“Ice-lore,” by Lydia Frances Williamson
29 Tuesday Jan 2019
Posted Poetry
in29 Tuesday Jan 2019
Posted Poetry
in23 Wednesday Jan 2019
Posted Other arts
inWilliam Arthur Deacon, Poteen: A Pot-Pourri of Canadian Essays (Ottawa: Graphic, 1926)
In searching for information about one of our authors (Anastatia Hogan), I had occasion to go through a collection of texts by William Arthur Deacon, an eminent Canadian literary critic of the early twentieth century. I found reference to Anastatia in only one of his books (The Four Jameses), but did uncover a couple of other interesting tidbits. One is the appearance of two lists of titles at the end of Poteen: A Pot-Pourri of Canadian Essays (1926) (which, interestingly, was first copyrighted by the author in the USA in 1925, but copyrighted in Canada and published in Ottawa in 1926, but that is another story…). The first list in Poteen is “representative of Canadian literary achievement,” containing books by those authors W.A. Deacon considered important in 1926, but is “limited to books which are reasonably credible and still in print” (221). The second is a list of authors whose poems are included in a number of collections published at the time. (Perhaps this isn’t as interesting to others as it is to me, but let it be said that I have compiled an (incomplete) comparable list that I keep in an Excel spreadsheet.) In our entries for individual authors, we have included Deacon’s collection of collections, but Deacon has actually indexed all of the authors, male and female, in the following titles: (Note, though, that the editors’ names, editions, and publication dates don’t always correspond with the published texts I have held in my hands).
Broadus, E. K., and E. H. Broadus, eds. A Book of Canadian Prose and Verse (Toronto: Macmillan, 1923).
Campbell, Wilfred, ed. The Oxford Book of Canadian Verse (Toronto: Oxford UP, 1913). [Deacon has “Campbell, Logan, Oxford Book, 1913”; the 1913 edition was edited by William Wilfred Campbell alone, although John Edward Logan contributed to the collection significantly.]
Caswell, Edward S., ed. Canadian Singers and Their Songs: A Collection of Portraits, Autograph Poems and Brief Biographies. 3rd ed. (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1925).
Garvin, John W., ed. Canadian Poets, 2nd ed. (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1926).
Lighthall, William Douw, ed. Canadian Poems and Lays (London: Scott, [c1892]).
Rand, Theodore H., ed. A Treasury of Canadian Verse: With Brief Biographical Notes (New York: Dutton, 1900).
Watson, Albert Durrant, and Lorne Pierce, eds. Our Canadian Literature: Representative Verse, English and French (Toronto: Ryerson, 1922). [Deacon has “Watson-Pierce, Our Can Lit., 3rd ed., 1923”; the 3rd edition was actually edited by Bliss Carman and Lorne Pierce, and published in 1934.]
My list, compiled so I could determine which authors were out of copyright, and thereby know which titles I could share on our blog, includes (so far) the following titles:
Canadian Authors Association, Voices of Victory: Representative Poetry of Canada in War-time (Toronto: Macmillan, 1941).
Garvin, John W., ed. Canadian Poets, 1st ed. (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1916).
Garvin, John W., ed. Canadian Poems of the Great War (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1918).
Maxwell, Lillian Mary Beckwith, ed. River St. John and Its Poets (Sackville, NB: O’Brien, 1947).
Roberts, Charles G.D., ed. Flying Colours (Toronto: Ryerson, 1942).
Stephen, A.M., ed. The Golden Treasury of Canadian Verse, illustrated by E. Wallcousins. 1928 (Toronto: Dent, 1931).
Here are the pages, and the searchable pdf, from Deacon’s pot-pourri.
21 Monday Jan 2019
Posted Prose
inDespite it’s condescending title, “The Ladies: God Bless Them!”, a short article in William Arthur Deacon’s The Four Jameses (1927), is important in that it contains reference to some of “the ladies” who interest us: notably Anastatia Hogan.
In going back and revisiting authors we had revised in the SFU database, I noticed that our information about Anastatia Hogan might be erroneous. It might also be exactly true. The problem is, I can’t tell which. It turns out that there were at least three Anastatia (or Anastasia) Hogans born in Newfoundland at the right time to be our author, and we have no concrete evidence about which is the poet Anastatia.
W.A. Deacon’s article does not shed much light on this biographical conundrum, but it does tell us a little about Anastatia Hogan as a poet, and a very little, too, about other female poets of the time.
The opening poem in the article is by Lady Roddick (Amy Redpath Roddick). James McIntyre’s daughter Kate Ruttan is discussed in the text—not surprisingly as he in one of the “four Jameses”—along with only two other women: Anastatia Hogan from Newfoundland, and Lillian Forbes Gunter of Regina, Saskatchewan. Of these, most attention is given to Anastatia Hogan, but we are still left wondering who she was, who her parents were, where she lived, and how poetry was integrated into her fuller life.
We’ll delve a little deeper, of course, but so far we have no way of determining which Anastatia to follow, biographically. If anyone out there has more information, please let us know!
Deacon, William Arthur. “The Ladies: God Bless Them!” The Four Jameses (Ottawa: Graphic, 1927) 181-185.
18 Friday Jan 2019
Posted Uncategorized
inHigginson, Thomas Henry. “Lines to Mrs. Margaret Dixon McDougall.” Poetical Works of Thomas Higginson. Vankleek Hill, ON: A.W.Otto, 1888. 77.
A couple of weeks ago, we were contacted by Nancy Guppy, the great-great-granddaughter of Margaret Dixon McDougall, who had some minor edits to make to our original entry, in the static database at SFU. We had not yet revised the entry for inclusion in the new database, so I took on that task. What a complicated family! But between us we have figured it out, I believe.
In searching for information, I came across this poem by Irish-Canadian poet Thomas Higginson, an encomium to Margaret Dixon McDougall, who by this time had moved to Michigan to live with her parents and her half-brother’s family. She subsequently moved to Washington state, and died on a visit to Seattle in 1899.
12 Saturday Jan 2019
Posted Poetry
inThis poem was first published in Annie Charlotte Dalton‘s Lilies and Leopards (1935), which (as I said yesterday) was illustrated by Rowena Pauline Gross. I have no record of where this image came from, nor whether or not it is in Dalton’s hand, but as one of our correspondents was the niece of one of Dalton’s friends, it is possible. Let this be a warning to students out there everywhere to take meticulous notes while researching…
10 Thursday Jan 2019
Posted Biography, Other arts
inVal Lem at the Ryerson University Library, called to my attention an artist, Rowena Gross, who attended the Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Art in 1927-28, and published in The Paint Box, a school publication intended to advance interest in the decorative arts, especially in BC.
What makes Rowena Gross particularly interesting to our project is that she also illustrated Lilies and Leopards (Ryerson, 1935) by Annie Charlotte Dalton, as well as designing the cover for Dalton’s The Call of the Carillon (posted earlier on our website).
Val sent me a link to the complete run of The Paint Box, which has been digitized by the Emily Carr University of Art + Design here in Vancouver, so I have diligently gleaned the names of all of the contributors so we could add the women authors to our Database of Canada’s Early Women Writers. The volumes may be useful for artists’ biographers, as they list the names and addresses of students; the 1930 volume also provides short biographies of some graduates. It appears, though, that our Rowena attended for only two years before branching out into her artistic career. I am only beginning to research the finer details of her life, which will be available in our project in a few weeks. The point of this posting is to share with you the comprehensive index of contributors to The Paint Box during its five-year run.
The index below lists all authors and artists identified by name. Dates in isolation indicate a written contribution; other contributions (art, executive committee rolls) are labelled on a separate line.
In addition to the index, I wanted to share this image with you. Each volume has two pages for autographs; in the Emily Carr collection, only in volume 2 (1927) have the autograph pages been used.
A Student Potter | 1928 |
Amess, Fred | 1928; 1929; 1930 cover design, 1928; woodcut, 1928; linoleum cut, 1929 |
Atkins, Violet; as Vi Atkins | 1929 |
Bell-Irving, B. | 1926 |
Binning, Bertram | 1930 business manager, 1930 |
Brown, Louise | 1930 |
Carter, Edith | 1926 |
Carter, Margaret | 1930 |
Cianci, Vito; also as V.S. Cianci | 1926; 1927; 1928; 1930 editor, 1927; woodcut, 1928 |
Corry, Margaret | 1926; 1927 |
Cummings, Parke | poem from Saturday Evening Post, 1927 |
Cuppage, E.M.; also as Mrs. Cuppage | 1929 |
Currie, Ada F. | 1928; 1929 woodcut, 1928; linoleum cut, 1929 |
Davey, Brenda | 1926 |
De Pencier, Betty | 1927 |
Erb, Marion | linoleum cut, 1930 |
Farley, Lillias | woodcut, 1928 |
Farmer, Madge | 1927; 1928; 1929 editor, 1929; woodcut, 1928; linoleum cut, 1929 |
Findlater, Betty | 1929 |
Fisher, Orville | linoleum cut, 1930 |
Fowler, P.M. | 1926 |
Fuller, Phoebe | linoleum cut, 1929 |
Gatewood, Frances V. | 1926; 1927; 1928 |
Gordon, Mary | linoleum cut, 1930 |
Gostick, Marg | linoleum cut, 1929 |
Gross, Rowena | 1927; 1928 editorial staff, 1928 |
Harris, Irene E. | 1929 editorial staff, 1929, 1930; linoleum cut, 1929, 1930 |
Harrison, Katherine | 1927; 1928 cover designer, 1927; business manager 1928; woodcut, 1928 |
Hensman, Dorothy | 1926; 1927; 1928 |
Herchmer, Laurencia A. | 1927 |
Hill, Sybil | 1927; 1928 editor, 1928; woodcut, 1928 (often about First Nations: those Hills?) |
Hoffar, Irene | 1930 woodblock design, 1928; linoleum cut design, 1929; linoleum cut 1930 |
I.E.H.; likely Irene Harris | 1930 |
I.W. | 1930 |
Jensen, Maude | 1926 woodblock design, 1928 |
Johnson, Ruby; also as R.J., R. Johnson, and Ruby Johnston | 1927; 1929 |
King, Hermione | 1926 business manager, 1926 |
Kirkpatrick, Phillis M.; also as Phyllis | 1926; 1927; 1929 woodblock design, 1928; linoleum cut, 1929 |
Lennie, Beatrice; also B. Lennie and Bee Lennie | 1927; 1928; 1930 |
Lewis, Margaret | 1928 woodcut, 1928 |
Lyne, Marjorie | 1929 cover design, 1929 |
M.A.L. | 1927 |
M.C. | 1930 |
MacDonald, Ione; linoleum cut, 1930 | |
MacDonald, J.W.G. | 1927; 1928 |
MacIntosh, H. | 1927 |
MacPherson, Alice M.; also as Grease-Monkey Al Mac in 1930 | 1929; 1930 linoleum cut, 1929 |
Marega, Charles | 1926 |
Mason, Dorothy | linoleum cut, 1929 |
McGregor, E. | 1927 |
McKechnie, Eleanor | 1929 |
Meilleur, Peter | business manager, 1927; editorial staff, 1928; woodcut, 1928 |
Melvin, Grace W. | 1928. 1929; 1930 |
Moore, Ellen M. | 1926; cover design, 1926; cartoon sketches |
Moore, Rosalie | linoleum cut, 1930 |
One Who Knows | 1930 |
Park, Marjorie K. | 1928; 1929 |
Park, Norma | linoleum cut, 1930 |
Patterson, Monica | 1930 |
Pluto | 1927 |
Priestman, Roger B. | 1927 |
Quinn, Bert | 1927 assistant business manager, 1927 |
Robertson, Masie | linoleum cut, 1929; woodcut, 1930; cover design, 1930 |
Scott, Charles H. | 1927; 1928 |
Sharland, Mrs. T.J. | 1927 |
Sharpe, Alice | editorial staff, 1929; woodblock design, 1928; linoleum cut, 1929 |
Sherman, Maud | 1926; 1927 woodcut, 1928 |
Smith, Kate A.; Mrs. Frank Hoole | 1928; 1929 linoleum cut, 1929; linoleum cut, 1930 |
Sutherland, Mary B. | 1926; 1927; 1928 |
The Potter | 1928 |
Tisdall, Dorothy A.; also as D.A.T. and Pindy Tisdall | 1929; 1930 business manager, 1929 (Pindy Tisdall) moved to Kamloops after graduation |
Turpin, Dorothy | editorial staff, 1928, 1930 |
Tweedie, Edith | 1929; 1930 editorial staff, 1930 |
Underwood, Evelyn | linoleum cut, 1929 |
Vanderpant, J. | 1928 |
Varley, F.H[orsman] | 1927; 1928 |
Vera, Ada and Theodore | 1928 |
Walker, Eula B.; “alias ‘Peter at the Dam’” | 1928; 1929; 1930 |
Ware, Ruth; also Ruth Ware Notzle, and R.W.N. |
1927; 1929; 1930 editorial staff, 1929 married Clifford Arthur Notzle, 27 Sept 1930 |
Weatherbee, Vera | woodcut, 1928; linoleum cut, 1929 |
Weston, Betty | woodcut, 1928 |
Wilcox, Laura | linoleum cut, 1930 |
Williams, Margaret; also M.A.W., Margaret A. Williams, and M.A. Williams | 1926; 1927; 1928; 1929 editor, 1926; woodcut, 1928 moved to Los Angeles, CA, after graduation |
10 Thursday Jan 2019
Posted Digital text, Poetry
inThis lovely little volume was privately printed by the author in about 1935. Here is a searchable pdf as well as the page images.
08 Tuesday Jan 2019
Posted Poetry
inWhile going through the files in our office, we came upon this letter and poem, from Helen Chapman to the editor of a book commemorating (as far as one can determine) the 75th anniversary of Saskatchewan becoming a province of Canada in 1905. Previous to that, it had been a part of the North West Territories: at that point Alberta, Saskatchewan, Athabasca, and Assiniboia. Manitoba had become a province in 1870, but that is its own separate fascinating history.
I can’t find the book, so I have no idea if the poem was ultimately included. And Helen Chapman no longer seems to live in Surrey, BC, so I can’t just call and ask her anything more about Miss Caroline Doyle or the poem. There was a Caroline S. Doyle who died in Lanigan, Saskatchewan, in 1959, who might be our lady, but without a little more to go on, we can’t be certain.
Regardless, having found this little gem, I wanted to share it with you all. Perhaps Caroline’s nieces, “The Blessed Girls,” will see this and tell us more about their aunt the Lanigan poet.