Eyeing the North Star: Directions in African-Canadian Literature

Nanette Morton teaches English at McMaster University.

Eyeing the North Star features poetry and prose by 21 African-Canadian
writers, including Austin Clarke, Claire Harris, Dionne Brand, M.
Nourbese Philip, Dany Laferriиre, and Gerard Etienne.

The selections demonstrate the wide range of African-Canadian
experience, which “incorpor-ate[s] diverse cultural, ideological, and
geographic references ... and further represent[s] various literary
influences ranging from western classics to the literature of developing
countries” (Clarke quoting Ayanna Black). Clarke’s informative,
scholarly introduction gives the anthology both historical and critical
context. He takes issue with writers (some of whom are included in the
collection) who deny African Canadians a literary past, and he
criticizes Carol Morrell (editor of Grammar of Dissent, 1994), who
relegates African- Canadian writers to the position of “teachers

of the white Canadian literary and political communities.”

This anthology would serve as a good companion to Clarke’s earlier
anthology of black Nova Scotian writing, Fire on the Water.