With an Introduction by Allan Gotlieb One of Canada’s most distinguished diplomats, Charles Ritchie was also a born diarist. Now, for the first time, Ritchie’s diplomatic diaries are collected in one complete volume, covering his entire career in the Canadian Foreign Service. Ritchie creates a startlingly vivid and perceptive portrait of daily life at the centre of major historical events, including one of the finest accounts of the London Blitz ever written — the people in the parks, the shabby streets, the heightened love affairs. Ritchie’s life was a whirl of high-society engagements, and he turns his dry wit and irreverence to the social scene. Evocative and compelling, these diaries beautifully portray a forgotten era.
From the author of Red Star Sister “An excellent biography. Brody has made the world a better place by telling [Mitford’s] saga so skillfully” (San Francisco Chronicle). Admirers and detractors use the same words to describe Jessica Mitford: subversive, mischief–maker, muckraker. J.K. Rowling calls her her “most influential writer.” Those who knew her best simply called her Decca. Born into one of Britain’s most famous aristocratic families, she eloped with Winston Churchill’s nephew as a teenager. Their marriage severed ties with her privilege, a rupture exacerbated by the life she lead for seventy–eight years. After arriving in the United States in 1939, Decca became one of the New Deal’s most notorious bureaucrats. For her the personal was political, especially as a civil rights activist and journalist. She coined the term frenemies, and as a member of the American Communist Party, she made several, though not among the Cold War witch hunters. When she left the Communist Party in 1958 after fifteen years, she promised to be subversive whenever the opportunity arose. True to her word, late in life she hit her stride as a writer, publishing nine books before her death in 1996. Yoked to every important event for nearly all of the twentieth century, Decca not only was defined by the history she witnessed, but by bearing witness, helped to define that history. “Brisk, engaging.” —Wall Street Journal “A valuable retelling of a provocative life.” —Kirkus Reviews
One of Canada’s foremost authors and journalists, offers a gripping account of the contest between John Diefenbaker and Lester Pearson, two prime ministers who fought each other relentlessly, but who between them created today’s Canada. John Diefenbaker has been unfairly treated by history. Although he wrestled with personal demons, his governments launched major reforms in public health care, law reform and immigration. On his watch, First Nations on reserve obtained the right to vote and the federal government began to open up the North. He established Canada as a leader in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, and took the first steps in making Canada a leader in the fight against nuclear proliferation. And Diefenbaker’s Bill of Rights laid the groundwork for the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. He set in motion many of the achievements credited to his successor, Lester B. Pearson. Pearson, in turn, gave coherence to Diefenbaker’s piecemeal reforms. He also pushed Parliament to adopt a new, and now much-loved, Canadian flag against Diefenbaker’s fierce opposition. Pearson understood that if Canada were to be taken seriously as a nation, it must develop a stronger sense of self. Pearson was superbly prepared for the role of prime minister: decades of experience at External Affairs, respected by leaders from Washington to Delhi to Beijing, the only Canadian to win the Nobel Prize for Peace. Diefenbaker was the better politician, though. If Pearson walked with ease in the halls of power, Diefenbaker connected with the farmers and small-town merchants and others left outside the inner circles. Diefenbaker was one of the great orators of Canadian political life; Pearson spoke with a slight lisp. Diefenbaker was the first to get his name in the papers, as a crusading attorney: Diefenbaker for the Defence, champion of the little man. But he struggled as a politician, losing five elections before making it into the House of Commons, and becoming as estranged from the party elites as he was from the Liberals, until his ascension to the Progressive Conservative leadership in 1956 through a freakish political accident. As a young university professor, Pearson caught the attention of the powerful men who were shaping Canada’s first true department of foreign affairs, rising to prominence as the helpful fixer, the man both sides trusted, the embodiment of a new country that had earned its place through war in the counsels of the great powers: ambassador, undersecretary, minister, peacemaker. Everyone knew he was destined to be prime minister. But in 1957, destiny took a detour. Then they faced each other, Diefenbaker v Pearson, across the House of Commons, leaders of their parties, each determined to wrest and hold power, in a decade-long contest that would shake and shape the country. Here is a tale of two men, children of Victoria, who led Canada into the atomic age: each the product of his past, each more like the other than either would ever admit, fighting each other relentlessly while together forging the Canada we live in today. To understand our times, we must first understand theirs.
Since the first atomic weapon was detonated in 1945, Canadians have debated not only the role of nuclear power in their uranium-rich land but also their country’s role in a nuclear world. Should Canada belong to international alliances that depend on the threat of nuclear weapons for their own security? Should Canadian-produced nuclear technologies be exported? What about the impact of atomic research on local communities and the environment? This incisive nuclear history engages with much larger debates about national identity, Canadian foreign policy contradictions during the Cold War, and Canada’s global standing to investigate these critical questions.
How is it that I can remember every word, every bit of musical phrasing, every nuance from every song from my early years (Mitch Ryder And The Detroit Wheels, Abba, The Band, Credence Clearwater’s Revival’s Bad Moon Rising, Judi Collins’ rendition of Joni Mitchell’s Both Sides Now) but had a bit of a time recalling the last four digits of our phone number when somebody asked me for it last night? So begins one of Judy Pollard Smith’s journal entries, which she started to write to mark her seventieth birthday. As a fan of the memoirs, journals, and letters of famous people, she wanted to explore whether the journals of everyday people have value. How do others perceive us when we look seventy on the outside but feel twenty-seven on the inside? She writes about light and weighty topics – from relaxing with a favorite book to considering the removal of reminders of Canada’s colonial past. “How can the past be erased for all its faults?” she writes. “If the current vein continues, Canada will end up with a revisionist history, without truth.” The More the Merrier offers a glimpse of the rich experiences of a seventy-year-old woman living life to the fullest.
The reader will enjoy several finely crafted personal essays interspersed with amusing vignettes. The essays provide a spirited and sensitive look at nature, music, literature, family, friends, heritage, multiculturalism and personal loss. Some of the essays have been previously published in newspapers or magazines. They are short, salient and to the point. This small tender book offers a unique glimpse at grief recovery. What do the bereaved do with the long corridor of empty hours? How do they go about recreating life? Where does the balance sit between continuing in sorrow or telling oneself that putting one foot in front of the other is essential? How do we hold onto the history of our loved ones? What life rafts have we in order when we need them? Who and what will we put in the drivers seat? In spite of the the loss factor the authour’s lyrical writing style brings smiles and hope. It is forward looking and honest. It is a calming read for lovers of life.
"At a certain point in our lives we are left only with our close relationships and our clear recollections." So begins Thumper: The Memoirs of the Honourable Donald S. Macdonald. An early supporter of Pierre Trudeau for the Liberal Party leadership, Donald Macdonald has had a career in public life spanning four decades that included posts as House leader, minister of national defence, minister of energy, and minister of finance. He chaired the landmark Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada, which led to free trade between Canada and the United States, and as High Commissioner to the United Kingdom he conferred with Margaret Thatcher and dined with Queen Elizabeth II. Drawing on extensive archival resources and contemporaneous personal diaries, Macdonald insightfully details his friendship with Trudeau, fascinating encounters with world leaders, and personal revelations about the October Crisis. In this behind-the-scenes account of the business of governing, he also describes high-stakes disputes with Alberta over soaring energy prices, the real story behind the resignation of John Turner as finance minister, and the decisive action taken against inflation using wage and price controls. Interlaced with anecdotes that reveal Macdonald's self-effacing good-nature, Thumper is a riveting memoir written with humility and candour, recalling an exceptional period in Canadian politics.
Today German Canadians are among Canada’s most assimilated citizens, often distinguishable from other Canadians by their name only. For centuries their pioneer farmers, economic developers, industrialists, professionals, musicians, artists, missionaries, fisherman, boat builders, and soldiers have acquired an acknowledged reputation as nation builders in Canada. Not too long ago, however, they were also associated with Canada’s enemy in two world wars, discriminated against, and subjected to infringements of their citizenship rights. Virtually overnight, Canadians of German-speaking background were recast into disloyal enemy aliens. Anti-German sentiments and stigmas, unknown in Canada before World War I, became firmly entrenched and have obliterated their legacy as nation builders. This book documents and illustrates how German Canadians have experienced Canada and how Canada has experienced German Canadians over the course of four centuries. It shows what influence Canada’s relations with Germany had on this development. This is the first comprehensive synopsis of the German experience in Canada.
In 1958 Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts proclaimed at the University of New Brunswick that "Canada and the United States have carefully maintained the good fences that help make them good neighbours." He could not have foreseen that his presidency would be marked not just by some of the tensest moments of the Cold War but also by the most contentious moments in the Canadian-American relationship. Indeed, the 1963 Canadian federal election was marked by charges that the US government had engineered a plot to oust John Diefenbaker, Canada's nationalist prime minister. Camelot and Canada explores political, economic, and military elements in Canada-US relations in the early 1960s. Asa McKercher challenges the prevailing view that US foreign policymakers, including President Kennedy, were imperious in their conduct toward Canada. Rather, he shows that the period continued to be marked by the special diplomatic relationship that characterized the early postwar years. Even as Diefenbaker's government pursued distinct foreign and economic policies, American officials acknowledged that Canadian objectives legitimately differed from their own and adjusted their policies accordingly. Moreover, for all its bluster, Ottawa rarely moved without weighing the impact that its initiatives might have on Washington. At the same time, McKercher illustrates that there were significant strains on the bilateral relationship, which occurred as a result of mounting doubts in Canada about US leadership in the Cold War, growing Canadian nationalism, and Canadian concern over their country's close economic, military, and cultural ties with the United States. While personal clashes between the two leaders have become mythologized by historians and the public alike, the special relationship between their governments continued to function.
