Canadian Literature

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Introduction; Canadian Literature in English; Canadian Literature in French

Introduction

Canadian Literature, literature of the peoples of Canada. Although Canadian literature enjoys an international presence today, as a whole it developed slowly. It began in the 17th century and achieved its distinctive character only after Canada gained independence from Britain in 1867. From the beginnings of European colonization in the 1600s until nationhood, various factors affected cultural development in the territory now known as Canada. From colonial times on, European Canadians were divided into two distinct populations: French-speaking and English-speaking. Although many people were bilingual (as are many Canadians today), the partisanship of these two groups, coupled with large numbers of immigrants who spoke other languages, proved to be divisive in any progress toward a single national literature. Rather than commit themselves to uniformity as the basis of their culture, Canadians instead accepted plurality (diversity) as a workable alternative.

Other factors also worked against a uniform national culture. As Canada’s boundaries rapidly expanded, its settlements became widely scattered. This complicated transportation and communication, thereby impeding the distribution of goods, including books. Canada did not have a revolution as the United States did. Canada’s slow population growth resulted in an evolutionary process of cultural development that continues today.

Finally, Canada has experienced tensions as a result of horizontal pulls across the Atlantic Ocean to Britain and France, and a vertical pull across the 49th parallel to the United States. Centers of publication long lay outside Canada. Although Halifax, Montréal, and Toronto had all emerged as literary environments by the 1850s, literature from Britain and the United States flooded into Canada without hindrance. Under such circumstances, a sense of a separate Canadian literary identity was achieved only slowly and with sustained effort.

By the 1960s, the Canadian literary scene had blossomed. More volumes of poetry, fiction, drama, and critical studies appeared yearly than formerly had appeared in a decade. New Canadian-owned publishing firms opened. In high schools and universities, courses in Canadian literature proliferated. Nevertheless, the literary achievement of the last decades of the 20th century is firmly rooted in Canada's literary past; it is the harvest of many decades of thoughtful cultivation.

Canadian Literature in English

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The European explorers who reached the island of Newfoundland on Canada’s northeast coast at the end of the 15th century were looking for a Northwest Passage, a westward sea route from Europe to Asia. Although their search was unsuccessful, one Italian explorer, John Cabot, reported back that the codfish off the coast of Newfoundland were so thick that he could scoop them up in baskets from the ship. European settlers soon arrived with an interest in trade or in converting the indigenous peoples to Christianity. Unknowingly, the settlers began to fashion a new society, but a literary dimension for this society grew slowly.

The Beginnings

By the early 17th century both Newfoundland and French territory in Canada were home to playwrights, poets, and culturally active church men and women. In 1604 French settlers established a colony called Acadia on Canada’s northeast coast; this region would later become the provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island. An Acadian culture developed under French influence, and immigration from Scotland in the 1700s brought Gaelic speakers and a Gaelic tradition of oral poetry to the region.

The late 18th century brought the two main stimuli that led to an English-language Canadian literature. The first was a British victory over French forces in Québec in the battle of the Plains of Abraham in 1759; the British takeover of most of New France (the French empire in North America) became official in 1763. The second was the outbreak in 1775 of the American Revolution, which soon drew northward to Canada many Americans who remained loyal to Britain. Canadian fiction in English had its origins at this time. The History of Emily Montague (1769) by English-born Frances Brooke is considered the first Canadian, as well as the first North American, novel. Written as a series of letters, it is based on Brooke’s experiences living in a garrison (military post) in Québec in the 1760s. The novel provides a portrait of 18th-century Canada while establishing a female literary voice early in English Canadian writing. Influenced by English poet Alexander Pope and French philosopher Voltaire, Brooke used the artificial conventions of the romance in her novel to talk of matters both fashionable and political.

The values of “peace, order and good government,” later sanctioned by Canada’s 1867 Confederation (union of the formerly British Canadian colonies), were articulated clearly by British Loyalists who emigrated north from the American colonies starting in 1775. These Loyalists (known in Canada as United Empire Loyalists) moved primarily to southern Ontario, the eastern townships of Québec, and New Brunswick. Towns such as Kingston in southeastern Ontario and Fredericton in New Brunswick became centers of political influence as well as of literary and educational activity during the 19th century.

Early Loyalist writers, such as New Brunswick author Jonathan Odell, who hailed from New Jersey, wrote staunch tributes to the British monarchy and corrosive satires of the American belief in republican government. Loyalist writing such as Odell’s work The American Times (1780), a series of satiric sketches in verse about leaders of the American Revolution, started a tradition of conservative thought that attempted to balance individual rights with those of the community. This tradition came to dominate Canada’s English-language intellectual history. It was countered to some extent by a second line of social thought urging progressive ideals.

The 19th Century

During the 19th century, Canadian writers grew more numerous and more ambitious, attempting new forms and addressing new subjects. At first, writers turned to narratives that recorded exploration, settlement, and survival. By the end of the century, the range of genres and topics had broadened considerably to encompass social issues of the day—from the politics of independence to the rights of women—historical romance, comedies of manners, and lyric poetry about the transcendence of nature.

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Introduction

Canadian Literature in English

The Beginnings

The 19th Century