Profiles in Canadian Literature ed. by Jeffrey M. Heath

Abstract

influence and allusions, thereby providing background and additional infor­ mation for the literary analysis that serves as the third part of each entry. Because of these bibliographies DBTEL is more than just a dictionary; it is a study guide and a self-referencing dictionary, too. With so many virtues, DBTEL nevertheless has one flaw and one occa­ sional failing. The flaw is this: while the book is designed to be used from biblical image to English author, many readers will want to use it from au­ thor to biblical image, and they will be frustrated. The student of Faulkner, for example, will find a very substantial bibliography of works on the Bible in Faulkner, but cannot consult an index to find what Faulknerian biblical usages are explored in DBTEL. Moreover, some authors who appear in the text, e.g., Margaret Mitchell, do not have a bibliographical entry. The ab­ sence of even a primitive index with name of author and page numbers of reference is all the more lamentable because of the volume’s excellent en­ tries. DBTEL’s occasional failing is with its necessarily truncated literary analyses. While many are marvels of economical insight, some appear to be expressions of frustration with the critical straitjacket, as when the biblical or non-biblical functioning of the Golden Bowl in James’s novel is said to be “one of the novel’s teasing questions.” Taken as a whole, DBTEL is a splendid and invaluable reference work for students, teachers, and scholars. For a work of its size, scope, and quality it is quite reasonably priced, thereby giving value in every sense. c h a u n c e y w o o d / McMaster University Jeffrey M. Heath, ed. Profiles in Canadian Literature. Series 7 & 8 (Toronto and Oxford: Dundurn Press, 1991). 167; 155. Photographs. $19.95 per volume (paper). For many of us, especially in Canadian studies, the photo-albumesque covers of Jeffrey Heath’s Profiles in Canadian Literature are a familar sight, piled, as they often are, on study tables or splayed across photocopiers in secondary school, college, university, and public libraries. Having read countless under­ graduate essays on Canadian literature, I can think of few secondary critical sources cited as frequently as the studies in the Profiles series — The Literary History of Canada and Atwood’s Survival are not even close seconds. From a purely utilitarian point of view, then, Jeffrey Heath is to be ap­ plauded for providing an entire generation of students and teachers with over 100 “profiles” of Canadian authors. The usefulness of Profiles cannot be denied. With the appearance, in 1991, of volumes 7 and 8 and their accompanying editorial hints that the project may soon terminate, it seems 365 appropriate to offer some reflections on what, taken as a whole, has been an ambitious undertaking. The Profiles books were published in pairs, with series 1 and 2 appearing in 1980, 3 and 4 in 1982, 5 and 6 in 1986, and 7 and 8 in 1991. Given that each companion pair involved anywhere from 27 to 37 contributing essays produced to meet specific format conventions (essay, chronology, comments by and about the author, selected bibliography and contributor’s note), it becomes apparent that eight volumes in eleven years is no small achievement. Series 7 and 8 include authors “previously absent” (“Foreword,” Series 7, 7, states Heath, as well as writers who have appeared, relatively speak­ ing, more recently on the literary scene. The former group features studies of Charles G.D. Roberts, Charles Heavysege, Robert Service, L.M. Mont­ gomery, P.K. Page, Irving Layont, Thomas Raddall, and Michael Ondaatje, among others. The latter group of “newer” authors, confined mostly to Se­ ries 8, includes David Adams Richards, Yves Beauchemin, Janette Turner Hospital, Sandra Birdsell, and Guy Vanderhaeghe. The individual essays in Profiles — and Series 7 and 8 are no exceptions — are of a consistently high quality, illustrating, as Heath notes in an editorial “Foreword,” a range of critical approaches. Space limitations preclude a detailed examination of individual essays, but several points about the series as a whole might be made. The appearance of the Profiles series coincides with the larger institu­ tionalization of...