Beginning in the 1890s, reaching its first full realization by modernist writers in the 1920s, and brought to its heyday during the Canadian Renaissance starting in the 1960s, the short story has become Canada's flagship genre. It continues to attract the country's most accomplished and innovative writers today, among them Margaret Atwood, Mavis Gallant, Alice Munro, Carol Shields, and many others. Yet in contrast to the stature and popularity of the genre and the writers who partake in it, surprisingly little literary criticism and theory has been devoted to the Canadian short story. This collection redresses that imbalance by providing the first collection of critical interpretations of a range of thirty well-known and often-anthologized Canadian short stories from the genre's beginnings through the twentieth century. A historical survey of the genre introduces the volume and a timeline comparing the genre's development in Canada, the US, and Great Britain via representative examples completes it. The collection is geared both to specialists in and to students of Canadian literature. For the latter it is of particular benefit that the volume provides not only a collection of interpretations, but a comprehensive introduction to the history of the Canadian short story. Reingard M. Nischik is professor and chair of American Literature at the University of Constance, Germany.

Reference Sources for Canadian Literary Studies offers the first full-scale bibliography of writing on and in the field of Canadian literary studies. Approximately one thousand annotated entries are arranged by reference genre, with sub-groupings related to literary genre.

This bibliography endeavors to record every short story written in English by a Canadian author and first published during the period 1950–1983, and contains 20,000 citations to stories by more than 5,300 authors. Organized alphabetically by author's last name, it includes references to anthology and story-collection appearances by these authors, thus providing a complete publishing history of each story cited. Hundreds of Canadian periodicals and dozens of anthologies were searched; in addition, the bibliography cites appearances by Canadian stories in foreign books and periodicals.

Double-Voicing the Canadian Short Story is the first comparative study of eight internationally and nationally acclaimed writers of short fiction: Sandra Birdsell, Timothy Findley, Jack Hodgins, Thomas King, Alistair MacLeod, Olive Senior, Carol Shields and Guy Vanderhaeghe. With the 2013 Nobel Prize for Literature going to Alice Munro, the “master of the contemporary short story,” this art form is receiving the recognition that has been its due and—as this book demonstrates—Canadian writers have long excelled in it. From theme to choice of narrative perspective, from emphasis on irony, satire and parody to uncovering the multiple layers that make up contemporary Canadian English, the short story provides a powerful vehicle for a distinctively Canadian “double-voicing”. The stories discussed here are compelling reflections on our most intimate roles and relationships and Kruk offers a thoughtful juxtaposition of themes of gender, mothers and sons, family storytelling, otherness in Canada and the politics of identity to name but a few. As a multi-author study, Double-Voicing the Canadian Short Story is broad in scope and its readings are valuable to Canadian literature as a whole, making the book of interest to students of Canadian literature or the short story, and to readers of both.

Canada's rich literary heritage, dominated by a multicultural and multilingual presence, reflects the country's unique history and experience. In addition, an emerging body of new writers is redefining both the geographic and metaphorical boundaries of Canadian literature. Coupled with the propagation of digital technologies, Canada's burgeoning publishing industry presents unique challenges for both the introductory and seasoned literary researcher. Literary Research and Canadian Literature: Strategies and Sources provides researchers with the tools to navigate Canada's multifaceted literary scene. This guide addresses the tools and best practices for selecting and evaluating print and electronic sources related to the extensive and varied literature of Canada. Beginning with an overview of the strategies needed to conduct online research, individual chapters examine general literary reference materials; relevant online library catalogs, including national and union library catalogs; scholarly journals; archival collections; microform and digital collections; periodicals, literary magazines, newspapers, and reviews; and Web and electronic resources. Special topics discussed include "little magazines," scholarly gateways, and cultural resources. The guide culminates in a chapter that illustrates the application of the strategies explored to solve a research problem. The strategies discussed within the guide are applicable to both canonical and lesser-known authors, therefore making this work relevant to anyone interested in researching Canadian literature.

This new volume of the Literary History of Canada covers the continuing development of English-Canadian writing from 1972 to 1984. As with the three earlier volumes, this book is an invaluable guide to recent developments in English-Canadian literature and a resource for both the general reader and the specialist researcher. The contributors to this volume are Laurie Ricou, David Jackel, Linda Hutcheon, Philip Stratford, Barry Cameron, Balachandra Rajan, Robert Fothergill, Brian Parker, Cynthia Zimmerman, Frances Frazer, Edith Fowke, Bruce G. Trigger, Alan C. Cairns, Douglas Williams, Carl Berger, Shirley Neuman, Raymond S. Corteen, and Francess G. Halpenny.

These tensions are revealed in the literature that Clarke argues to be - paradoxically - uniquely Canadian and proudly apart from a mainstream national identity."--BOOK JACKET.

This Companion is a complete introduction to the fictional and non-fictional writings of the Nobel Prize winner Alice Munro.