In the right hands,
Della Mae
ABC
these 26 letters
DEF
dance into words,
GHI
thoughts,
JKL
and ideas
MNO
that teach you,
PQR
transport you,
STU
and time and again
VWX
reward you.
YZ
In the right hands
Author: Janet Halls
Peter Carey: Quintessentially Australian
A question for members only: What does Peter Carey have in common with Susan Hill, Alexandr Solzhenitsyn, George Jonas, and Rex Murphy? If you don’t know, the answer is “Anita.” My tenure in CWLC only goes back to 2012, so this is just an incomplete list of Anita’s eclectic author presentations!
That’s the thing about our “book club with a difference:” Our annual theme takes on a life of its own when one is on the upcoming slate. The presenter has been reading and researching like crazy, quite often an author and/or theme that may not be one she normally reads. The lucky members come home with new insights and another author to add to their ever-expanding reading lists. Horizons expand! With all of us stuck at home this year, our theme of Australia and New Zealand has given us a welcome new literary horizon. Anita selected two-time Booker Prize winner Peter Carey, whose novels, short stories and non-fiction are summed up by Anita as “quintessentially Australian.”
Janet H
Learn more about Peter Carey from our “resident expert” here!
Westword Article on CWLC
The Writers’ Guild of Alberta’s magazine Westword published an article about our Club in their October-December 2019 issue. Moorea Gray wrote the article, and we have been granted kind permission to post this article on our website.
Further information about the Club can be found by clicking on ABOUT US
THE CALGARY WOMEN’S LITERARY CLUB
A book club with a difference (then and now)
Moorea Gray
The Calgary Women’s Literary Club (CWLC) — founded in 1906 by Annie Davidson — is a self-described “book club with a difference.” With the diversity of book clubs emerging among friends and in communities, libraries and schools — some led by television and Internet celebrities — you might wonder what makes CWLC different. Although some elements of the club evolved over the past 113 years, the structured program, dedicated membership and rich legacy of literary study and community involvement all contribute to the club’s distinctiveness and long-lasting success.
Club meetings don’t consist of members reading and discussing the same book. Instead, one member prepares a 30-35-minute talk based on her choice of an author. Every two years, the executive committee selects a theme upon which presentations are based. This year, for example, the theme is “Cultural Awareness Through Literature” and presentations include the works of Richard Wagamese and Susanna Moodie, among others. In addition to member presentations, guest speakers make appearances. Distinguished guest authors have included W.O. Mitchell (1966) and Grant MacEwan (1981).
Membership comes with a yearly fee of $40 ($0.25 in 1906). Like Davidson and her fellow readers, CWLC members are creative, well-read, interesting and passionate about literature and learning. Members are expected to attend regularly and present every other year.
Since 1906, presentation summaries, meeting minutes and other documents of interest have been housed in the Glenbow Museum’s Library and Archives. Soon, the materials will move to the University of Calgary. These archives provide details of club activities and literary trends, community events, women’s rights and world history.
Although community engagement is not the purpose of the guild, when the opportunity arises, the CWLC gets busy. In 1915, members helped to pay for seamstresses for the Military Chapter of the Red Cross. In 2018, the club purchased a window in support of the Calgary Public Library’s Windows of Opportunity fundraising program with a bequeathed sum of money from a past member. Members take pride in honouring Davidson’s legacy; it’s not uncommon for the executive to ask, “What would Annie do?”
A widow in her late sixties, New Brunswick-born Davidson (née McKean) held the first CWLC meeting in her home on February 9, 1906. ” At the first meeting, by-laws were drawn up, officers elected and program topics chosen. Early meetings were devoted to rather heavy works, e.g. Shakespeare’s Henry IV and V, and world affairs and current events. By the 1920’s they were devoted to pure literature. Attendance ranged from 25 to 30.” (Source: “Our History,” CWLC website, calgarywomensliteraryclub.com)
Davidson, aware that the growing city of Calgary would profit significantly from a library, applied for a Carnegie Foundation library grant. From 1883 to 1929, Andrew Carnegie — a Scottish-American philanthropist — helped fund the building of more than 2,500 libraries worldwide, of which 125 are in Canada. “A library outranks any other thing a community can do to benefit its people. It is a never-failing spring in the desert,” said Carnegie. To obtain funding from the foundation, Calgary was required to provide land for the library site, and a petition of one-tenth of the male electorate’s signatures was needed. Thanks to Davidson’s leadership and determination, the foundation provided a grant of $80,000, and the Central Memorial Library opened in 1912. The first CWLC meeting held in the beautiful sandstone building was on February 6 of the same year. Unfortunately, Davidson died in 1910 — a few years before the library’s opening.
The CWLC is the oldest club of its kind in Canada. Today, the club meets every Tuesday afternoon in March, April, and October and November at the Memorial Park Library (previously named Central Memorial Library). Coffee and treats are served at 1:30 P.M. A welcome and administrative note from the club president is followed by the presentation and a question and answer period.
The CWLC has a current membership of 35 women. New members are welcomed and encouraged, and men are welcome to attend as guests. For more information and to submit an online membership application, please visit our website (calgarywomensliteraryclubcom). No longer are two written references required — as in the early years — but only a keen interest in literature.
Mooréa Gray holds degrees in English literature and education. She has been a member of the CWLC since 2016. Along with raising her family and teaching, Gray has devoted much of the last decade to researching Icelandic-Canadian poet Stephan G. Stephansson and published an anthology of his translated poetry in August 2019. She is a native of Calgary, where she lives with her family.
Remembering Kay Coutts
It is always with sorrow that we announce a passing of one of our members. Kay Coutts was an enthusiastic member of the Calgary Women’s Literary Club. From 1989 to 2010, she entertained and educated us with presentations on a wide range of authors including Pearl S. Buck, Susanna Moodie, Sir Winston Churchill, Leo Tolstoy, and Doris Lessing to name a few. She did about fifteen talks in ten years! She continued to join our meetings thereafter. She will be missed.
For more about Kay’s rich life CLICK HERE
It has been far too long
It has been far too long, yes it’s been quite a while,
Since we greeted each other with a hug and a smile.
And we listened intently to the paper being read,
Agreeing to the comments with the nod of our head.
It’s been ages since the minutes were shared,
And we nibbled on treats that a member prepared.
The silence we feel brings a sigh to our hearts,
This nasty Corona still keeps us apart!
But the good news is that we all still keep well,
Just imagine the stories we’re saving to tell.
Though our luncheon a virus has hauled off in stealth,
Let us raise up our glasses with a toast to our health.
Denise Doz
Denise Doz
Timbuktu: A journey afar.
In my request for members to enliven our website while we could no longer meet, Janet S. took up the challenge and sent me some photos from Timbuktu, which until recently had a famous library. You must read on, lest we take libraries for granted. Timbuktu represents (or used to?) the most remote location on Planet Earth, wherever you live. Of course, our Janet S. has been there, with pictures to prove it. Two photos show the Timbuktu Library door. (Janet H.)
I visited Timbuktu in 2009, on my way to the Tuareg Festival in the Desert. Touring the dusty town, I was fascinated to hear of the history of this fabled city. It was once a rich trading centre, a crossroads in the trade of salt, gold and slaves, and the site of the first university in the Muslim world, established in 1140. It became famous for the study of sciences such as astronomy and medicine, as well as for literature and religion. I was shown the library, which held the handwritten manuscripts dating back to the establishment of the university. Many of the manuscripts remained in private hands. It was explained to me that many of the families who had passed them down through the generations were uncomfortable having all the precious manuscripts kept in one place. They felt that it was their duty to protect these ancient records of the past.
Their instincts were very good, as I was there at a very uncertain time. The private army of Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi had just disbanded, and taking their weapons with them, they were making incursions into Mali. The people of Timbuktu were worried as to what the future would hold for them as they were Sufi Muslims and the fanatic Sharia jihadist Muslims from Qaddafi’s army were on the move south. The governments of all 8 of us in the tour group, Canadian, Australian, British and American sent warnings to us in Timbuktu that we should get out. We were all certain that we would be safe until after the festival. Luckily that was the case, and then we left rapidly. The Festival in the Desert went off well, carrying on the melodic traditions of the Tuaregs that stretched back at least to the times of the founding of Timbuktu. Many tribesmen had travelled hundreds of miles across the Sahara by camel to attend. I found out later that it was at this time that two Canadian diplomats had been kidnapped in Niger, and it turned out later that they were being kept in Mali, about 250 kilometres from where we were. About 2 months after, a tour group was attacked near Timbuktu and a British man and a German lady were killed. However, it was not until three years later that the jihadists burned the library of Timbuktu and destroyed the forty-two tombs of the prophets that were a feature of Timbuktu. Luckily, those manuscripts in private hands were smuggled out of the area.
Janet S.
Bibliophiles: Feel good about having more books than you will likely read!
Flora shared this fun article, for your reading pleasure:
CLICK HERE IF YOU HAVE OVERSTUFFED BOOKCASES!
If you ARE getting through some of those books on your shelves, consider showcasing your favourites here! Your recommendation can be added to the website, and archived in Category “I’m Reading.” (Check out the menu to the right.) These can be short and sweet, as if you’ve been asked to comment for a book sleeve. Just send your draft to the webmaster, Janet Halls.
Immigrant Literature: A two way mirror
Not so long ago, I discovered immigrant literature through a novel which completely changed the way I perceived current news about illegal Mexican immigrants. Not only had I gained more insight into their plight, I saw our own North American culture from their point of view — and it was unflattering.
With this season’s theme of cultural awareness in literature, I sought to present to the Club five fictional books which address ongoing immigrant issues in North America, written in different styles and dealing with different cultures. I had a wealth of choice, and when I had run out of time to read more, I selected these:
Environmental: The Tortilla Curtain (above-mentioned) about illegal Mexican immigrants (Author T.C. Boyle, 1995)
Suspense: The House of Sand and Fog about Iranian-Americans (Author André Dubus III, 1999)
Legal drama: The Boat People about Sri Lankan asylum seekers in Canada (Sharon Bala, 2018)
The two books below are in many categories, or perhaps defy categorizing. You will laugh and you will cry while reading their narrators’ highly quirky, often funny, recounting of tragedies.
Coming of age (the best I can do… unlike any other book I have read:) The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao about Dominican Republicans in New Jersey (Junot Díaz, 2007)
War/spy novel/mystery/comedy/tragedy… : The Sympathizer about Vietnamese refugees to the United States (Viet Thanh Nguyen, 2015)
Why search out immigrant literature? Fiction will humanize immigrants in a way news reports cannot. Novels make us more aware of the enormous challenges immigrants face and can deepen our understanding, empathy and compassion for those who hope to find a better life here.
Janet Halls
Susanna Moodie and Her Teacups Come to Canada
Moorea revealed how foreign our own Canadian culture can be by sharing her study of Susanna Moodie, a 19th Century British settler, whose book about the realities of Roughing it in the Bush; or, Life in Canada (1852) was not the encouraging guide to promote emigration its publishers had envisaged!
Susanna Moodie is important historically, providing a window into what was then Upper Canada (Ontario.) For a genteel British family — who had expected to rise to the top of colonial society, the reality was not what they expected. Mrs. Moodie, who was already a published author in Britain, became a pioneer of Canadian literature, and has influenced writers such as Carol Shields, L.M. Montgomery, Timothy Findley and Margaret Atwood.
This courageous immigrant shared her experiences through the art of writing, while she adapted, not always easily or willingly, to a culture more foreign than she had expected — and which would be largely foreign to Canadians today. Link to Moorea’s insightful summary by CLICKING HERE.
[Webmaster’s addition: Enjoy stumbling upon what is almost certainly THE MOODIE HOMESTEAD, THROUGH THIS LINK. It is an artist’s watercolour images, someone who would have gone to enormous effort to reach the Moodie homestead shortly after the family had moved from the bush.]
Diana Gabaldon: Storyteller extraordinaire: Bold. Beautiful. Beloved.
It’s no wonder that the “father of geology” James Hutton was Scottish, as is the Loch Ness monster and Scottish bagpipes: What a country and culture! Cecilia opened her presentation with Wings’ Mull of Kintyre. The “earworm” hasn’t left me since (in a good way!) The opening music for the TV series, “The Skye Boat Song,” is equally haunting, with traditional lyrics telling of Bonnie Prince Charlie’s escape to the Isle of Skye.
Cecilia felt as entirely immersed in the world Gabaldon paints in the Outlander novels, as her son had been many years ago escaping into J.K. Rowling’s world of Harry Potter.
In 1988, a scientist, university professor and contributor to professional publications, decided to try her hand at writing a novel, for practice only. Diana Gabaldon by chance caught a Dr. Who episode with a compelling 18th century, kilted Scottish character. That was the catalyst for what has become The Outlander series. By using time travel, the author was able to provide modern perspectives. As a counterpoint to the fantasy, Ms. Gabaldon weaves in reality using her meticulous research of history, medical practices and medicinal plants.
Regrettably, I can’t provide a link into the 18th Century, but FOLLOW THIS FURTHER TO DIVE DEEPER INTO CECILIA’S REFLECTIONS