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Oct 9 - United Way

Stupid United Way booksale. A simple "Last day - by donation!" sign shouldn't have such power:
  • Doug Cuthand, Tapwe: Selected Columns of Doug Cuthand (the thoughtful and provocative Cree journalist from Saskatchewan, whose colums I so often appreciate on the rare times I see them in the Times-Colonist)
  • Ivan Doig, Dancing at the Rascal Fair
  • Brian Fawcett, Local Matters: A Defence of Dooney's Cafe and Other Non-Globalized Places, People, and Ideas (sample line: "Siding with environmentalists doesn't fool me into trusting them, or, for that matter, liking them" [92])
  • The Best of Granta Travel (1991)
  • Vid Ingelevics, Hunter : Gatherer (exhibition gallery from the Southern Alberta Art Gallery & the Tom Thomson Art Gallery -- mostly photos of woodpiles!)
  • Hugh MacLennan (text), The Colours of Canada (another entry in my growing pile of 60s/70s coffee-table books about Canadian nature, to set against my similarly growing pile of Sierra Club photo-books)
  • ed. Wells, Velie, & Walker, Appleseeds and Beercans: Man and Nature in Literature (a 1974 anthology)
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David L. said…
Ha! That was my copy of Ivan Doig -- a book I've dragged across the country several times, but never got around to reading! Let me know if its any good.

I managed to avoid the temptation of checking out the United Way sale and just gave away books this year. Liberating... until I see the stacks of unread magazines and books scattered across the house and office.
October 9, 2009 at 3:26:00 PM PDT
Anonymous said…
I wonder what you'll think of the Doig. I love his non-fiction -- This House of Sky, Winter Brothers (wondrous), the sequel to This House of Sky (title escapes me this moment) which I didn't like as well, mostly because it covered the same ground THOS but didn't manage to sustain the latter's highly original perspective and tone. But I find the fiction a bit silly. The settings are great -- Montana for the most part -- but somehow the characters are dumb. But maybe they're intended more for a male readership. Is this an incendiary thing to say?
tk
October 9, 2009 at 6:13:00 PM PDT
richard said…
Damn you, Leach!

Theresa, I've heard great things about Doig's nonfiction as well, but not all that much about the fiction. With the roaring success of A River Runs Through It, I thought that I'd've heard more about Doig's Montana fiction if it was something really wonderful. But characters being dumb because they're for a male readership? Good heavens. You must have had your coffee this morning without the usual helping of tact! :-)
October 9, 2009 at 9:54:00 PM PDT
Anonymous said…
Oh, gosh. What I meant was was something like this: the fiction is about guys who seem as though they've stepped from the pages of a hurtin' song. Lonesome dove guys. Sam Shepherd guys. I don't know men like them, though I guess they're out there. And maybe they're reading Ivan Doig's novels and having moments of recognition. Somehow the nostalgia that suffuses the non-fiction is of a different order. (Odour?) And I didn't mean to offend your male readers, Richard...
October 10, 2009 at 7:15:00 AM PDT
richard said…
Oh, I was just teasing, Theresa! I read enough Westerns as a kid to know what you mean. The hurtin' song has an enormous appeal to listeners of country music; I don't know that it's mostly a male listenership for that particular strand of country song, mind you, but I've always liked it myself.

Guess I'll have to give one of them a read, now -- unlike that wastrel Leach....
October 10, 2009 at 8:25:00 AM PDT
Anonymous said…
Whew. Glad you're still talking to me...Try the rascal fair one. The main character is actually quite dear but there's more than a whiff of high lonesome in those pages too. And yes, like you, I confess to liking the music myself. On a recent road trip to Boundary country, I think I drove my husband crazy by playing Ian Tyson's "Road to Las Cruces" over and over again. But somehow the idea of a novel about that brooding spurned cowboy lover doesn't have the same resonance for me.
October 10, 2009 at 9:07:00 AM PDT
richard said…
I suppose "Road to Las Cruces" will do, if you don't have handy a copy of "Irving Berlin (Is 100 Years Old Today)"!

Sure, I'm still talking to you. And I hope to meet you on the 20th, when you're here reading with Anik See and Des Kennedy, at the Cornerstone Cafe.
October 10, 2009 at 2:23:00 PM PDT
Anonymous said…
Oh, yes. Introduce yourself for sure! I agree about the Irving Berlin song and of course "Summer Wages" and a handful of others. I always buy my Ian Tyson cds at the Quilchena Store...
tk
October 10, 2009 at 4:39:00 PM PDT
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