The Wrong World: Selected Stories and Essays of Bertram Brooker

by Bertram Brooker, Gregory Betts (Editor)

Bertram Brooker won the country's first Governor General's Award for literature in 1936 for his novel "Think of the Earth," and his explosive, experimental paintings hang in every major gallery in the country. He was Canada's first multidisciplinary avantgardist, successfully experimenting in literature, visual arts, film, and theatre. Brooker brought all of his experimental ambitions to his short fiction and prose. "The Wrong World" presents a rich sampling of his prose work, much of it previously unpublished, which adds new insight into his aesthetic ambitions.
Working during an incredible period of transition in Canadian society, Brooker's stories document Canada's evolution from a provincial colony into a modern, urban country. His essays participated in that evolution by advocating a passionate awakening of the arts, the end of prudish sentiment and censorship, and a radical rethinking of the nature of war. They capture the limitations and hypocrisies of the Canadian social contract and argue for a more just and spiritual society. His stories humanize his social vision by dramatizing the psychological and emotional cost of Canada's transition into a modern civilization. In turn devastating, penetrating and poignant, Brooker's prose works offer a sharply focussed window into the turbulent interwar years in Canada.

340 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Bertram Richard Brooker was a Canadian writer, painter, musician and advertising agency executive.

Born in England he moved to Portage la Prairie, Manitoba in 1905 with his family.

He moved to Toronto, Ontario in 1921 and joined the staff of Marketing magazine. Brooker served as the magazine's editor and publisher from 1924 until 1926. In 1923, he published his first book, Subconscious Selling.

In 1931 Brooker was embroiled in a controversy about nudity in art when a painting of his was removed from a gallery exhibition because it contained nudity. Brooker wrote the essay "Nudes and Prudes" as a rebuke.

In 1936, Brooker's novel Think of the Earth became the first work to win the Governor General's Award for Fiction.

Brooker is regarded as the first Canadian abstract impressionist painter. He was strongly influenced in his development as an artist by LeMoine Fitzgerald.