My Past Is Now: Further Memoirs of a Labour Lawyer

Gerald J. Stortz is an assistant professor of history at St. Jerome’s
College, University of Waterloo.

In this second volume of John Stanton’s memoirs, several irritants
that were in the first volume are continued. Stanton is an ideologue,
and both volumes reflect it. In addition, the author uses photographs
that are irrelevant (and poorly reproduced) and repeats information from
the first book in the second.

These caveats aside, this is a valuable primary source for those
interested in the history of labor in British Columbia, a province that
seems to have an unusually rich sense of its own history. Whether the
reader agrees with Stanton or not, this is a unique first-hand account
of events, which one suspects in almost no case will be consonant with
the “official” versions.

The book is a product of the B.C. Aural [sic] Legal History Project at
the University of Victoria. Clearly, as so often is the case, the
editors have tried to leave as much as possible in the interviewee’s
words. While this is a noble intention, here it results in some rather
long-winded passages. They are, however, well worth wading through.