Writing Home

R.G. Moyles is a professor of English at the University of Alberta and
the co-author of Imperial Dreams and Colonial Realities: British Views
of Canada, 1880–1914.

This is a collection of essays—mostly on literary loves but also on
whimsical encounters or humorous reflections. In his foreword, Alberto
Manguel, no mean writer himself, states that Writing Home is “a richly
rewarding collection. To see favourite writers such as Alistair MacLeod
and Mordecai Richler intelligently annotated, to be (almost) convinced
of the merits of others whom I’ve never much liked, to be offered the
discovery of the (to me) puzzling joys of geopiety and patrification, to
be introduced to Georges Bugnet and the anglers of Paradise, to be made
to wonder about the imaginative links between Robertson Davies and Iris
Murdoch and John Irving—and all this in a clear, sparkling style—is
pleasure in the deepest sense.”

What Manguel alerts us to is not only the richness of the fare we are
about to sup, but the immense pleasure of the supping. David Carpenter
is one of our finest stylists, noted for his gentle, ironic humor and
his sly understatement. His brilliant essay on Georges Bugnet evinces a
sense of wonderment about, and love for, his subjects (Bugnet and
research), and, unexpectedly, a dose of family intrigue. Completely
lacking in “stiff-rumped academic jargon,” this is a book for the
common reader.