The Poetry of Confederation

Class Four

Housekeeping: (Suggested: 5 minutes)

• Your two-page proposal for the Short paper will be due next week, February 18^th, unless you are presenting. If that the case, I will take it the following week.  The paper itself will be due in three weeks, on March 4^th for everyone.  It is fine to use the subject of your 10-minute presentation as the subject of your Short Paper.

• Short Paper Assignment: Your short research paper will be 4-5 pages in length. It will offer a literary argument on one of the texts we have read by mid-semester. The paper will need to follow MLA conventions and have at least four academic secondary sources. 20% of your grade.

Opening In-Class Writing: (Suggested: 10 Minutes)

• For the past three weeks, I have asked you how Canada is represented through the readings we have encountered. Tonight, I want to ask you a slightly different question: What are the different versions of Canada – or what are the “Canadas”  – that you are seeing through these readings?

Group Discussion: (Suggested: 5 – 7 Minutes)

Class Discussion of Group Findings (Suggested: 5 -7 Minutes)

In-Class Writing: (Suggested: 10 minutes)

• What are the specific details from Wacousta that have stuck with you? Why? Do they relate to the theories we have been discussing or not? (5 minutes)

• What are the specific details from Candian Crusoes that have stuck with you? Why? Do they relate to the theories we have been discussing or not? (5 minutes)

Group Discussion (Suggested: 5-7 minutes)

Class Discussion of Group Findings (Suggested: 5-7 minutes)

Closing Activity: (5-10 minutes)

• We are approaching the end of our general introduction to Canadian Literature, and are about to move into new territory: Let’s compile a listing of key terms and concepts, quotes and notions that we might use as guidance from here on out.  Let’s begin by looking over our notes, and  then discussing what we find.

Break

Student Presentation: (Suggested: 10 minutes)

• Stewart’s presentation on Malcolm’s Katie

Class Discussion of Presentation: (Suggested: 5 minutes)

Canadian Confederation!

Historical Context: (Suggested: 5-7 minutes)

• So, we’ve been considering a lot of theory for the past three weeks, and tonight we are going to get a bit of a break from that to consider some historical information.

• This is the time-line we have been considering so far, though we have not read these books in this order:

Time-line so far:

·         The History of Emily Montague (1769)

·         Wacousta (1832)

·         Canadian Crusoes (1836)

·         The St. Lawrence and the Saguenay (1856)

·         Roughing it in the Bush (1852)

Canadian Confederation — 1864

·         Malcolm’s Katie (1884)

• One of the things that you may have noticed is that Malcom’s Katie appears to stand out in its sense of place. It is not entirely clear where all the action is occurring. It is kind of an “everyplace.”

• This is very different than the rest of the literature we have been encountering, and there’s a reason for that. It relates, at least in part, to Canadian Confederation

We have not talked about Confederation yet, but we need to now.

• Canada’s Confederation! What was it?

• Prior to 1864, Canada was a collection of colonies, each had its own government, like the US before the Revolution.

• First, we need to know that the provinces we today call Ontario and Quebec, used to be called “upper” and “lower” Canada. If you think that is weird, bear in mind that Maine used to be called Massachusetts.

• So — in Upper Canada and Lower Canada shared a common legislature.
  

• The English-speaking Canadians of upper Canada outnumbered the French of Lower Canada.
  

• But at the time, their legislature ran on equal representation, not representation by population. Kind of like our Senate today.
  

• Well, as the populations grew unequally, the government  became deadlocked.  Upper and Lower Canada solved this by uniting with the maritime colonies: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island.
  

• Well, now that the colonies were united, lots of questions emerged. It was no longer simply “what does it mean for me to be in this place.” Rather, the question was, what does it mean for “us” to be in this place – and who are “we,” anyway? This question is important because the Federal  Government suddenly had more control over the provinces that the provincial governments.
  

In-class Journal: (Suggested: 10 minutes)

• This is the question I want you to ask yourselves tonight. How easy of a question is it to ask and answer? Let’s approach it this way: What is your community? What does it mean to be from “here,” now, anyway? What is the point of your community identify? Do you think of yourself as a “Mainer” or “American?” A resident of Bangor?
  

• How are these identities different from one another, and do we have the tools to talk about these differences?

Group Discussion: (Suggested: 5 -7 Minutes)

Class Discussion: (Suggested: 5-7 minutes)

Mini-lecture: (Suggested: 10 minutes)

• Most of us probably use rhetorical techniques and narrative forms that we have harvested from our culture to express these ideas – but what happens if these techniques and narratives are taken away? What do we do then? Well – this is both a decidedly American and Canadian question, and the two nations have gone about answering it in very different ways.

Look at this time-line again:

·         The History of Emily Montague (1769) (Romance)

·         Wacousta (1832)   (Romance)

·         Canadian Crusoes (1836) (??!)

·         The St. Lawrence and the Saguenay (1856) (Sonnets)

·         Roughing it in the Bush (1852) (Travel writing)

Canadian Confederation — 1864

·         Malcolm’s Katie (1884) (??!)

• With a few exceptions, we have been considering writing about Canada written by people either visiting Canada, or writing about Canada for audiences that live outside of Canada.

• The narrative and poetic techniques have seen have been largely European in origins – or “Americanized” versions of European techniques, and there is good reason for this.

• However, once Canada underwent confederation, we begin to see efforts by Canadians to express Canada in literary language particular to Canada itself, as well as to its individual regions.
  

• This is a crucial stage for any nation. It is, essentially, becoming self-aware through artistic representations.Nothing really exists for a nation until it has been expressed through language — I would argue.
  

• Well, this gives rise to the question of what the voice of this new nation will be. Writers during this period are no longer only trying to speak to the literary market about Canada through well-worn literary conventions. Now, they must come up with the decidedly Canadian conventions for articulating the literature of Canada.

So – what does all this mean?

How do we create a voice?

Well, let’s address that question with another question:

• What is the point of poetry, anyway?  This is a question that often turns people off to English, or which people use as a weapon to attack people who study English literature.  It’s an enormously important question, and one you will need an answer to, if you don’t already have one.

So – try to come up with an answer…

In class Journal: (Suggested: 10 minutes)

Group Discussion: (Suggested: 5 minutes)

Class Discussion: (Suggested: 5 minutes)

• Well, one definition for poetry is that it is an effort to harness the full potential of language in the service of a particular interest or interests. Poetry sets the stage for narrative forms by calling landscapes, people and places into formation – formations that are then investigated in their particular relationships through narration, or “prose.”

Poetry of the Confederation (Mini-lecture: 10 minutes)

• Okay, so that’s poetry, in a nutshell (cliche!) – but if you are a Canadian living around 1864 looking for a Canadian voice, you have a HUGE problem on your hands.

• First, you nation’s literary tradition is defined in no small way by William Wordsworth, and there is also a troublesome poet south of the border named Walt Whitman to deal with (Emily Dickinson is writing at this time too, but here work is not published until a bit later).

William Wordsworth 1770-1850

Wordsworth harnesses poetic conventions to articulate the absolute connection between the internal and external landscape.

Walt Whitman: 1819-1892

Whitman, in an effort that is equally amazing,  investigates similar territory _without the same poetic conventions_ and in a wholly “American” voice.

• Well – what’s left?  These are two profound voices that still shape poetry today.

• What’s left is the third way, one that experiments with the established forms by infusing them with new content — a concern that will be shared at a later point by Modernist poets — in fact, we can see a great precursor to T.S. Eliot’s “The Wasteland” tonight.

• These poets had to work against, and with, the conventions of Victorian poetry and prose and the decline of the Romantic traditions.

So I wanted to take a few moments this evening just to introduce you to a few of the Confederation Poets:

• Charles G.D. Roberts 1860-1943

He attended the University of New Brunswick, where I go!

He was a teacher, like me.

But I could never grow a mustache like that.

Let’s consider a poem of his: Canada

• Bliss Carmen 1861 -1929

Also a “Frederictonian”

Let’s consider a poem by Bliss Carman

• Archibald Lampman

1861-1899

Let’s consider one of his poems

The City at the End of Things

Your homework for next time is to read and comment on the apparent themes and issues addressed in five poems by two of these three poets. Links to the work of all three can be found on this site

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