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Temerity & Gall
For more than five decades, John Metcalf has worked tirelessly as editor, anthologist, writer, critic, and teacher to help shape our understanding of Canadian literature and imagine its potential. A long-time editor of the Best Canadian Stories anthology; fiction editor at some of the preeminent literary presses in the country for more than forty years; and past editor of Canadian Notes and Queries, Canada's longest-running independent journal of literary criticism, Metcalf has worked tirelessly to support generations of our best writers. In Temerity & Gall, Metcalf looks back on a lifetime spent in letters; surveys, with no punches pulled, the current state of CanLit; and offers a passionate defense of the promise and potential of Canadian writing.
444 pages, Paperback
Published May 24, 2022
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September 7, 2022
John Metcalf (b. 1938) came from england to canada at some point, found the writing scene in this country (I think Wyndham Lewis called it a "nationette") poor, and finds it only slightly less poor, if for changed reasons. Some of his contrariness I agree with, and he quotes from B.S. Johnson, for gosh sakes. Not a figure you'll see brought in by a canadian mainstream literary person. He has choice remarks about arts funding (against), the cBC (once was more for, but now seems disenchanted by), and certain Respected Writers (Atwood, Alexis) and their consumables. As for readers: "The audience, however, for the most part, remains lumpen, and has not grown large enough, despite decades of dirigiste coddling and hothousing to comprehend, let alone sustain, a literary culture."
T&G is loosely structured in four parts named after three cities -- montreal, toronto, ottawa -- with a postscript. We get glimpses of Metcalf's life as an editor (there's a repetitiveness in this that could have been done away with, and throughout the book where a few people are introduced more than once) and writer, and he presents memories about and arguments around his time working for various publishing houses. He talks about friendships, especially with Clark Blaise and Ray Smith, and Dan Wells, owner and publisher of Biblioasis (the publisher of T&G). There are tart comments as well as sweeping generalizations, for this is, like some of his other non-fiction books, a polemic, and there's every reason to justify the occasional electric shock administered to canlit's tenderest parts (i.e., the bureaucrats and mediocre writers). (Yet Metcalf likes writers whose work I am cold to, like Munro, and no amount of praise on that subject will warm me.) He is good on what "excellence" means in canada's art council terms: generally speaking, a book that's been published by someone. Because what else could be published, here or anywhere? He is for aesthetics over quotas and every other consideration.
There are lengthy close readings (focusing on the "how" more than the "why" of writing, thankfully) with generous quotations that accompany a peacock display of the first editions Metcalf owns, what he paid for them, and their condition (he reads bookseller's catalogues so is adopting some of their methods [if not manners]). With that in mind, I confess to dog-earring many pages. My copy is number 343 of a limited signed edition of 750 copies. I didn't know that's what I would be getting when I ordered the book from the publisher. Will my marks increase or decrease the value? "O dearie I!," as John Cowper Powys liked to say, not for me to say, not for me to say at all.
For those who follow my reviews and are canadian (writers or readers), this is a book whose approach you may enjoy or at least find plenty to agree and disagree with. In canada we're short of writers who are assertive and barbed and who provoke thought. Recommended to those who like such things (and he gives praise where he feels it's due, it's not all brickbats or, to change metaphors, a meal of tongues) and those who, unaware of some disputes in canlit, might be interested in seeing that not every literary person in this country is restrained and repressed, or 'polite and nice,' if you prefer that kind of language.
A nice touch is a dialogue conducted in a different font with Wells, the publisher, who often thinks Metcalf makes too much of some things and too little of others. Their email correspondence shows affection and respect.
T&G is loosely structured in four parts named after three cities -- montreal, toronto, ottawa -- with a postscript. We get glimpses of Metcalf's life as an editor (there's a repetitiveness in this that could have been done away with, and throughout the book where a few people are introduced more than once) and writer, and he presents memories about and arguments around his time working for various publishing houses. He talks about friendships, especially with Clark Blaise and Ray Smith, and Dan Wells, owner and publisher of Biblioasis (the publisher of T&G). There are tart comments as well as sweeping generalizations, for this is, like some of his other non-fiction books, a polemic, and there's every reason to justify the occasional electric shock administered to canlit's tenderest parts (i.e., the bureaucrats and mediocre writers). (Yet Metcalf likes writers whose work I am cold to, like Munro, and no amount of praise on that subject will warm me.) He is good on what "excellence" means in canada's art council terms: generally speaking, a book that's been published by someone. Because what else could be published, here or anywhere? He is for aesthetics over quotas and every other consideration.
There are lengthy close readings (focusing on the "how" more than the "why" of writing, thankfully) with generous quotations that accompany a peacock display of the first editions Metcalf owns, what he paid for them, and their condition (he reads bookseller's catalogues so is adopting some of their methods [if not manners]). With that in mind, I confess to dog-earring many pages. My copy is number 343 of a limited signed edition of 750 copies. I didn't know that's what I would be getting when I ordered the book from the publisher. Will my marks increase or decrease the value? "O dearie I!," as John Cowper Powys liked to say, not for me to say, not for me to say at all.
For those who follow my reviews and are canadian (writers or readers), this is a book whose approach you may enjoy or at least find plenty to agree and disagree with. In canada we're short of writers who are assertive and barbed and who provoke thought. Recommended to those who like such things (and he gives praise where he feels it's due, it's not all brickbats or, to change metaphors, a meal of tongues) and those who, unaware of some disputes in canlit, might be interested in seeing that not every literary person in this country is restrained and repressed, or 'polite and nice,' if you prefer that kind of language.
A nice touch is a dialogue conducted in a different font with Wells, the publisher, who often thinks Metcalf makes too much of some things and too little of others. Their email correspondence shows affection and respect.
Displaying 1 of 1 review