Paths of Desire: Images of Exploration and Mapping in Canadian Women's Writing

Patricia Whitney, former coordinator of Women’s Studies at the
University if Prince Edward Island, is the Bank of Montreal Visiting
Scholar in Women’s Studies at the University of Ottawa.

This is a book for academics, and it adheres appropriately to scholarly
conventions. It reads very much like a thesis, with has both the faults
and the strengths associated with that form. It is thorough and
meticulous, and it embraces contemporary literary theory with
enthusiasm. On the other hand, the text is turgid and prolix. That
aside, it seems incredible that the University of Toronto Press would,
at the end of the 20th century, publish a book on Canadian women writers
that ignores both women of color and aboriginal women writers. To be
fair, the author acknowledges this shortcoming in her introduction, but
she fails to justify her choice to marginalize these women— no doubt
because there is no justification for doing so.

In this book, Goldman focuses on images of mapping and exploration in
the writing of Audrey Thomas, Susan Swan, Daphne Marlatt, Aritha van
Herk, and Jane Urquhart. Of this group, only Marlatt writes outside the
conventions of realism that seem to dog Canadian writing in English,
although all are among our best writers and deserve careful critical
attention, which Goldman provides. Moreover, Goldman is assiduous in her
textual analysis and identification of subversive technique. Perhaps
because Marlatt is the most daring formally, she seems to centre Paths
of Desire, although the exclusive focus on the brilliant Ana Historic is
limiting. At times, too, the discussion of the text seems lost in
countless citations, some of which—for example, the long digression on
Fifth Business—are not fully justified.

If Marlatt’s work centres this study, then Urquhart’s gives it
closure. Goldman’s analysis of The Whirlpool is thoughtful and
thorough, but raises an essential question: Where is Away? Given that
Goldman aspires, like Virginia Woolf, “to explore the notion of
terrain and boundaries as they relate to gender,” it seems
inexplicable that Urquhart’s masterpiece is ignored.

Paths of Desire will find its place as a useful teaching reference for
upper-division undergraduate courses.