Bee hives near here

Here is the single bee hive behind Mountainview School. My impression is that the bee hive was placed here for educational purposes, but I didn't see any children in the area so I am probably wrong about this. The bee keeper made some honey, and now the hive will be relocated to where he winters his hives. I really enjoyed seeing the bees, it reminded me of when I had a dozen or so bee hives where I lived in the country; it reminded me of two friends, George Johnston and Reg Skinner, who helped get me into bee keeping. 

Some Notes on E.K. Brown

E.K. Brown, a study in conflict, Laura Smyth Groening, 
University of Toronto Press (1993)

A while ago I read Laura Smyth Groening's biography, E.K. Brown, a study in conflict (1993); Professor Smyth Groening taught at Concordia University, here in Montreal, like Patricia Morley who also taught at Concordia and wrote biographies of Leo Kennedy and William Kurelek. Smyth Groening's biography of E.K. Brown is fascinating; Brown was a Canadian scholar whose death in his early forties silenced an important voice of intelligence and dedication to literature. Brown was a gifted scholar who wrote on a variety of literary subjects: for instance, Canadian poetry before it became as fully recognized as it is today; he also wrote on Matthew Arnold, Willa Cather, and E.M. Forster and he translated French literature into English. During World War Two Brown worked as a speech writer for Prime Minister McKenzie-King. Brown had prodigious energy and curiosity. Brown was a man of prescience and foresight; he wrote on Cather and Forster when their reputations had fallen into decline. Brown also had a distinguished teaching career, he taught at Toronto, Winnipeg, Cornell, and Chicago and was recognized for his brilliance; it is unfortunate that Brown died in 1951 when he was only 45 years old. It seems that Brown's work is no longer discussed and Brown himself has been all but forgotten despite this excellent biography; I wonder how many graduate students in Canadian Literature have even heard of E.K. Brown... 

There is much about Brown that I find interesting; for instance: he was one of the first scholars of his generation to favourably re-evaluate the Confederation Poets; he helped promote the literary careers of Duncan Campbell Scott (his friend) and Archibald Lampman (Scott's friend), and he emphasized the importance of Scott and Lampman over that of Carman and Roberts; in his yearly reviews of new Canadian books, published in the University of Toronto Quarterly, and in his book On Canadian Poetry (1943), he emphasized the importance of Canadian literature; he wrote on Mathew Arnold; he wrote the first biography of Willa Cather; he wrote on E.M. Forster. He was also friends with Leon Edel, both studied at the Sorbonne in the 1920s, and Edel completed Brown's biography of Cather after Brown's early death. 

Perhaps it is Brown's friendship with Leon Edel that is his main connection to the Montreal Group of poets; Edel was not a member of the Montreal Group in the sense that he was a ;poet, but he was associated with them, he was a student at McGill University when the other members were active and he helped them publish the McGill Fortnightly Review; the Montreal Group included F.R. Scott, A.J.M. Smith, Leo Kennedy, and A.M. Klein. While Brown was good friends with Edel he was an acquaintance of A.J.M. Smith. In his review of a book of poems by Smith, Brown was disappointed that the book was so sleight. he contended, with others, that Smith, as a poet, had not published enough to be a significant poet. Personally, I don't agree with Brown on this, Smith has a few poems that are brilliant but, as readers, we do expect more than a hundred poems in a lifetime from a poet. Objectively, this is a correct conclusion; but upon reflection it is a different matter; time filters a poet's work, the good poems (possibly only two or three poems) survive and the rest of a poet's body of work becomes of little interest to most people other than a few critics and literature students. But later Brown almost apologizes to Smith for his earlier comments, he affirms that Smith was a good poet, just not a prolific poet. Both Brown and Smith published books on Canadian poetry in 1943; they were, in some ways, competitors in defining Canadian poetry. 

Brown is not a poet but he is still an important part of our history of Canadian literature; he is not as important as Northrop Frye but he should not be far behind Frye in his significance to Canadian letters; however, neglect of Brown's books has resulted in most people never having heard of Brown.To get the full flavour of Brown's personality, I suggest reading his correspondence with Duncan Campbell Scott, it shows the warmth and kindness of the two men, it was an enduring friendship. I think it was Scott who mentions something about Northrop Frye in one of his letters, this was before Frye became famous, and there is speculation that Northrop Frye must be a made-up name, it is an amusing aside that echoes something of what other people have wondered over the years since then. 

BTW, one day my friend George Johnston, who was a student of Frye's in the late 40s or early 1950s, said that he and some other poets, like Jay McPherson, who knew Frye, were called "Little Frye"; George was working on his PhD under Frye when Frye wanted him to read Madame Blavatsky's The Secret Doctrine : The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy, a long and tedious work; it was at that moment he knew it was time to drop his PhD. I think Frye wanted him to read Blavatsky in relation to his studies on William Blake.

My only problem with Smyth Groening's biography is with the sub-title, I am not sure what the "study in conflict" is regarding E.K. Brown. He seems, to me, to have lived one of the least conflicted lives one could find. But maybe this is a reference to Matthew Arnold, I am not sure. Since reading Smyth Groening's biography of Brown I have read several of Brown's books, they all deserve to be read.

Review of In the Writers' Words, Conversations with Eight Poets

Laurence Hutchman on Grand Blvd near Somerled, Montreal, March 2016

                                 

Laurence Hutchman 

In the Writers' Words, Conversations with Eight Poets

Guernica Editions, Toronto, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-5507-309-1

Conversations with Eight Poets

by

Stephen Morrissey

             Laurence Hutchman's In the Writers' Words, Conversations with Eight Poets is a valuable addition to our knowledge of modernist Canadian poetry. The poets interviewed in these conversations are Ralph Gustafson, George Johnston, P.K. Page, Fred Cogswell, Louis Dudek, Al Purdy, Anne Szumigalski, and James Reaney. All eight of these poets have made important contributions to Canadian literature—they are all distinguished members of the Canadian poetry canon—and several have also contributed as translators and publishers.

            There is an easy intimacy between Laurence Hutchman and the poets he is interviewing. It feels as though we are listening in on good friends having a friendly but serious conversation on a subject about which both of them are passionate. Each interview is prefaced with a vivid and detailed description of the poet's home or place of work where the interview took place. When Hutchman is invited into Ralph Gustafson's Eastern Township's home he sits by a warm fire in late December; he describes the "chilly November morning in Saskatoon" when he rode a borrowed bicycle to interview Anne Szunigalski and entered her home where he admired paintings "everywhere on the walls, mostly done by her own family."
            Just before the interview which takes place in James Reaney's university office, Hutchman notes, "We sit on a green couch for the interview. On the wall facing us there is a painting of Reaney's, of The Nihilist Spasm Band. Above us is a picture, 'A Well Organized Athletic Meet on Centre Island, 1907 two women carrying eggs on a spoon.' Above those are topographical maps representing Grand Bend, St. Mary's and Stratford." Hutchman's awareness of the minutiae and detail of the place where the interview takes place enhances each interview that follows. In these interviews we are invited to know the human side of the eight different poets. Indeed, these conversations are an invitation for new readers to explore each poets' work.
            Scholars will find In The Writers' Words, Conversations with Eight Poets a valuable source of insight into these poets' work; recent criticism I've written on Louis Dudek's major long poem "Continuation" has been deepened by reading the interview with him. I can hear Dudek's voice—engaging and inquiring—in his discussion with Hutchman; Dudek states,

                        In Continuation 1 and Continuation 2, I at last found a voice where

                        I could say exactly what I want to say, and everything I want to say,

                        in the most amazing fragmentary way... you have to take risks in poetry.

                        What is poetry trying to do on the page? It's trying to represent the

                        poet's thought.

                        Many of us have fond memories of having met these eight poets. I remember meeting James Reaney at a League of Canadian Poets AGM in Toronto; he was wearing a tie decorated with books that I liked so much it took me a year before finding a similar tie for myself. In Edmonton, a few years ago, Mark Abley's excellent keynote address at the League's AGM was on Anne Szumigalski and it brought her life and work to a new audience. Elsewhere, I heard Fred Cogswell and Ralph Gustafson read their poems and from time to time corresponded with them. I sat and talked with Al Purdy after one of the times I heard him read. Louis Dudek, besides being my professor, was a friend until the end of his life. I remember being a first year graduate student at McGill University and walking into the English Department's staff lounge and seeing Laurence sitting discussing his own poetry with Louis Dudek. Dudek's DC Books published Hutchman's first book, Explorations (1975). George Johnston was a good friend, we both lived in rural south-western Quebec after he retired from teaching at Carleton University. In addition to many discussions on poetry George taught me the basics of the art of bee keeping which I did for many years. George and his wife Jean were both good friends and warm-hearted people, over the years of knowing them I also got to know some members of their family. During their careers all of these poets that Hutchman interviews readily made themselves available to newer poets. Reading Hutchman's conversations with them reminds me of the generosity and welcoming spirit of this modernist generation of poets, many of whom made an indelible impression on me.
                  All eight of these poets began writing and publishing during the 1930s to the1950s. Individually and collectively they made a significant contribution to Canadian poetry. P.K. Page, reminiscing about when she lived in Montreal, reminds us of poets we may have forgotten but who are still important for their role in Canadian literature, they include Patrick Anderson and John Sutherland. She also remembers with fondness Montreal poet A.M. Klein; Page says,

            ... he was only nine years older than I but he seemed to belong to a different generation. This had to do with a series of things, I think, with the fact that he was married, had children, and a law practise. He was already established as a poet... I find him a  wonderful poet and can't think why people today don't see it. But they will again.

            In his interview George Johnston discusses the literary scene back in the 1930s when he was a student and had just begun writing; Johnston states, "To tell the truth, I was hardly aware of a literary life in Toronto, except at the university. There was one intellectual sort of magazine which came out once a month..." This comment by Johnston reveals to us how far Canadian literature has progressed over the last sixty or seventy years.

            The eight poets Hutchman interviewed spent a lifetime writing poetry and thinking about poetry; theirs was a life centered on literature and poetry. The New Brunswick-based poet Fred Cogswell, who did a tremendous service for poets across Canada during his many years of running the literary small press, Fiddlehead, makes this statement on "the philosophical nature of ... poetry":

           

The particular philosophical nature of poetry is that its function is to illustrate the  qualities of the human mind that are the basis for the attitudes we have as human beings. Keep going farther than you've already gone, or you become a victim of what you've written up until that moment.

            In the interview with P.K. Page, living at the west coast edge of the continent, in Victoria, BC, a clap of thunder is heard as the interview comes to an end. PK says to Hutchman, "You're conjuring up gods that we don't normally have." This is what Hutchman does in all of these interviews. He conjures the gods of poetry. Hutchman's interviews with each of these eight poets is an intimate conversation with each individual. We hear their voice, their commitment to poetry, and their example of a life lived for poetry. Hutchman's book stays vivid and lively and brings the reader directly into the personality and writing of each of the eight poets. For anyone of any age, either scholar or reader, who is interested in the modernist poets of Canada, this book is an indispensable companion to the poets' collected works. That is part of the magic of this book.

                                                                        Stephen Morrissey

                                                                        Montreal, September 3, 2013

Tea with George and Jeanne Johnston, 16 February 1992

George Johnston in 1992

Photos taken in the living room of their Henderson Street home, Huntingdon, Quebec

Jeanne Johnston, Carolyn Zonailo, George Johnston

We always enjoyed tea with George and Jeanne Johnston, good friends from our years living in Huntingdon, Quebec. George and Jeanne were lovely people, generous, loving, welcoming... I have been blessed by knowing them.

Honey bees on UBC campus

Walking by the L.S. Klinck Building on the UBC campus last week I noticed honey bees gathering nectar and pollen in the flowers (pictured above). Notice the large pollen sacs on the honey bees' legs. There were also a few bumble bees, and other bees, but the honey bee is always of interest and anyone who has kept bees has a fondness for them. Back in the mid-1970s my friend R.R. Skinner opened his hives for me to observe his bees. That was interesting and I knew right away that one day I would keep my own bees. On my visits to R.R. I would write down pretty much everything he said--I seem to have the ability of sitting and listening to people talk about themselves for many hours in a non-judgemental and fairly passive way--but R.R.'s stories about beekeeping were always interesting, including moving hives on his bicycle and overwintering a hive in his bedroom. Beekeepers can be quite obsessive about bees, and this obsession seems eccentric to people who have never kept bees. But one man's eccentricity is another man's normal life.



Above, the L.S. Klinck Building on the UBC campus.

It was in the early 1980s that my friend, the poet George Johnston, sat down with me and went over what I would need to establish my own apiary. I ordered some beekeeping equipment through the mail but also drove to Bedford, Quebec to pick up boxes of bees. That's how you buy honey bees, several thousand come in a wooden box with a wire mesh front and a queen bee contained in a small box inside the larger box. You literally dump the bees into a hive like bits of Styrofoam; however, the queen bee is released into the hive only gradually so that she will be accepted by the other bees. How do you release the queen gradually? There is a sugar plug that the worker bees and the queen eat opening a space for the queen to emerge into the hive. If, for whatever reason, the worker bees don't like the queen, they will quite literally kill the queen, which means more work for the beekeeper as she will have to be replaced. There is also a smell to bees, it is feral and reminds us that bees are never domesticated, only contained. I went with George, and possibly with George Elliot, about whom George has written some memorable poems, to beekeeping seminars across the border in New York State. These events were always memorable and enjoyable to attend. I also remember, one time, driving home from Bedford with boxes of bees and beekeeping equipment and the brakes failing on the car... somehow I still made it back home, maybe fifty miles distance. That was interesting...

I used to have about ten hives that I kept in the field, near some apple trees, about a hundred feet behind The Cedars, our house on the Trout River in Huntingdon, (more correctly, Godmanchester) Quebec. I had a big hand-turned honey extractor that I bought second hand, but like many beekeepers I preferred making comb honey. Comb honey is cut directly from the frame, it's honey the way bees make it in a hive, but it also means you've destroyed the comb the bees have made, while with liquid honey you can recycle the frame with the comb on it because all you've done is cut off a surface layer of wax before extracting the honey. You extract the honey by the centrifugal force of spinning the frames. There's money in bees wax that can be made into candles and pollen that some people believe has health benefits, but this should be qualified, if you want pollen for allergies or whatever, you need local pollen since your allergies are to local plants, not pollen from China that has dubious if any value. Beekeepers have always known that bee stings can help relieve arthritis, and this seems to be getting some press in recent years; however, I remember R.R. suggesting that the bee sting acted as a kind of accupuncture treatment, and maybe this is a correct explanation for this .

Unless you've kept bees you may not understand the happiness one can experience opening hives on a hot summer day. The bees are probably fairly passive on such days, but a whiff of smoke passed over the top of the frames seems to keep them busy and diverted from the beekeeper's activities. Never wear perfume or any other scent to an apiary, I've had a nasty experience being stung by doing that. I kept bees for about ten years and was put out of business by mites from across the US border infesting my bees. Don't worry about killer bees, thirty years after I began beekeeping I still don't see them as a problem here in Canada. I remember, as well, lying in the grass near the entrance to the hives and watching bees coming and going, what a wonderful sight that is! They're bringing in nectar, their pollen sacs are full, and some bees are removing dead bees; in the fall the drones, male bees that inseminate the queen on her single maiden flight, are being expelled. Don't forget, all worker honey bees are female. Lying there, in the grass on a summer day, that's when you realize the genuine affection one feels for the honey bee.