The Princess and the Whisk Heads: A Fable

Douglas Barbour is a professor of English at the University of Alberta.
He is the author of Lyric/anti-lyric : Essays on Contemporary Poetry,
Breath Takes, and Fragmenting Body Etc.

This little adult fable is about the relationship between art and public
policy. Of course, that’s a subject dear to the heart of all Canadian
artists, but Smith sets his fable in a small kingdom just a stone’s
throw away “from the cruel and contemptuous industrial state that
surround[s] it,” which could be the psychological state most artists
think they’re in. Often witty, sometimes a bit too cute, it’s the
tale of a princess who lives surrounded by art in her castle, but
hasn’t paid enough attention to the capital city and its younger
citizens, who feel cut off from all artistic possibility by the
spirit-numbing work of the architectural and educational bureaucracy of
government. When she hears rumours about a new rebellious group of young
people, she disguises herself to go among them. They are strange indeed,
especially in the painful but apparently mind-altering body
modifications they undergo.

Her adventures among the restless youth of her country, and her attempt
to connect with them, lead her at first into trouble, and then to an
attempt to open the palace to the populace that results in something of
a riot. But eventually things work out, sort of, in a fairy-tale
reconciliation among all the people.

The Princess and the Whisk Heads is a delightful little
wish-fulfillment fantasy, neatly constructed, unsentimental, and with a
certain panache. Still, I wonder exactly who its intended audience is,
as it contains scenes too adult for young people, and may just seem too
cute for the adults who might be moved to do something about the way our
own country is failing the arts.