Thirty-Two Short Views of Mazo de la Roche

Paul Hjartarson is an associate professor of English at the University
of Alberta.

The title of this book is meant to bring to mind the recent feature film
Thirty-two Short Films About Glenn Gould. Both works take as their
subject the lives of internationally famous and yet enigmatic Canadians;
both seek innovative ways to grasp their elusive subject; and both build
on earlier biographies. In the introduction, Bratton writes: “This
biography acknowledges from the beginning the impossibility of
completely knowing its subject. I have therefore sought a form that can
appropriately contain the various fragments that I have pieced together
from one person’s life. In frankly acknowledging—indeed,
exploiting—the limitations inherent in my undertaking, I hope that I
have allowed something of the real Mazo de la Roche to emerge.”

While the use of a fragmentary, discontinuous narrative worked
beautifully in Thirty-two Short Films, Bratton is unable to make it work
in this study of Mazo de la Roche. One reason may lie in the very
different trajectories of Mazo de la Roche’s and Glenn Gould’s
careers. Mazo de la Roche rose to prominence in 1927, at the age of 48,
when her novel Jalna won the Atlantic Monthly Prize; Glenn Gould became
famous at the age of 23, when Columbia Records released his first
recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations. The popularity of Mazo de la
Roche’s writings has diminished steadily since her death in 1961; none
of her many books is currently in print. Gould’s reputation, on the
other hand, appears secure, and the demand for his recordings continues
to be strong. Thus, whereas Thirty-two Short Films both assumes and
elaborates upon the growing Gould legend, Bratton’s book engages a
figure who has pretty much disappeared from view. Thirty-two Short
Views, in short, lacks the rich and many-layered context that both
enabled the making of Thirty-two Short Films and contributed to its
success. While Bratton’s knowledge of Mazo’s life is impressive, the
most complete and engaging study of the novelist remains Joan Givner’s
Mazo de la Roche: The Hidden Life (1989).