Canadian Authors

 

 

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 Canadian Authors

I am a proud Canadian author of over twenty fiction and non-fiction books in my long writing career. But I am just one of thousands of published writers from this huge country. Canada has had a long and illustrious history of producing world renown authors and books going all the way back to the 18^th century.

     Frances Moore was born in England in 1724. She was a well-known poet and playwright in England before she and her husband, Reverend John Brooke moved to Quebec City in 1763, for John to take up the post of army chaplain. During her time there Frances wrote The History of Emily Montague, a love story set in the newly formed Quebec province. The story is told through the voices of her characters by way of personal letters between the two. This is known as the epistolary (of letters) type of writing and it was popular during the1700s in Europe. The Brookes’ returned to England in 1768 and the novel was published in 1769 by the London bookseller, James Dodsley. The History of Emily Montague was the first novel written in what is now Canada and the first with a Canadian setting. Frances died in 1789.

 The following gives a brief history of two authors from the province of Newfoundland/Labrador.

Margaret Iris Duley was born on September 27, 1894, in St. John’s, in the colony of Newfoundland (Newfoundland didn’t become a province of Canada until 1949). Her father, Thomas Duley, had emigrated from Birmingham, England, while her mother, Tryphena Soper was born in Carbonear, NFL. Margaret graduated from the Methodist College in St. John’s in 1910, and in 1911 she and her family went to England for a relative’s wedding. She decided to stay and study drama and elocution (distinct pronunciation and articulation of speech) at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. Unfortunately, she had to return home when WWI broke out in Europe.

 

     Duley worked at the Women’s Patriotic Association to raise money and supplies for the Royal Newfoundland Regiment. Her older brother was injured during the war and her younger brother was killed.

 

     Duley’s father died in 1920 and left her an income of $250 a year. This allowed her some freedom and she joined the Ladies Reading Room and the Current Events Club. This club produced many leaders of the Newfoundland women’s suffrage movement. She was also a supporter of the Women’s Franchise League who petitioned island-wide for women to vote. The Newfoundland government passed a suffrage bill in March 1925, allowing women to vote at age 25, men at 21. In the 1928 general election, 90 per cent of women eligible to vote cast a ballot.

 

     In 1928, during a boat trip to the Labrador coast with her brother, a seagull with eyes like yellow ice hovered in front of Margaret. She used this fierce, yellow-eyed image in her first book titled, The Eyes of the Gull. It is the story of a thirty-year-old woman who wants to escape her outport life and leave an overpowering mother.

 

     Margaret’s second novel, Cold Pastoral, was published in 1939. It is about an orphaned young girl who is adopted into a wealthy family in St. John’s and is loosely based on a real case of a child lost in the woods.

 

     During WWII Margaret worked for the Women’s Patriotic Association and the St. John’s Ambulance. Later she because the Public Relations Officer for the Red Cross and started writing newspaper articles. In her third novel, Highway to Valour (1941), Margaret used the 1929 tidal wave that struck the Burin Peninsula as a backdrop for the life of the young heroine. Her fourth book Novelty on Earth was published in 1942 and the Caribou Hut (1949) was based on her volunteer work at the Caribou Hut, a hostel for returning servicemen. All her novels had a strong female characters.

 

     During this time she also did interviews and broadcast talks on CJON, a local radio station. The station sent her to England in 1952 to transmit stories on the coronation of Queen Elizabeth.

Margaret developed Parkinson’s disease and her health started to decline in 1955. She was unable to hold a pen by 1959 and moved in with her sister-in-law. She lived with her until her death on March 22, 1968, at the age of seventy-three.

 

     Margaret Iris Duley is considered Newfoundland’s first novelist (female or male) and was the first Newfoundland writer to gain an international audience. She was loved in England and the United States for her novels, yet belittled at home for her outspoken views on women’s rights and her novels’ bold portrayal of the female perspective. Her niece, author Margot Duley, described her as a free thinking, free spirited, outspoken and charismatic personality in a society where this was not encouraged.

      

     A Parks Canada historic plaque dedicated to Margaret Iris Duley is attached to the Education Building on the campus of the Memorial University in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador. Her home at 51 Rennies Mill Road is part of a Women’s History Walking Tour of St. John’s. She was designated a National Historic Person by Parks Canada in September, 2007.

 

Edwin John Dove Pratt was born on February 4, 1882 in Western Bay, in the colony of Newfoundland (Newfoundland didn’t become a province of Canada until 1949). His father was a Methodist Minister and was posted to many different communities so Edwin moved around a lot during his childhood. He graduated from Newfoundland’s Methodist College in St. John’s in 1901. Three years later he became a candidate for the Methodist ministry and served a three-year probation before entering Victoria College at the University of Toronto.

     E.J. Pratt’s first published poem, A Poem on the May Examinations, was printed in Acta Victoriana in 1909. He received his Bachelor of Arts in 1911 and his Bachelor of Divinity in 1913. He was ordained as a minister and served as an Assistant Minister in Streetsville, Ontario and joined the University of Toronto as a lecturer in psychology. He also continued to take classes and earned his PhD in 1917. He self-published a long poem, Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland that same year. Edwin married Viola Whitney whom he had met at Victoria College in 1918. His first traditionally published works, a poetry collection called Newfoundland Verse came out in 1923. He also published a number of reviews and articles over the years plus eighteen more books of poetry.

     Edwin Pratt started the Canadian Poetry Magazine in 1935 and was its editor for the next eight years. He won the Governor General’s Award for poetry three times, was appointed Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St George, and awarded the Canada Council Medal for distinction in literature in 1961. He died April 26, 1962 at the age of eight-two.

 

 

My Poetry Moment

 

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https://bwlpublishing.ca/donaldson-yarmey-joan/

 

My Poetry Moment

     Over my writing career I have had articles, short stories, travel books, and mystery, young adult, and science fiction novels published. And one poem. When that one poem was accepted for publication, I felt I had taken my writing to another level. I decided, though, that my contribution was going to be different, that I was going to take the poetry community by storm. I wanted to make my mark, to stand out in the poetry world. And to do that I came up with a new poetry sub-genre that I called Script Poetry. Just like a movie script I set up the scene and the tone for the poem and give some background of the story in the poem by using a script layout. It made the whole poem more visual and that way I could get right to the meat of what I wanted to say.

     I enthusiastically sent out my script poems and waited for the accolades to come in.

     Surprisingly, the publishers were not as galvanized about this new style of poetry as I was. No one accepted them for publication.

     But never underestimate the power of a script poet scorned. At the same time as I was planning my burst onto the poetry stage, I was writing my mystery novel "The Only Shadow In The House," the second book of The Travelling Detective Series. I gave one of my characters the career of a poet and her specialty was Script Poetry. Needless to say the publishers and critics in my fictional world were highly impressed with the poems. The poetry was very popular with the reading public and the poetress won many awards.

     To quote from my book: One critic wrote that her poems have an innovative, revolutionary style that is shaking the foundations of the conventionally staid poetry community, while another critic called them insightful and powerful.

     I have taken one of the script poems from that novel for you to judge for yourself.

 

Fade In

Act One

Exterior-Farm House-Night.

There is snow on the ground. Stars twinkle in the clear, night sky. A vehicle pulls into the yard and a woman climbs out. She stares at the house then takes a deep breath. She releases it in a vapour. With slow tread she climbs up the steps and enters the darkened house. Inside, she stops and listens.

 

There is no noise in my house, it is dark and silent.

Today, I buried you. Is this what it is like in your grave,

total quiet, total darkness?

I flip on the light and wander the house

looking at the possessions that

represented a life that never existed,

except in my own mind.

This has been our home for nineteen years

but it now feels alien to me.

Because from now on I know that mine

will be the only shadow in the house.

I must leave here soon.

 

End Act One

Fade Out

 

Fade In

Act Two

Interior-Farm House- Night.

All the lights are on in the house. The woman is in the kitchen. She pushes over the shelving holding plant seedlings and pots. She heads to the dining room and goes to a china cabinet with no doors. All the shelves hold figurines and dishes and knick knacks. They crash to the floor with a sweep of her hand. The ones that don’t break, disintegrate under her foot.

 

“Damn you, Ben. Damned you to hell!” I yell.

I want you to hear. I want you to know

the sorrow and the pain you have brought me.

I go from room to room, expunging.

I spray your shaving cream on the walls.

I dump your aftershave in the tub.

I grab a knife and shred your clothes.

Finally, there is nothing of yours left.

I feel some satisfaction.

You destroyed my life and now I have

destroyed everything that represented yours.

“There you bastard,” I say. “Rot in hell.”

 

Fade Out

End Act Two

 

Fade In

Act Three

Interior-Farm House- Night

The woman is standing in front of a picture on the living room wall. The furniture and floor are littered with debris. She takes the picture off the hook and stares at it a long time.

 

I find our wedding photograph on the wall.

I’d had it enlarged for our tenth anniversary

as my loving gift to you.

Were you as pleased as you said you were

or was that just a sham?

I smash the glass against the corner of the table.

I cut my finger removing the shards.

I look at you smiling back at me.

Were you an impostor in our marriage?

For now I wonder how many other

women did you see over our nineteen years.

I slash the picture with the knife. How symbolic.

 

End Act Three

Fade Out

Are There Rules for Writing

 

 https://books2read.com/Sleuthing-the-Klondike

https://bwlpublishing.ca/donaldson-yarmey-joan/

Are There Rules to Writing?

Some new writers believe there is a formula for writing, that something should happen by a certain page in the manuscript and another thing so many pages further. In some genres, like romance, that may be the case but for most it isn’t. And even some of those who write romance say they just present the story. For mystery stories, some believe it should start out with the murder, or disappearance, or some sort of mysterious or secretive action while others begin their story with the characters and setting. And remember there are all sorts of sub-genres with every genre and for each one of them the story can be started according to the author’s taste.

So, if there are no rules for writing are there rules for being a writer? Maybe. It depends on who you listen to. Some writers follow a set pattern of writing, such as outlining, using a certain software, or doing their first draft with pen and paper. But there are more dimensions to writing other than putting words on paper.

Don’t try to write like a famous author you admire. You have your own way of writing that is your style and voice. Stay with it.

Before a manuscript is sent to an editor, agent, publisher, or beta reader, it should be free of mistakes in spelling, punctuation, and in the story line—make sure there is no change to a character’s hair colour or what a character did when in the story. Don’t have a character talk about something before they’ve even experience it or witnessed it.

Once their manuscript is complete some writers look for beta readers to give them feedback on the story. It is important to remember that not everyone will like the same story. Even famous writers can’t please their readers all of the time. So don’t be angry or hurt if someone doesn’t like yours. Take what they have to say about your manuscript and see if it needs changing. Bottom line, though, is that it is your work so your opinion comes first. And to add further, there are a lot of people who will resent your success. Ignore their cutting remarks.

Don’t sit back after you’ve sent your manuscript away. Start your next book, compose a short story, keep writing. And if you find that the writing of a story isn’t going well, feel free to set the manuscript aside and start another. You can pick the first one up again at a later time.

And after having said all that, here are some of my quirks about my writing. I have a set way of developing the story before I start to write it depending of the genre. If it’s historical I will do a lot of research to get to know the era, the clothing, the hairdos, etc, before starting and continue researching as the story advances to make sure I get all the facts right. If it’s a mystery then I decide on the death or disappearance then add the characters and let them tell the story. A lot of the time I don’t know who did it until part way through or even at the end of the manuscript. If it’s a romance, then I start with the characters and the setting and see what happens.

I say that I am a pantser writer in that I don’t use an outline but once the story progresses then I will plot out scenes that will be coming next so I do a bit of outlining.

Bottom line about writing: do what works best for you and ignore the rest.