“Bubbles,” by Dorothy Rushbrook

Rushbrook, Dorothy. “Bubbles.” Creative Young Canada: Collection of Verse, Drawings and Musical Compositions by Young Canadians from Seven to Twenty Years of Age. Ed. Aletta E. Marty. Foreward “Agnes Delamoure” (Nancy Durham). Toronto: Dent, 1928.

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Nova Scotia Book of Verse: Halifax Bicentenary Edition (1949)

Because our project includes authors whose first publication is 1950 or earlier, we include all books published by our authors, regardless of date. Not so with anthologies, or we would be overwhelmed completely trying to keep track of whose poetry and stories have been picked up in obscure—or even less obscure—collections around the globe. I recently ran across the Nova Scotia Book of Poetry, volume 1, which was published in 1949. (Volumes 2 and 3 were published in 1951 and 1953.) I am not sure whether there are further volumes, but the first three were co-edited by one of our authors, Sister Maura (née Mary Power) of Halifax, and so are of interest.
Most of the poetry in this collection is still bound by copyright, so I have not reproduced it here, but I have provided a list of contributors, with the women poets’ names in italics. Of these fifty-four poets, we have entries for only four (in bold), and only twelve were on our extended list. That leaves forty-two new women to learn more about; all we know is that they all lived in Nova Scotia in the 1940s. Any other information would, of course, be greatly appreciated!

Rhodenizer, Vernon B., and Sister Maura, eds. Nova Scotia Book of Verse, vol. 1 (Halifax, NS: Nova Scotia Centre, Poetry Society of England, 1949).

Maura, Sister
Rhodenizer, Vernon B. (editor)

Algar, Helen Bryant
Archibald, Bertha Ogilvie
Baird, Mabel Gladys
Baker, Isobel Howley
Beckford, Elizabeth
Bendall, Christobel
Beveridge, Helen
Boggs, Marguerite
Bone, Mrs. James W.
Brooks, Helen E.
Brow, Adeline
Bushell, Sydney
Christie, Mrs. R.S.
Currie, Ernest Prest
Darby, Louis Fraser
Davis, Sarah R.
Eaton, Mrs. O.
Edgecombe, Elizabeth
Edwards, Muriel K.A.
Fulton, Ellen
Garbutt, Elizabeth
Gorrill, Mrs. Albert
Goddard, Lila B.
Gunn, A.S.
Hart, Jean Thomson
Hart, Gilbert S.
Hartigan, K.L.
Henry, Eileen Cameron
Holdsworth, Roger, M.
Horne, Winnifred
Kennedy, Isobel
Kendrick, Peter
Kirkconnell, Watson
Lewis, H.V.
Lorton, Mary Woodworth
Loomer, L.O.
Loubett, Elsie
MacAskill, Ellis
McCarthy, Mrs. J.
MacCormack, Phyllis
MacDonald, Agnes Foley
MacIntosh, Claire Harris
McLean, Elizabeth
McLeod, Bea
Magee, Eldon, S.
Moore, Philip H.
Mosher, Mrs. B.
Murray, E.M.
Murray, Frances C.
Murray, Rev. Robert
Nicholson, Jean M.
Outhouse, E. Laurence
Patra
Preston, Margaret M.
Pugsley, Josephine H.
Ritcey, Rev. Norman
Rive, H.M.
Riveden, Helen C.
Sister Mary Rose
Russell, Edith
Ryan, E. Anne
Schurman, Bertie Bowlby
Silver, B.C.
Smith, A.W.L.
Smith, Olive Gertrude
Steeves, Mildred H.
Stewart, D.I.
Stuart, Veronica
Sullivan, Mary A.
Sutherland, Robert
Thomson, Mona
Trask, Enid
Tupper, Kathryn (Munro)
Tyler, Hilda Washington
Warren, Sarah H.
Watt, John S.
Freeman, B. Webb
Westcott, Mrs. C.
Winters, Rose
Woodworth, Aimee H.
Wright, Evelyn Frances
Zinck, Russel

“The Tree and The Child,” by Catherine de Vaux MacKinnon

“Trinette” [Catherine de Vaux MacKinnon]. “The Tree and The Child.” Creative Young Canada: Collection of Verse, Drawings and Musical Compositions by Young Canadians from Seven to Twenty Years of Age. Ed. Aletta E. Marty. Toronto: Dent, 1928. 117.

Catherine de Vaux MacKinnon, the daughter of Lilian Vaux MacKinnon, wrote this in her youth; it is one of her four poems included in Creative Young Canada (1928).

“Rise Up Ye Dead,” by Elizabeth S.G. Belyea

Belyea, Elizabeth S.G. “Rise Up Ye Dead.” The Poetic Voice of America. Ed. Margaret Nelson (New York: Avon, 1940): 46.

“Peace,” by Stella Bainbridge

Bainbridge, Stella M. “Peace.” University Magazine 18 (1919): 301.

Flying Colours (1942), edited by Charles G.D. Roberts

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Amabel King, Amelia Garvin, Annie Charlotte Dalton, Audrey Alexandra Brown, Dorothy Dumbrille, Edna Jaques, Eloise Hamilton, Frances Beatrice Taylor, Frances Hanson, Irene Chapman Benson, Katherine Hale, Kathryn Munro, Marjorie Pickthall, Robina Monkman, Sara Carsley, Verna Loveday Harden

Roberts, Sir Charles G. D., ed. Flying Colours (Toronto: Ryerson, 1942).

Late last night, after I finished preparing the post for Remembrance Day 2017, I thought to myself: Why wait for Remembrance Day 2018 to post another digital edition of “contemporary patriotic verse,” this one edited by one of Canada’s foremost poets at the time, Charles G.D. Roberts. It seems more important to get this text out into the digital world, so others can have access to it.

“This collection,” Roberts tells us, “is intended primarily for use in Canadian schools [so that] our young pupils should be aroused to a consciousness and appreciation of our budding Canadian literature.” I remember reading many of these poems in school in the 1970s, so obviously his selection has formed the canon of patriotic Canadian poetry. It is interesting to note, too, that some of the poems in this volume also appear in Voices of Victory, posted earlier this morning.

It turns out that individual poems must be out of copyright, not just the volume, so I have had to excise a few authors’ works. Higher resolution versions of the images, as well as copies of the excised poems, are available upon request.

 

 

“Pauline Johnson,” by Margaret Fairley

Even in 1954, female critics were lamenting the exclusion of Canada’s Early Women Writers from the canon of Canadian literature, such as it existed at that time. In this 1954 article in the magazine New Frontiers, Margaret Fairley tells us that E. Pauline Johnson, now recognized as an iconic early Canadian poet, was “cold-shouldered by the clique of poets and novelists who [were[ more at home with the cosmopolitan writers of the United States and Britain than with the people of Canada.”

Yet the number of our authors who have written articles on Johnson, published contemporaneously or long after her death, speaks to her popularity throughout the decades; Sara Jeannette Duncan even interviewed her for the Toronto Globe in 1886. As with so many early women writers, modern critical interest in E. Pauline Johnson is finally restoring her to her rightful place within her national literature. This article by Margaret Fairley was part of the movement towards such restoration.

One again, I have posted images of the pages as well as a searchable pdf of the article. The two poems included are by E. Pauline Johnson.