Wah." Concerning Poetry, 12:2 (Fall, 1979), 3-13.

Discusses the B.C. poet in terms of his sense of continuity between interior and exterior worlds. In avoiding the distancing quality of description, Wah reaches toward a creative participation in his subject material which Bowering relates to the linear and immediate aspects of musical improvisation.

Brown, Allan. "Beyond the Crenel — A View of Bowering." Brick, no. 6 (Spring 1979), 36-39.

Recent works by George Bowering are discussed in this expansive review/commentary, exploring particularly their evocation of cultural and physical landscapes as agents of the author's self-definition.

Brown, Dennis. "Susan Musgrave: The Self and the Other." Canadian Literature, no. 79 (Winter 1978), 60-73.

Musgrave's poetic development charts a process through which the rarity between the self and the other is resolved in a complex and multi-faceted synthesis.

Dabydeen, Cyril. "Deepening the Enigma; Interview with Joy Kogawa." CV II, 4:3 (Fall 1979), 31-33.

Kogawa suggests the "deceptive" nature of metaphor and discusses mythic and cultural patterns in her works, especially in terms of Japanese-Canadian "identity."

Davidson, Arnold E. "Entering The Circle Game: Margaret Atwood's Beginnings as a Poet." Concerning Poetry, 12:2 (Fall 1979), 47-54.

This essay takes the titular concept of "game" as the key to the emergence of Atwood's evasive poetic personae.

Dragisic, Peggy. "'Rain Leaf & Moss Wetroof Talk': Aspects of Colleen Thibaudeau's Poetic Voice." Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 38-49.

"Colleen Thibaudeau's poetry is informed by a vision of the interconnectedness of all things, for which she develops the symbol of  'one big sea.'

Dragland, Stan. "Thinking Every Which Way." Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 14-17

An article/review of Colleen Thibaudeau's Air, 14-16.

_____. "Tom Marshall's The White City." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 12, (Fall 1978), 192-203.

In The White City, the last of his "four elements quartet," Marshall develops a vision of the recovery of Eden in both the physical and the mental space that is Canada.

Gibb, Michael, ed. "Discography". In Sound Poetry, A Catalogue for the Eleventh International Sound Poetry Festival, Toronto, Canada, October 14 to 21, 1978, edited by Steve McCaffery and bp Nichol. Toronto: Underwhich Editions, [1979], 75-88.

A listing, revised and updated by bpNichol, of Gibb's Kontextsound; a compilation of sound poetry, text-sound compositions, poésie sonore, auditive texts, optophonetics, verbosonics, lingual music (Amsterdam: Kontext Publications, 1977).

Gold, Artie. "Poetic mêlée drama." Books in Canada, 8:2 (February 1979),

A survey of the Montreal poetry scene over the past ten years.

Grady, Wayne. "Susan Musgrave Comes to Grips with the Mystical World of West Coast Mythology." [Interview] Books in Canada, 8:4 (April 1979), 32.

Irvine, Lorna. "The Red and Silver Heroes Have Collapsed." Concerning Poetry, 12:2 (Fall 1979), 59-68.

Explores the restructuring of sexual mythologies through the course of Atwood's poetry. Male/female dichotomies create a world of hostility and disguise only to be chanced by recognition of a joint struggle toward humanity.

"Just an English-speaking Person."  [Inteview with Ian Young]  CV II, 4:3 (Fall 1979). 45-48.

Young discusses his poetry as an extension of gay activism and considers the role of gay poet in Canada, especially in discovering and exploring a "gay heritage."

Mallinson, Jean. "A Reading of Pat Lane." Brick, no. 7 (Fall 1979), 5-8.

Lane's poetry embodies the contraries of vulnerability and destructive ness in man through verbal and graphic imagery. Abstraction and emblematic structures are creative gestures in which language may focus meaning in the physical world.

"A Margaret Atwood Interview with Karla Hammond." Concerning Poetry, 12:2 (Fall 1979),73-81.

Atwood discusses her academic background, the aural aspects of poetry, and the relation of her poetry to her prose works.

McCaffery, Steve. "Sound Poetry: A Survey." In Sound Poetry, A Catalogue for the Eleventh International Sound Poetry Festival, Toronto, Canada, October 14 to 21, 1978, edited by Steve McCaffery and bpNichol. Toronto: Underwhich Editions, [1979], 6-18.

A descriptive, historical account which places Canadian sound poetry in context as a movement, citing major influences and directions.

McCombs, Judith. "Atwood's Nature Concepts: An Overview." Waves, 7:1 (Fall 1978), 68-77.

Explores "Atwood's woman-centred critique of the men's nature myth, in which nature is regarded as a female temptress/threat. In Atwood's poetry, women identify with nature against man, finding a life-source in acceptance of the natural world.

McKay, Jean. "A Biographical Sketch" [Two Interviews with Colleen Thibaudeau] Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 6-11.

_____. "A Colleen Thibaudeau Checklist." Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 71-78.

_____, and Don McKay. "Colleen Thibaudeau's Elastic Moment." Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 29-32.

Thibaudeau's poetry maintains a primitive pre-school power, resisting the "closure of a confining perspective and subject matter." Her vision encompasses both "homing and adventurous impulses."

"More Poems by Colleen Thibaudeau." Brick, no. 6 (Spring 1979), 25.

Additions to the Colleen Thibaudeau checklist published in Brick, no. 5 (Winter 1979), 71-78.

Moritz, Albert. "The Private Life of Don Coles, Unprolific Poet; Things that Matter Are Closest to Home." [Interview] Books in Canada, 8:7 (August/September 1979), 36-37.

Norris, Ken. "Interview bpNichol: Feb. 13, 1978." Essays on Canadiian Writing, no. 12 (Fall 1978), 243-250.

Oliver, Michael Brian. Poet's Progress: The Development of Alden Now lan's Poetry. Fredericton: Fiddlehead Poetry Books, 1978. 46 pp.

Explores Nowlan's poetry as a progressive process of self-definition, of ten in the face of a hostile or absurd external world.

Pearce, Jon. "The Lives Behind Things: An Interview with Tom Wayman." Quarry, 28:4 (Autumn 1979), 57-70.

Extended interview exploring influences, circumstance of composition, and dramatic techniques in his poetry, and constructive image patterns welding the material and human worlds. Also considered are didactic impulses which seem to emphasize content over form.

Rosenberg, Jerome. " 'For of Such is the Kingdom . . .': Margaret Atwood's Two Headed Poems." Essays on Canadian Writing, no. 16 (Fall/Winter 1979-80), 130-139.

Rosenberg sees a "vigorous development of fresh details that underpin both a new philosophic strength and a continued mellowing of her traditionally caustic tone" in Atwood's most recent collection.

Scobie, Stephen. "Everyone is an Expert on the Present. An Interview with Tom Wayman." NeWest ReView, 4:5 (January 1979), 3-4, 14.

Wayman discusses the "poetry of daily experience," seeing work as "the central experience of the Prairies" and an avenue to personal identity.

_____. Regional Documentaries." NeWest ReView, 4:10 (June 1979), 7.

Discusses the National Film Board's film adaptation of Saskatchewan poet Andy Suknaski's Wood Mountain Poems as appropriate because of the poems' visual-physical immediacy "at home in the landscape."

Sillers, Pat. "Power Impinging: Hearing Atwood's Vision." Studies in Canadian Literature, 4:1 (Winter 1979), 59-70.

The reader of Atwood's poems is lured into playing roles and taking part in the dramatic dialogue the poet generates between the "voice of then poems and the eye of the reader."

[Stange, Ken] "Interview [with Allan Brown]." Nebula, no. 10 (May 1979),

Brown discusses the relationship between concrete and abstract imagery in his poetry, as well as gestures of language and major themes.

Stenbaek-Lafon, Marianne, and Ken Norris. "An Interview with Joe Rosenblatt." CV II, 4:1 (Winter 1979), 32-37.

Triangle, Dick. "Layering and Levering: Notes on the Poetry of Colleen Thibaudeau." Brick, no.5 (Winter 1979), 19-28.

Thesen, Sharon, ed. "14 Plums." [Extracts from an Interview with George Bowering] Capilano Review, no. 15:1 (1979), 86-107.

Bowering speaks of the relationships between poetry (temporal) and prose (spatial), the developments of his own poetic attitudes in terms of regionalism and the past, and the relationship with his audience.

Thompson, Lee Briseoe, and Deborah Black. "The Dance of a Pot-bellied Poet: Explorations into 'A Tall Man Executes a Jig.'" Concerning Poetry, 12:2 (Fall 1979), 33-3.

In its seven-sonnet form, the poem is formally reflective of the dancing motions it enacts, an emblematic "dance of the creative process," explored here in terms of image patterns, structural movements, and the final fusion of thought and feeling.

Wachtel, Eleanor. "Why b b into C.C. Won't Go." Books in Canada, 8:6 (June/July 1979), 3-6.

A chronicle of bill bisett's recent career, particularly events surrounding and subsequent to his loss of Canada Council funding.

Watt, F.W. "A Different Son: Walter Canadian Poetry." Canadian Forum, 59:692 (September 1979), 20-24.

For over twenty years after his emigration from Germany, Bauer lived and wrote in Canada, exploring in his work the broadening sense of interrelationship between Europe and Canada. This openness is contrasted with the predominantly national emphases of Pratt, F.R. Scott, George Johnston, Layton, Lee and others, suggesting that Bauer's work (nearly all in German) offers an affirmative, humanistic "poetry of experience."

Weir, Lorraine. "'Fauna of Mirrors': The Poetry of Hebert and Atwood." Ariel, 10:3 (July 1979), 5-19.

In Hébert's Le Tombeau des rois, parallel images of eyes, water, mirrors, reflection chart the female person's acquiescent passage through life and death. Similar images in Atwood's poems are expressions not of desensitization and passivity, but of felt pain and the struggle of the individual will toward liberation.

Wiseman, Christopher. "Reticence and Emergence: The Poetry of Florence McNeil." CV II, 4:2 (Spring 1979), 36-40.

Florence McNeil is a young poet, but her five books represent an already important achievement, revealing a fine command of visual metaphor, a substantial range of content, and masterful control of tone.


GENERAL STUDIES

Broad, Margaret. "The Eclectic Yes: Fred Cogswell and Hi Fiddlehead Publications." CV II, 4:2 (Spring 1979), 9-14.

A discussion of the Editorial policy of Fiddlehead and the Fiddlehead poetry books under Fred Cogswell.

Godard, Barbara. "The Avant-garde in Canada: Open Letter and La Barre du jour." Ellipse, 23/24 (1979),98-113.

These two Little Magazines are seen as nurturing Modernist literature, La Barre du jour offering a vehicle for Quebec literary activity in concrete, "pop," and avant-garde, and Open Letter providing critical devellopment of a "new poetics," often expanding into exploration of multi- and cross-media arts.

Marshall, Tom. Harsh and Lovely Land; The Major Canadian Poets and the Making of a Canadian Tradition. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1979. 184 pp.

"Examines four stages in the development of a purely Canadian tradition in poetry through a focus on the work of major poets writing in English from the mid-nineteenth century to the present." Elements previously appeared as the "Major Canadian Poets, 1978-79.

Pearce, John, ed. 12 Voices; Interviews with Canadian Poets. Ottawa: Borealis Press, 1979. 250 pp.

Interviews with Brewster, MacEwen, Marshall, Musgrave, Page, Souster, Wayman, Helwig, Lee, Newlove, Ondaatje, and Waddington.

Ricou, Laurie. "The Three Provinces of Prairie Poetry." NeWest ReView, 4:7 (March 1979), 5-6, 12, 14.

Seeking to explode the clichés of prairie homogeneity in themes of desolation or nostalgic pastoral, this essay considers the recent output and present literary environment in Saskatchewan (dominant), Manitoba (Winnipeg-centred), and Alberta (more prose-oriented).

Walsh, William. "The Shape of Canadian Poetry." Sewanee Review, 87:1 (Winter 1979), [73]-95.

A summational overview of the Canadian poetry scene leads into discussion of key figures of what the author sees as "main lines in the tradition of contemporary Canadian poetry": Anne Wilkinson (English), Robert Finch (European), A.M. Klein (Jewish), and Earle Birney (North American).

Linda Dowler and
Mary Anne Jameson