Are there Canadian dragons? And if there are, what are they like? Canada is far too young a country to have ever had a population that naively believed in dragons of the European variety. By the time Europeans settled the land, dragons were known to be myths, creatures of the imagination. Besides, leathery wings and …
Tag: Gwendolyn MacEwen
“Index”: an HTMElegy
On CKUT (McGill Campus Radio) this week on Monday and at the launch for the Veg magazine yesterday, I read some magical poems I composed recently. One was inspired by Gwendolyn MacEwen and John Dee, the other was an elimination of James Frazer's The Golden Bough, and the last was a pantoum, a fabulously musical …
King of Egypt, King of Dreams by Gwendolyn MacEwen
Gwendolyn MacEwen's historical novel King of Egypt, King of Dreams was published in 1971 and as far as I know, it is out of print-except by online order from Insomniac Press. Nonetheless I am fascinated to review it, because it stands as a powerful testimony to the tragedy of those who own a unique, transcendent …
Continue reading King of Egypt, King of Dreams by Gwendolyn MacEwen
Gwendolyn MacEwen’s Mystical Vision of the Franklin Expedition in “Terror and Erebus”
Canada has been celebrating the discovery of Captain Sir John Franklin's ill-fated ship, the Erebus, since early September. Along with the Terror, captained by Francis Crozier, this ship carried Franklin and his crew on their fatal quest for the Northwest Passage, which lasted three years (1845-1848). For most of that time, Franklin was stranded, a …
Julian the Magician by Gwendolyn MacEwen
Julian the Magician is the work of a poet of the mythic, the magical, and the exotic: Gwendolyn MacEwen. Although she is better known for her poetry--and mostly, I suspect, by academics rather than the general public--I recommend reading her today. Her style is a "sort of powerful poetic mad half-abandoned prose somewhere between [Kenneth] …
Matthew Rettino 