Canadian poetry

Canadian poetry is poetry of or typical of Canada. The term encompasses poetry written in Canada or by Canadian people in other languages versus those written in Canadian languages. They are written in English, French, Gaelic and Aboriginal languages.

English-Canadian poetry

Beginnings

The earliest works of poetry, mainly written by visitors, described the new territories in optimistic terms, mainly targeted at a European audience. One of the first works was Robert Hayman's Quodlibets, composed in Newfoundland and published in 1628.

With the growth of English language communities near the end of the 18th century, poetry aimed at local readers began to appear in local newspapers. These writings were mainly intended to reflect the prevailing cultural values of the time and were modeled after English poetry of the same period.

Oliver Goldsmith's long poem The Rising Village appeared in 1825. It was a response to The Deserted Village by his namesake and great-uncle Oliver Goldsmith.

In the first half of the 19th century, poetic works began to reflect local subjects. Acadia by Joseph Howe and The Saint Lawrence and the Saguenay by Charles Sangster are examples of this trend. Early nationalistic verses were composed by writers including Thomas D'Arcy McGee. Many "regional" poets also espoused the British political and aesthetic jingoism of the period. For example, High Tory loyalist & occasional poet Thomas H. Higginson of Vankleek Hill, Ontario, produced paeans to Sir Francis Bond Head (Wm. Lyon Mackenzie's opponent) and the British war effort in the Crimea (such as Sonnet to Florence Nightingale and others), while producing some interesting nature verse exemplifying the all-pervasive influence of Wordsworth's view of nature and the sublime.

In 1857, Charles Heavysege attracted international (British and American) attention for his verse drama Mari na de Saul.[1]

Confederation

The first book of poetry published in Canada following the formation of the new Dominion of Canada in 1867 was Dreamland by Charles Mair (1868).

A group of poets now known as the "Confederation Poets",including Charles G. D. Roberts, Archibald Lampman, Bliss Carman, Duncan Campbell Scott, and William Wilfred Campbell, came to prominence in the 1880s and 1890s, Choosing the world of nature as their inspiration, their work was drawn from their own experiences and, at its best, written in their own tones. Isabella Valancy Crawford, Frederick George Scott, and Francis Sherman are also sometimes associated with this group.

During this period, E. Pauline Johnson and William Henry Drummond were writing popular poetry - Johnson's based on her part-Mohawk heritage, and Drummond, the Poet of the Habitant, writing dialect verse.

Early 20th century

In 1907 Robert W. Service's Songs of a Sourdough, Kipling-type verse about the Klondike Gold Rush, became enormously popular: the book would go on to sell more than three million copies in the 20th century. His success would be inspire many other poets, such as Tom MacInnes.

Marjorie Pickthall received much critical attention in this period. In 1915, John McCrae, serving as a surgeon in the Canadian Army, wrote the famous war poem "In Flanders Fields".

After the war, in Newfoundland, E. J. Pratt described the struggle to make a living from the sea in poems about maritime life and the history of Canada; while in central Canada, poets such as Ralph Gustafson and Raymond Knister were moving away from traditional verse forms.

During the 1920s and 1930s, the Montreal Group (a circle of young poets which included A.J.M. Smith, A.M. Klein, and F. R. Scott) helped inspire the development of modernist poetry in Montreal through the McGill Fortnightly Review and the 1936 anthology New Provinces. The "new poetry" valued intellect over sentimentality, or as some have put it, logic over human emotions . Under the literary editorship of Earle Birney, the Canadian Forum helped promote similar developments in Toronto. Dorothy Livesay, born in Manitoba, was an important contributor to the Toronto movement.

The Maritimes remained a holdout for traditional verse. The Song Fishermen of Halifax were a magnet for new poetic talent in the late 1920s due to having Bliss Carman and Charles G.D. Roberts as members. The most notable of the new poets were the sonneteers Kenneth Leslie and Robert Norwood.

The Canadian Poetry Magazine was founded by Pelham Edgar of the Canadian Authors Association in 1936.[2] Traditional verse was what sold in Canada all through this period; and it was what Canadian Poetry Magazine emphasized. Wilson MacDonald was a top selling Canadian poet of the time.

Post-war

Following World War II, a new breed of poets appeared, writing for a well-educated audience. These included James Reaney, Jay Macpherson and Leonard Cohen. Meanwhile, some maturing authors such as Irving Layton, Raymond Souster, Harold Standish and Louis Dudek, moved in a different direction, adopting colloquial speech in their work.

In the 1960s, a renewed sense of nation helped foster new voices: Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje, Leonard Cohen, Eli Mandel and Margaret Avison. Others such as Al Purdy, Milton Acorn, and Earle Birney, already published, produced some of their best work during this period.

The TISH Poetry movement in Vancouver brought about poetic innovation from bpNichol, Jamie Reid, George Bowering, Fred Wah, Frank Davey, Daphne Marlatt, David Cull, and Lionel Kearns.

Since the 1990s, several Governor General's Award-winning poets, in particular Jan Zwicky and Tim Lilburn, have been engaged in nonfiction writing that maps the relationships between poetry and philosophy. Zwicky's "Lyric Philosophy" and "Wisdom and Metaphor", as well as Lilburn's collection "Thinking and Singing", are representative works.

A younger generation of Canadian poets has been expanding the boundaries of originality: Brian Brett, Ken Babstock, Karen Solie, Lynn Crosbie, Patrick Lane, David McGimpsey, Stuart Ross, Sonnet L'Abbé, George Elliott Clarke and Barry Dempster have all imprinted their unique consciousnesses onto the map of Canadian imagery. Evie Christie's collection, Gutted, seems to evoke the 17th century metaphysical conceit, but in a modern, urban Canadian guise.

A notable anthology of Canadian poetry is The New Oxford book of Canadian Verse, edited by Margaret Atwood (ISBN 0-19-540450-5).

Literary prizes

Notable literary prizes for English Canadian poetry include the Governor General's Awards, the Griffin Poetry Prize, the Gerald Lampert Award, and the Pat Lowther Award.

Uniquely Canadian forms

Mirelle

Tom MacInnes reportedly invented "a five-line stanza of his own he called the ‘mirelle’."[3]

Viator

The Viator poem form was invented by Canadian author and poet Robin Skelton. It consists of any stanzaic form in which the first line of the first stanza is the second line of the second stanza and so on until the poem ends with the line with which it began. The term, Viator comes from the Latin for traveller. An example of Skelton's form may be found in his excellent reference book, The Shapes of our Singing, and is entitled Dover Beach Revisited.

An unpublished example of the Viator is included below to illustrate how the line travels through the poem, its repetition adding weight to the process described. The repeating line is highlighted in boldface type.

Shallot Confiture by Russell Collier

It's care in cooking slow and carefully
that turns a shallot glistening golden brown;
in salted water first you must weigh down
the scalded bulbs to meet this recipe.

Boil vinegar and sugary spices;
it's care in cooking slow and carefully
the syruped shallots, gradually,
then overnight, you'll rest the shallot slices.

Then two days more, you'll slow repeat
your patient simmering, calmly, gently;
it's care in cooking slow and carefully
that yields your shallots clear and sweet.

By fourth day, time to lift them free,
to pack them in that savoury sauce,
preserve that silky, golden gloss;
it's care in cooking slow and carefully.

French-Canadian poetry

Early verse

The first book written in verse by a Canadian was Maryadharaman Épîtres, Satires, Chansons, Épigrammes et Autres Pièces de vers by Michel Bibaud, published in 1830.

Mouvement littéraire

A group of French-speaking poets and authors belonging to the Mouvement littéraire came to Ottawa from Quebec City when the civil service moved to Ottawa in 1870. This group included Alfred Garneau, Antoine Gerin-Lajoie, Achilles Frechette and others. They are considered some of the most important poets and writers in 19th Century French Canada.

End of 19th century

Octave Crémazie is considered the father of French Canadian poetry. His poetry and that of his follower Louis Fréchette are romantic of form and patriotic in inspiration. At the same time, Pamphile Le May was writing intimist poetry about the simple farm life and Alfred Garneau wrote his feelings.

The Montreal School

L'École littéraire de Montréal was not a literary school but a group of poets that met regularly. In reaction to the earlier following of the romantic Victor Hugo, they took later schools (such as the Parnassian or symbolism) as their masters. The most talented among them was certainly Émile Nelligan, a young poet who stopped writing at only 19 years of age due to mental illness.

The terroir

Outside Montreal, other poets, such as Nérée Beauchemin (1850-1931) continued Pamphile Le May's depiction of the life of the habitants. Then came the powerful Alfred Desrochers (1901-1978), a precursor to the "pays" school of poetry of Gaston Miron and John Paul Ambas.

In 1937, Hector de Saint-Denys Garneau published the first book of modernist poetry in French Canada, Regards et Jeux dans l'espace. Garneau's reputation would soar in the 1950s after publication of his Complete Poems (1949) - as would that of his cousin, poet Anne Hébert (1916-2000).

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Charles Heavysege," Gale Encyclopedia of Biography, Answers.com. Web, Mar. 12, 2011.
  2. ↑ Harrington, Lyn (1981). Syllables of Recorded Time: The Story of the Canadian Authors Association, 1921-1981. Dundurn. pp. 174–. ISBN 978-0-88924-112-1.
  3. ↑ Donald Stephens, "Tom MacInnes Biography," Encyclopedia of Literature, 8275, JRank.org, Web, May 25, 2011.

Further reading

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