Places Far From Ellesmere

by Aritha van Herk

Internationally acclaimed novelist Aritha van Herk takes geography and fiction and creates of them a fiction mapped on the lines of geography, a geography following the course of fiction. A new reading of Tolstoy's tragic heroine Anna Karenina and a sojourn at Ellesmere Island come together, and the North becomes an incomparably beautiful place, a living, unread, feminine landscape.

Genres: Fiction, Canada

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 9, 2003

About the author

Aritha van Herk is a Canadian writer, critic, editor, and university professor.

Her parents and elder siblings immigrated to Canada from the Netherlands before she was born. She grew up in a bilingual home, speaking English and Dutch. In 1974, she married Robert Jay Sharp, who is a geologist. Van Herk studied Canadian literature and Creative Writing at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, graduating with a B.A. Honours in 1976, and an M.A. in 1978. Since 1983, Aritha van Herk has been teaching at the University of Calgary. She teaches Creative Writing, Canadian Literature, and Contemporary Narrative.

Reviews

[Ginny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yes--it was amazing. But not for everyone. And not if you have never really read Anna Karenina. A novel as poem, written in the second person--you thought, you felt, you observed. And yes, I frequently agreed. Yes, I did experience many of these things. If all the names for the landmarks that surround us are names of men, then how do we read ourselves? If you know anything about Anna, you know that thoughts of suicide will permeate.

[Jeff · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this up because it was referenced in Jenny Hval's book, Girls Against God, which I absolutely loved. It's definitely a book of its time, with lots of added forward-slashes in the tradition of 80s deconstructionism. The author photo on the back cover was worth the price I paid for the book, honestly. I think if I were Canadian, the book would have been more interesting, but I mostly only enjoyed the last third, where the connections to Anna Karenina are made explicit.

[Mark Dickson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t know whether to rate this as a 3* or a 5*.

Part experimental memoir and part response to “Anna Karenina”. In theory I should absolutely love this. And I do. But there’s also this deliberate disconnect and sporadic ineffability to the descriptions of place and person that makes it difficult to fully dial into.

This will probably fluctuate wildly around in my head for quite a while.

[Susanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is of my favorite books. Van Herk does such a superb job capturing a particular place at a particular time it makes you wish you'd been there yourself. I read it when I first moved to Canada, and it made me want to travel to the Arctic Circle. I still haven't been there so far, but I'm still planning to go there someday.