Queen's Domain: Canadian Culture & Victoria University

A Bibliography of Canadian Poetry (English)

Charles Canniff James (1863–1916) was a book collector, academic, distinguished civil servant, and an authority on Canadian history and literature. James was educated Victoria College, Cobourg, Ontario, where he received a Bachelor of Arts in 1883 and a Master of Arts in 1886.

In 1898, presented a collection of approximately four hundred volumes and pamphlets of Canadian literature to Victoria University Library. At that time, the library was located in the Alumni Hall on the main floor of Victoria College. James was a strong supporter of the library, and he also donated the Alfred Tennyson collection.

The bibliography was issued by the Victoria University Library Committee in a limited edition of two hundred copies.

James, Charles Canniff, 1863–1916

Canadiana

William Briggs

1899

Canadian poetry—Bibliography

Public domain

Z1377 .P7 J3

Songs and Sonnets

Helena Jane Coleman (1860–1953) was a music teacher, poet and writer. Coleman was educated at Ontario Ladies’ College, Whitby, where she received the Gold Medal in Music, and became the Head of its Music Department (1880–1892). She took a one-year leave of absence to pursue post-graduate studies in music in Berlin, Germany.

Coleman contributed poems to a large number of Canadian and American newspapers journals, such as the Atlantic Monthly, Collier’s, the Globe, Ladies’ Home Journal, Literary Digest, the Mail and Empire, Saturday Night, Star Weekly, and numerous other publications. She was a member of the Author’s Society, the Canadian Author’s Association, the Rose Society, and the University Women’s Club in Toronto.

Songs and Sonnets was the first collection of poetry published under Coleman's real name. Her subsequent short stories and articles continued to appear under pseudonyms. 

Coleman, Helena, 1860–1953

Canadiana

William Briggs

1906

Public domain

PR6005 .O27 S62

The Search for the Western Sea: The Story of the Exploration of North-Western America

Lawrence Johnstone Burpee (1873–1946) was a historian, a civil servant, a librarian and a writer. He was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia and educated partly at home and at public and private schools.

In 1890, he entered the Canadian federal Civil Service to serve as private secretary to three successive Ministers of Justice. From 1905 to 1912 he was Librarian of the Carnegie Public Library in Ottawa. From 1912 until his death, he was Canadian Secretary of the International Joint Commission.

Burpee was one of the founding members of the Canadian Historical Association, National President of the Canadian Authors’ Association, editor of the Canadian Geographical Journal, founding member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Writers’ Foundation, Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (1911), Honourary Secretary (1926–1935), and President (1936–1937).

He received the Medaille de Vermeil award from the Académie Française for work in Canadian history and the Tyrrell Gold Medal from the Royal Society of Canada. Burpee published extensively in the areas of Canadian bibliography, geography and history.

His publications include: A Bibliography of Canadian Fiction (William Briggs, 1904, co-editor: L.E. Horning), Canadian Life in Town and Country (Newnes, 1905, co-author: H.J. Morgan), A Little Book of Canadian Essays (Musson Book Company Limited, 1909), A Century of Canadian Sonnets (Musson Book Company Limited, 1910), An Index and Dictionary of Canadian History (Morang, 1911, co-editor: Arthur G. Doughty), Humour of the North (Musson Book Company Limited, 1912), Sandford Fleming, Empire Builder (Oxford University Press, 1915).

Burpee was the editor of An Historical Atlas of Canada (T. Nelson, 1927) and Journals of LaVerendrye (1927).

The Search for the Western Sea is the history of the early travellers and fur traders in the north-west. The book includes a folded colour map produced by J. G. Bartholomew and a map engraved by Emery Walker, in addition to bibliography of the exploration of north-western America. The preface is dated January 12th, 1908.

The title was revised with additional research and republished in 1935 as two volumes.

Burpee, Lawrence J. (Lawrence Johnstone), 1873–1946

Canadiana

The Musson Book Company

1908

Northwest Passage
Northwest, Canadian—Description and travel
Northwest, Canadian—History

Bartholomew, J. G. (John George), 1860–1920, cartographer
Walker, Emery, 1851–1933 engraver

F1060.4 .B96 1908

The Wood Carver's Wife

Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall (1883–1922) was a librarian, a writer and a poet. She was born in Gunnersby, Middlesex, England. She sold her first story, “Two-Ears.” to the Globe (a Toronto newspaper) while still a student at Bishop Strachan School. 

Pickthall was appointed as an assistant librarian at Victoria University Library, Toronto, from 1910 to 1912 and her writing was published in several periodicals during that time, including Acta Victoriana, a student literary journal at Victoria College. Pickthall published over two hundred short stories and approximately one hundred poems along with numerous articles in journals such as Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, and Scribner’s. 

Selected publications include: The Drift of Pinions (John Lane Company, 1913), Lamp of Poor Souls and Other Poems (S.B. Gundy, 1916), Little Hearts (Methuen, 1916), The Bridge: A Story of the Great Lakes (Hodder and Stoughton Limited, 1922), The Woodcarver’s Wife and Other Poems (McClelland and Stewart Company Limited, 1922), and The Complete Poems of Marjorie Pickthall (McClelland and Stewart Company Limited, 1927), posthumously published. 

Victoria University Library holds the Marjorie Pickthall fonds, consisting of records pertaining to her activities as a poet, writer, and librarian. The collection includes correspondence, manuscripts (poems, short stories and articles), personal materials and photographs, and artistic material by Pickthall including paintings and drawings. 

The Wood Carver's Wife is a play, staged at Hart House Theatre, November 19, 1921, in association with the Canadian Authors' Week. This is a limited edition of the play and only two hundred and fifty copies were published. It includes illustrations by J.E.H. Macdonald (1873–1932), a painter, and biographical essay, "Marjorie Pickthall: A Memory", by Isabel Ecclestone Mackay (1875–1928), a poet.

Pickthall, Marjorie L. C. (Marjorie Lowry Christie), 1883–1922

Canadiana

McClelland and Stewart Limited

1922

MacDonald, J. E. H. (James Edward Hervey), 1873–1932 artist
Mackay, Isabel Ecclestone, 1875–1928

Public domain

PR6031 .I3 W6 1922

Yearbook of the Arts in Canada

Bertram Richard Brooker (1888–1955) was an artist, novelist, poet, journalist, critic, and advertising executive. He was born in Croydon, England and settled in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba, in 1905.

Brooker was the first Canadian artist to exhibit abstracts and and his preferred media were oil, watercolour, pencil, ink and print. His early paintings include Sounds Assembling (1928) and Alleluiah (1929).

He was awarded the first Governor General's Award for his novel, Think of the Earth (Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1936).

Yearbook of the Arts in Canada, a review of art, poetry, drama and literature was a project originated and edited by Brooker. The first volume was published in 1929, and the second appeared in 1936.

Brooker, Bertram, 1888–1955

1929

Arts—Canada—Periodicals
Canadian literature—Periodicals

Edgar, Pelham, 1871–1948
Deacon, William Arthur
Denison, Merrill, 1893–1975
Lismer, Arthur, 1885–1969
Haines, Fred S. (Frederick Stanley), 1879–1960
Housser, Frederick Broughton, 1889?–1936
Harris, Lawren, 1885–1970
Mitchell, Roy, 1884–1944
Carman, Bliss, 1861–1929
MacDonald, Wilson, 1880–1967
Scott, Duncan Campbell, 1862–1947
Pratt, E. J. (Edwin John), 1882–1964
Grove, Frederick Philip, 1879–1948
MacDonald, J. E. H. (James Edward Hervey), 1873–1932
Kennedy, Leo, 1925–1982
Livesay, Dorothy, 1909–1996
Klein, A. M. (Abraham Moses), 1909–1972
Fulton, Ellen, 1887–
McNaught, Eleanor
Carsley, Sara E.
Brown, Audrey Alexandra, 1904–
Smith, A. J. M. (Arthur James Marshall), 1902–1980
Scott, F. R. (Francis Reginald), 1899–1985
Knister, Raymond
Callaghan, Morley, 1903–1990
De la Roche, Mazo, 1879–1961
Brown, E. K. (Edward Killoran), 1905–1951
Sandwell, B. K. (Bernard Keble), 1876–1954
Macphail, Andrew, 1864–1938
Cox, Leo, 1898–
Niven, Frederick, 1878–1944

N6540 .A1 Y4 1928/29

The Art of the Novel from 1700 to the Present Time

Oscar Pelham Edgar (1871–1948) was a teacher and an academic. He was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of James David Edgar (1841–1899), a promient politician, lawyer, and businessman) and Matilda Ridout (1844–1910, a historian, writer, and feminist).  

Edgar was educated at Upper Canada College. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Toronto in 1892 and a Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland in 1897. He began his teaching career as modern-language master at Upper Canada College (1892-1895). He was appointed to the staff of the Department of French at Victoria College, Toronto, as Lecturer in 1897, then as Head from 1901 to 1910. He also began to lecture in the Department of English in 1902, later transferring permanently to the latter, where he held full professional rank until 1938 and served as Head for twenty-eight years.

Edgar was a member of the Athenaeum Club, London, England; of the Canadian Society of Authors where he served as Secretary; of the Tennyson Club, Toronto, where he served as President; of the Modern Language Association, Ontario, where he served as President; of the Ontario Education Society, where he served as Secretary from 1908 to 1909; and of the Canadian Writers' Foundation which was founded by Edgar. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1915 and received its Lorne Pierce Medal for distinguished service to Canadian literature in 1936.

Edgar published many reviews and articles, along with three monographs: A Study of Shelley with Special Reference to his Nature Poetry (William Briggs, 1899), Henry James: Man and Author (Macmillan Company of Canada, 1927), The Art of the Novel from 1700 to the Present Time (Macmillan Company, 1933). He also contributed a chapter on Canada to The Cambridge History of English Literature (Cambridge University Press, 1916), and acted as Canadian advisor for the Dictionary of National Biography (1911).

The Art of the Novel studies the emergence of the novel as a literary form, beginning with the publications of James Richardson in the late eighteenth century. The book also includes chapters on the contributions of nineteenth and twentieth-century authors, including Jane Austen, Henry James, Joseph Conrad and Virginia Woolf, among others. 

Edgar, Pelham, 1871–1948

Canadiana

Macmillan Company of Canada

1933

American fiction—History and criticism
English fiction—History and criticism
Fiction—History and criticism

Brown, E. K. (Edward Killoran), 1905–1951

Public domain

PN3365 .E4 1933

White Narcissus: A Novel

John Raymond Knister (1899–1932) was an editor, a writer and a poet. He attended Victoria College between 1919 and 1920.

Knister's career was short but prolific. He published three novels, about a hundred short stories and poems, a play, hundreds of book reviews and author's profiles. 

Knister was the editor of Canadian Short Stories, the first anthology of this literary form published in Canada (Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1928). He was also the author of White Narcissus: A Novel (Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1929), My Star Predominant (1934), and Collected Poems of Raymond Knister (edited by poet Dorothy Livesay, Ryerson Press, 1949).

Infused with imagist sensibilities and set in the countryside of Ontario, White Narcissus is considered to be a major contribution to the emergence of realism in Canadian literature.

Desmond Pacey (1917–1975) was critical of the dubious quality of the plot and the eccentricity of the characters, but recognized Knister's accurate and sincere portrayal of life in the Ontario countryside: "His early death was a heavy loss, for there were few other writers to take up the task he had laid down, that of describing honestly the Ontario rural scene."  

Knister, Raymond

Canadiana

Macmillan Company of Canada Limited

1929

Brookshaw, Drake, artist

PR9199.3 .K55 W45 1929a

A Pocketful of Canada

John Daniel Robins (1884-1952) was a professor, creative writer and editor, who had a lengthy and distinguished teaching career at Victoria University. Born in Windsor, Ontario in 1884, to Thomas Brackhill Robins and Elizabeth Snelson Plant, he attended Albert College in Belleville before graduating with a B.A. (1913) and M.A. (1922) from Victoria University, and a Ph.D. from University of Chicago (1927).

A Pocketful of Canada (William Collins Sons and Company Limited, 1946) is a colourful, quaint miscellany of Canadiana: poetry, literary prose, songs, travel sketches, essays on Canadian history and culture, photographs, statistics, and historical and political documents.

The selected works were intended for high school students, the general public, and newcomers to Canada interested in the history of the country. Poet and anthologist A.J.M. Smith praised the volume for its considerable educational value.

Robins, John D., 1884–1952

Canadiana

William Collins Sons and Company Limited

1946

Canadian literature

Buchanan, Donald W. (Donald William), 1908–1966, photographer
Hyde, Laurence, 1914–1987 artist

PR9194.4 .P6

Collected Poems of Raymond Knister

John Raymond Knister (1899–1932) was an editor, a writer and a poet. He attended Victoria College between 1919 and 1920. 

Knister's career was short but prolific. He published three novels, about a hundred short stories and poems, a play, hundreds of book reviews and author's profiles. 

Knister was the editor of Canadian Short Stories, the first anthology of this literary form published in Canada (Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1928). He was also the author of White Narcissus: A Novel (Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1929), My Star Predominant (1934), and Collected Poems of Raymond Knister (edited by poet Dorothy Livesay, Ryerson Press, 1949).

Collected Poems of Raymond Knister were selected and edited by Dorothy Livesay (1909–1996), a poet and Knister's friend. It includes a biographical essay on his life and legacy, in addition to Livesay's recollections. The design of the book was executed by Thoreau MacDonald (1901–1989), an illustrator, painter, and designer. 

The title was published as part of a series, Ryerson Library of Canadian Poets and concludes with a complete bibliography of Knister's writings, published up to 1949, compiled by Margaret Ray, Associate Librarian, Victoria University Library. The front endpapers are signed by promient Canadian literary personalities: Mazo de la Roche, Wilson Macdonald, Morley Callaghan, and Lorne Pierce.

Knister, Raymond
Livesay, Dorothy, 1909–1996

Canadiana

Ryerson Press

1949

Knister, Raymond—Bibliography
Knister, Raymond—Biography

MacDonald, Thoreau, 1901–1989, book designer
Ray, Margaret V., bibliographer

PR6021 .N44 A17 1949

A Book of Canadian Humour

John Daniel Robins (1884-1952) was a professor, creative writer and editor, who had a lengthy and distinguished teaching career at Victoria University. Born in Windsor, Ontario in 1884, to Thomas Brackhill Robins and Elizabeth Snelson Plant, he attended Albert College in Belleville before graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (1913) and Master of Arts (1922) from Victoria University, and a Ph.D. from University of Chicago (1927). 

In addition to his academic endeavors, he edited the highly regarded A Pocketful of Canada (1946), and wrote the popular non-fiction book The Incomplete Anglers (1944), as well as the novel Cottage Cheese (1951), and was also recognized for his knowledge of folklore.

Margaret Violet Ray was a librarian and bibliographer. She attended Victoria College, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 192?. Ray was appointed to the position of Assistant Librarian at Victoria University Library in 192?. She compiled and published a number of bibliographies, including a bibliography of Pelham Edgar's publications (appeared in Across My Path, Ryerson Press, 1952) and a bibliography of Raymond Knister's poems, short stories and articles (in Collected Poems of Raymond Knister, edited by Dorothy Livesay, Ryerson Press, 1949). 

A Book of Canadian Humour is anthology of risible poems and prose, including works by Stephen Leacock, E.J. Pratt, Robertson Davies, Nellie McClung and other promient figures.

Ray, Margaret V.
Robins, John D., 1884–1952

Canadiana

Ryerson Press

1951

Canadian wit and humor

PN6178 .C3 B6

Across My Path

Oscar Pelham Edgar (1871–1948) was a teacher and an academic. He was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of James David Edgar (1841–1899), a promient politician, lawyer, and businessman) and Matilda Ridout (1844–1910, a historian, writer, and feminist).  

Edgar was educated at Upper Canada College. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Toronto in 1892 and a Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland in 1897. He began his teaching career as modern-language master at Upper Canada College (1892-1895). He was appointed to the staff of the Department of French at Victoria College, Toronto, as Lecturer in 1897, then as Head from 1901 to 1910. He also began to lecture in the Department of English in 1902, later transferring permanently to the latter, where he held full professional rank until 1938 and served as Head for twenty-eight years.

Edgar was a member of the Athenaeum Club, London, England; of the Canadian Society of Authors where he served as Secretary; of the Tennyson Club, Toronto, where he served as President; of the Modern Language Association, Ontario, where he served as President; of the Ontario Education Society, where he served as Secretary from 1908 to 1909; and of the Canadian Writers' Foundation which was founded by Edgar. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 1915 and received its Lorne Pierce Medal for distinguished service to Canadian literature in 1936.

Edgar published many reviews and articles, along with three monographs: A Study of Shelley with Special Reference to his Nature Poetry (William Briggs, 1899), Henry James: Man and Author (Macmillan Company of Canada, 1927), The Art of the Novel from 1700 to the Present Time (Macmillan Company, 1933). He also contributed a chapter on Canada to The Cambridge History of English Literature (Cambridge University Press, 1916), and acted as Canadian advisor for the Dictionary of National Biography (1911).

Across My Path, published posthumously, is a collection of autobiographical essays and literary criticism, edited by Northrop Frye. The book chronicles Edgar's childhood experiences in Victorian Toronto, the travels he undertook jointly with his father, and critical assessment of Canadian poetry and literature, including the work of E.J. Pratt. It includes a complete bibliography of Edgar's publications, compiled by Margaret V. Ray.   

Edgar, Pelham, 1871–1948
Frye, Northrop, editor

Canadiana

Ryerson Press

1952

Canadian literature

PR55 .E3 A3

Least of All Saints

Grace Irwin (1907–2008) was a teacher, pastor, novelist, humanist and classicist. Born in Toronto in 1907, she attended Parkdale Collegiate Institute before attaining a B.A. (1929) from Victoria College, University of Toronto, and M.A. (1932) from University of Toronto. Irwin went on to a long and rewarding career teaching at Humberside Collegiate Institute, heading the Latin and Greek Department, 1942–1969. Irwin's writing enjoyed immense popularity in evangelical communities. 

Irwin received received an Honorary Doctorate of Sacred Letters from Victoria University in 1991. In 1968, she was awarded the Centennial Medal of Canada. 

Irwin wrote seven novels, including Least of All Saints (McClelland and Stewart Limited, 1952). Set in Toronto during the 1920s, it follows the spiritual journey of Andrew Connington, a cynical agnostic who decides to enter the ministry as an outlet for his intellectual and rhetorical skills, not because his faith is genuine. The novel commences in Connington's conversion. 

Irwin, Grace, 1907–2008

Canadiana

McClelland and Stewart Limited

1952

PR9199.3 .I79 L4

The Boatman

Jean Jay Macpherson (1931–2012) was a poet and professor, born in London, England. She received a Bachelor of Arts in classics, German, and philosophy from Carlton College in 1951, followed by a library science degree from McGill University. Macpherson earned a Master of Arts dgree in English in 1955 and a Ph.D. in 1964 from the University of Toronto where she was mentored by Northrop Frye. Macpherson and Frye collaborated on a book, Biblical and Classical Myths: The Mythological Framework of Western Culture. She spent her career teaching in the Department of English at Victoria College.

Macpherson published her first poem at age 15 and her work regularly appeared in Canadian poetry magazines, such as Contemporary Verse and The Fiddlehead. In the 1950s and early 1960s she ran her own small press, Emblem Books, and produced eight chapbooks by emerging poets, starting with her own, O Earth Return, in 1954.

Her publications include Nineteen Poems (The Seizin Press, 1952), The Boatman (Oxford University Press, 1957), Welcoming Disaster (Saannes Publications Limited 1974), and many others. Macpherson received the E.J. Pratt Medal, the Levinson Prize, and the Governor-General's Literary Award for her poetry.

Victoria University Library holds the Jay Macpherson fonds, consisting of records relating to her poetry, academic career, and personal life.

The Boatman is a collection of poems divided into six sections. Frye included a thorough critical appraisal of the book in the 1957 edition of "Letters in Canada," an annual review of creative writing, published in the University of Toronto Quarterly. Frye wrote that "The Boatman is the most carefully planned and unified book of poems that has yet appeared" in "Letters." 

Macpherson, Jay

Canadiana

Oxford University Press

1957

PR6025 .M317 B6 1957

Winter Sun

Margaret Avison (1918–2007) was a poet, editor, teacher, librarian, and archivist. She graduated from Victoria College in 1940 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature, publishing poetry in Acta Victoriana. 

Her first major poem, "Gatineau," was published in the Canadian Poetry Magazine in 1939. Other poems appeared in Canadian Forum, Poetry, Contemporary Verse, Origin, and other magazines, in addition to A. J. M. Smith's anthology The Book of Canadian Poetry: A Critical and Historical Anthology (University of Chicago Press, 1943).

Winter Sun (University of Toronto Press, 1960) was Avison's first collection of poetry and is representative of her early work. The poems are highly intellectual and secular, emphasizing sensory images and perception, and exploring the relationship and interactions of the humankind with natural and urban surroundings. The book received Governor General's Award. According to critic Munro Beattie, it "contains some of the most stimulating and endearing poems ever written" in Canada.  

Other major works include The Dumbfounding (Norton, 1966), sunblue (Lancelot Press, 1978), and No Time (Lancelot Press, 1989). 

Avison, Margaret, 1918–2007

Canadiana

University of Toronto Press

1960

PR9199.3 .A8 W5

Creative Writing in Canada: A Short History of English-Canadian Literature

William Cyril Desmond Pacey (1917–1975) was a literary critic and professor. Born in New Zealand, Pacey had emigrated to Canada with his mother. He graduated from Victoria College in 1938 where he studied under Professor Pelham Edgar (1871–1948), an author, editor, founder of the Canadian Writers' Foundation, proponent of Canadian poetry, literature, and cultural life, and mentor to many distinguished Canadian poets and writers, including E.J. Pratt and Northrop Frye.

Pacey also edited Acta Victoriana, a student literary journal, while studying at Victoria. He continued his education at Cambridge on Massey Fellowship, graduating with a doctorate in 1941. His scholarly career was situated in the English Department of the University of New Brunswick. Pacey's major works of poetic and literary criticism and anthologies include Frederick Philip Grove (Ryerson Press, 1945), A Book of Canadian Stories (Ryerson Press, 1947), Essays in Canadian Criticism, 1938-1968 (Ryerson Press, 1969), among other titles. Pacey wrote intepretive and critical essays on the works of Ethel Wilson, Sir Charles G.D. Roberts, Dorothy Livesay, Leonard Cohen, and Archibald Lampman.  

Creative Writing in Canada was first published 1952 and it was the major title of Canadian literary criticism for many generations of undergraduates. It analyzes the historical development of Canadian literature over two hundred years, from the colonial period through the 1950s. 

Pacey, Desmond, 1917–1975

Canadiana

Ryerson Press

1961

Canadian literature—History and criticism

PR9184.3 .P3 1961

Double Persephone

Margaret Eleanor Atwood (1939–) is a novelist, poet, critic, and professor. She is a Companion of the Order of Canada and is recognized as the most prolific and celebrated contemporary Canadian writers. Atwood attended Victoria College, University of Toronto, majoring in English literature and minoring in French and Philosophy. She earned a Master of Arts degree from Radcliffe College, Harvard University, in 1962.

The second volume of poetry, The Circle Game (Contact Press, 1966), received the Governor General's Award, cementing Atwood's reputation as a poet. Her critically acclaimed novels are Surfacing (Simon and Schuster, 1972), The Handmaid's Tale (McClelland and Stewart Company Limited, 1985, winner of the Governor General's Award, the Los Angeles Times Prize, the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction and the Commonwealth Literary Prize), and Cat's Eye (McClelland and Stewart Company Limited, 1988, recipient of City of Toronto Book Award, the Coles Book of the Year Award, the Canadian Booksellers Association Author of the Year Award, and the Foundation for the Advancement of Canadian Letters in conjunction with Periodical Marketers of Canada Book of the Year Award), among numerous other works of fiction.

As a major work of literary criticism, Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (House of Anansi Press, 1972) explores the preoccupation with survival against the forces of nature and history as a shaping influence on Canadian culture and literature.

Double Persephone was Atwood's first collection of poetry. The poems are concerned with myths and archetypes and were influenced by Atwood's professors at Victoria College, Jay MacPherson and Northrop Frye.

Atwood, Margaret, 1939–

Canadiana

Hawkshead Press

1961

PR6051 .T9 D6 1961

A Divided Voice

Francis Edward Sparshott (1926–2015) was an academic, philosopher, and a poet. He was born in Chatham, England. Sparshott was educated at the King’s School in Rochester, England. He received a B.A. and a M.A. (1950) from Corpus Christi College, Oxford, England. He moved to Toronto, Ontario in 1950 when he was appointed to the Department of Philosophy at the University of Toronto. He joined the faculty of Victoria College, University of Toronto, in 1955 as Professor of Greek Philosophy, Ethics, and Aesthetics.

Sparshott was a member of the League of Canadian Poets since 1968, serving as president from 1977 to 1979. In 1981, he received first prize for "The Cave of Trophonius" in the annual Literary Competition sponsored by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

A Divided Voice was Sparshott's first collection of poetry, combining philosopher's insight with man's romanticism toward the ordinary experiences of life.

Sparshott, Francis Edward, 1926–

Canadiana

Oxford University Press

1965

PR6069 .P33 D5

Haiku

Mildred Claire Pratt (1921–1995) was an artist, poet and editor, daughter of writer Viola Leone Whitney Pratt (1892–1984) and poet E.J. Pratt (1882–1964). Pratt majored in English and Philosophy at Victoria College, University of Toronto and upon graduation in 1944 was awarded a gold medal in Philosophy. She then enrolled at Columbia University, New York City, to pursue graduate work in International Studies.

She also studied art at the Doon School of Art, Toronto and at the Boston Museum of Fine Art. She preferred working with woodcuts and her work was exhibited at shows across Canada and Europe.

Later in her life, Pratt began writing poetry. Her poems were published in various poetry magazines in Canada and the United States. She published three illustrated volumes of poetry: Music of Oberon (Robert E. Massmann, 1975), Black Heather: Haiku (1980), and Haiku (1965). 

Pratt, Mildred Claire, 1921– author, artist

E.J. Pratt

1965

PR9199.3 .P733 H3

Changes

Ronald Gordon Nudell Bates (1924–) is a writer, poet, columnist, translator, and professor. He was born in Regina, Saskatchewan and educated at the University of Toronto, graduating with Bachelor of Arts (Victoria College, 1948), Master of Arts (1949) degrees and a Ph.D. in 1960.

Bates's selected poetry collections include The Wandering World (Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1959), The unimaginable circus; theatre and zoo (privately printed, 1965), and Changes (Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1968). In addition, his poems have appeared in various periodicals. He is also the co-editor of works of criticism on Erik Lindegren and James Joyce, and the author of critical articles published in journals and a biography of Northrop Frye (McClelland and Stewart Company Limited, 1971).

The volume is from the estate of David Sinclair (1942–1974), Rare Books and Special Collections Librarian, Victoria University Library.

Bates, Ronald, 1924–

Canadiana

Macmillan Company of Canada Limited

1968

Canadian poetry

PR6052 .A85 C45

Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature

Margaret Atwood’s major contribution to Canadian literary criticism, intended as a handbook for secondary school teachers, was according recognized as the most influential work of Canadian criticism in the 1970s. It examines the themes of literary alienation from the environment, and the notion of a national obsession with Canadian “self-victimization.”

Atwood, Margaret, 1939–

Canadiana

House of Anansi Press

1972

Canadian literature—20th century—History and criticism

PR9189.6 .A8

The Bush Garden: Essays on the Canadian Imagination

The collection of essays by Northrop Frye may be read as a record of poetic production in English Canada during one of its crucial periods. He discusses the imaginative legacy bequeathed to present and future Canadian writers by the earlier novelists and poets.

Frye, Northrop

Northrop Frye

House of Anansi Press

1971

Canadian literature—20th century
Painting, Canadian

PR9184.6 .F79

Black Orchid

Albert Frank (A.F.) Moritz (1947–) is a poet, author, translator, film critic, and editor.

A prolific poet, he has published numerous acclaimed collections and contributed to many anthologies and periodicals. Through the years, Professor Moritz has won distinguished awards for his poetry, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, 1990, Selection to the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets, 1984, and the Griffin Poetry Prize for his work Sentinel in 2009.

Professor Moritz is the Coordinator of the Jewison Stream of the Vic ONe Program at Victoria College.

Black Orchid "explores the mysterious cycles of nature and society and the individual’s struggle for freedom... [A] lucid and powerful view of man’s quest for redemption both from, and through, his world."

The poems in the collection were republished in Early Poems (Insomniac Press, 2002).

Moritz, A.F. (Albert Frank)

Canadiana

Dreadnaught

1981

Cameron, Michael
Wald, Susana, illustrator
Zeller, Ludwig, 1927–, illustrator

PR9199.3 .M67 B523 1981

The New World Journal of Alexander Graham Dunlop, 1845

David Paul Sinclair (1942–1974) was a librarian and researcher. He was born in Toronto, Ontario. He died in Toronto after a street accident in London, England.

Sinclair received a M.A. and a Bachelor of Library Science from the University of Toronto. From 1968 to his death, he was employed as a librarian at Victoria University, Toronto, working on manuscripts and the Canadiana collection. He also provided accessioning and cataloguing services to the Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, and taught a course in Canadian Fiction in what was then the Victoria College Department of English.

At the time of his death, he was on leave, working on a Ph.D. in Bibliography at the University of London, England, under Arthur Brown. His chosen subject was English-language printing and publishing in the Canada’s in the nineteenth century, with special emphasis on their relationship to the growth of literary activity. His research focused on nineteenth century British and Canadian poetry from which he published articles and reviews. His research interests also included Canadian book history and copyright issues. He edited Nineteenth Century Narrative Poems (1972) for the New Canadian Library. A more detailed biography, with bibliography appears in The New World Journal of Alexander Graham Dunlop, 1845 (1976) which was completed by his colleague, Germaine Warkentin.

The New World Journal of Alexander Graham Dunlop chronicles the travels of Alexander Graham Dunlop (1814–1892) in the United States and the Canadas. Dunlop's father, John Dunlop was a Temperance reformer, while his uncle, William Dunlop, worked with John Galt in developing the land owned by the Canada Company in southwestern Ontario. 

Dunlop's travel journals describes his experiences in New Oreleans and other cities of the U.S. as well as Toronto, Kingston, Montreal, Quebec, Hamilton, and Niagara Falls. 

The publication of the book was made possible by the memorial contributions made to Victoria University Library by the parents, relations, and friends of David Sinclair.

Dunlop, Alexander Graham, 1814–1892, author

Canadiana

Dundurn Press

1976

Canada—Description and travel
United States—Description and travel

Barrett, Elizabeth, artist
Sinclair, David, 1942–1974, editor
Warkentin, Germaine, editor

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