This Ragged Place

Patricia Morley is professor emerita of English and Canadian studies at
Concordia University, and the author of Kurlek, Margaret Laurence: The
Long Journey Home, and As Though Life Mattered: Leo Kennedy’s Story.

Terry Glavin’s fourth book about British Columbia comprises nine
essays about its people, land, and history. He handles these subjects
with passion and insight. (Glavin’s personal and poetic prose has
already garnered two National Magazine Awards and one Western Magazine
Award.)

In essays like “The Skeena Run,” a very personal tale of a scenic
journey by rail from Jasper to Prince Rupert, Glavin skilfully blends
geography, history, literature, and scholarly research to produce fine
journalism. In “Spirit Dancers,” he describes the ceaseless changes
to the terrain being wrought by white settlers and the difficulties
Natives continue to encounter over spirit dancing, despite the fact that
laws banning this secret ritual were struck from the Indian Act in 1951.
An elder worries that the dancers’ spirit power might not be as strong
as it was in the old days because the young dancers do not have the same
“powerful places” where they can train—the sites of awesome
natural beauty unspoiled or unmarked by human activities.

This Ragged Place moves easily through outer and inner landscapes,
taking the reader through space, time, and many facets of human
experience. It’s an enjoyable journey.