Significant Things

M. Wayne Cunningham is a past executive director of the Saskatchewan
Arts Board and the former director of Academic and Career Programs at
East Kootenay Community College.

With understanding and compassion, Toronto artist and author Helen
McLean profiles the life of Edward, a homosexual British art dealer.
Having been abandoned at age six by his recently married mother, Edward
is rejected in his mid-forties by the second major love of his life,
Paulo, an English-Italian artist for whom he acted as an agent as well
as a lover. Crammed with the complexities of collecting and restoring
art, McLean’s tightly written novel brings Edward’s character
vibrantly to life with his commitment to being “a connoisseur of fine
things,” including rare fountain pens, unique pocket knives, and
fragrant perfume bottles.

Edward’s dedication to art brings him into contact with Jack, a
knowledgeable and sympathetic mentor and lover, but only one in a series
of passing affairs. Not so fleeting is his calculated seduction by the
French teacher at the boarding school to which his mother, Dolly, and
her husband, Mr. Rak, consigned him, kicking and screaming, immediately
after their marriage. Equally indelible is his rape by his older
schoolmates and, when he returns home, his seduction by his ailing
mother’s 35-year-old nurse, Miss Flagg, whom he suspects of being
Rak’s mistress as well. To extract himself from Flagg’s clutches
after Rak dies of a stroke, Edward pays her off, places his mother in a
nursing home, and moves permanently to Toronto, where he eventually
launches his career as an art collector after a long and rewarding
apprenticeship with his former employers. While searching for new work
and new talent in Europe, he is instantly smitten by the much younger
Paulo. The one-sided infatuation, Paulo’s deception in their artistic
and love affairs, and Edward’s frustration and dejection are portrayed
delicately, empathetically, and philosophically as an older and wiser
Edward meditates about his life in the midst of his beloved collections.


McLean’s familiarity with art, her skill in depicting human flaws and
foibles, her talent for creating realistic dialogue, her ability to tell
a story, and her vivid prose all make Significant Things a rewarding
reading experience.