Canadian Writers and Their Works: Fiction Series, Vol. 12

W.J. Keith is a retired professor of English at the University of Toronto and author A Sense of Style: Studies in the Art of Fiction in English-Speaking Canada.

This extended volume in the Canadian Writers and Their Works fiction
series contains introductory essays on four authors: Timothy Findley
(unaccountably omitted from the original plan), Sandra Birdsell, W.P.
Kinsella, and David Adams Richards.

The superb essay on Richards, by Lawrence Mathews, is a model of what
such a survey should be. He is the sole contributor to show evidence of
having formed a convincing set of literary-

critical principles. He knows that “criticism of the way in which an
author uses language” is central to any valid approach as well as to
“any mature evaluation of a work of literature.” He successfully
conveys what he calls “my sense of what is important about
Richards’s fiction,” and makes clear and well-argued value
judgments. He writes smoothly and cogently, with no trace of obfuscating
jargon, and can be read profitably by beginning student and seasoned
reader alike. Above all, his study embodies a practical demonstration of
the difficult art of serious reading.

In comparison, the other contributions fail to measure up: all are
decidedly run-of-the-mill. Dallas Harrison, on Birdsell, dutifully lists
themes and identifies techniques, but gives his readers no clear reason
why Birdsell needs to be read, and his obsession with awards (properly
faulted by George Woodcock in his general introduction) is effectively
countered by Mathews’s judgment that Richards won the Governor
General’s Award for one of his weakest novels.

Lorraine York, on Findley, diligently traces his stylistic and
ideological development, but makes none of the necessary discriminations
within his notoriously uneven oeuvre. She also ignores many key issues
that need elucidation (e.g., Findley’s use of Pound’s fictive
Mauberley as the protagonist of Famous Last Words, or the presence of
the preternatural iceberg in The Telling of Lies).

Don Murray writes breezily about the breezy Kinsella, but preaches to
the converted (“Kinsella’s fans will also enjoy.”). He mentions
some of the reservations serious readers may have (“So what?” “The
author is applying a formula”) but casually shrugs them off:
“However, countless readers have been wonderfully entertained ...”

All in all, this volume unwittingly but usefully serves as a mirror of
the strengths and weakness of contemporary criticism.