Highways of Canadian LiteratureLogan, J. D. (John Daniel)
History
Highways of Canadian Literature
Logan, J. D. (John Daniel)
Canadian literature -- History and criticism
When the World War caused, first, an intenser sense of the unity of the
Motherland and Canada, and, secondly, a plethora of verse and prose,
especially verse, by Canadians in the field in France and in Flanders,
and by Canadians at home, there arose in England a definite and
systematic movement to promote in the United Kingdom the recognition and
study of the literary history and literature of Canada, or at least
Canadian literature written in the nineteenth century and first quarter
of the twentieth century. Sir Herbert Warren, President of Magdalen
College, Oxford, who for some time during the late war was Professor of
Poetry at Oxford, engaged in a serious and sympathetic study of the
literature of Canada, and lectured on Canadian literature at the
Colonial Institute, London, and elsewhere. Moreover, Sir Herbert Warren,
then also President of the Poetry Society of London, had a by-law passed
which stipulated that living Canadian authors should be recognized as
non-resident members of the Poetry Society of London; and Canadian
authors were invited to send copies of their published verse and prose
to the Librarian of the Poetry Society, for cataloguing and exhibition
in the reading room of the Society. Besides Sir Herbert Warren, two
other British lecturers of established reputation—Miss Louise Bagley
and Miss Julie Huntsman—devoted themselves to systematic lecturing on
Canadian literature, verse and prose, in certain notable educational
institutions in London and in provincial centres in England. Moreover,
since the late war the works of Canadian authors have been in increasing
numbers either published in England simultaneously with their
publication in other countries, or have been first published in England
and later republished in Canada, and in the United States.
In these facts, therefore, we have a kind of empirical proof or
pragmatic test that in the United Kingdom there has existed for a
considerable time a genuinely respectful recognition of the fact of a
Canadian literature in the English language.
For the purposes of a Synoptic History of Canadian Literature in the
English language a significant year is that of 1760. For that year marks
both the Fall of Montreal (following the Fall of Quebec in 1759) and the
Puritan Migration from New England to Maugerville, on the St. John
River, and to the valleys of western Nova Scotia, in ‘Nova Scotia,’
which at the time embraced the mainland of what is now Nova Scotia, as
well as New Brunswick, and part of Maine.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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