Cabbagetown is one of Toronto's most vibrant downtown neighbourhoods: tiny workers' cottages stand cheek-by-jowl with grand Victorian homes; it has parks, gardens, theatres, a working farm, and a main street that boasts an eclectic mix of pleasant shops and restaurants. This beautifully illustrated book captures the highlights of Cabbagetown's lively history. Penina Coopersmith traces Cabbagetown's origins in the eighteenth century, growth in the Victorian era, decline in the thirties, and renaissance today. Also included are two walking tours that highlight historic and contemporary buildings and sites. Lively and informative, Cabbagetown: The Story of a Victorian Neighbourhood offers residents and visitors alike a fascinating portrait of one of Toronto's most interesting neighbourhoods.

Toronto's Cabbagetown in the Depression...North America's largest Anglo-Saxon slum. Ken Tilling leaves school to face the bleak prospects of the dirty thirties-where do you go, what do you do, how do you make a life for yourself when all the world offers in unemployment, poverty and uncertainty? "As a social document, Cabbagetown is as important and revealing as either The Tin Flute or The Grapes of Wrath. Stern realism has also projected upon the pages of a whole gallery of types, lifelike and convincing. He is well fitted to hold the mirror up to human nature." Globe and Mail. Cabbagetown was first published in an abbreviated paperback edition in 1950 and was published in its entirety in 1968. This, the first quality paperback edition, contains the full unexpurgated text of Cabbagetown.

Photographs of the residents of a poor section of southeast Atlanta.

Robert Fulford called it “a remarkable glimpse of the underbelly of Toronto,” but the reviews that greeted the publication of Cabbagetown Diary in 1970 were decidedly mixed. The novel’s rowdy concoction of grit and violence and rooming-house sleaze had a strongly polarizing effect on its readers. Many admired the frankness of Butler’s depiction of a sordid environment, and others deplored the obscenity of the language and the dangerous and careless ways in which his characters behave, bent as they are on downward self-transcendence. But Cabbagetown Diary was undeniably a promising debut by a young writer whose brash tone and pungent subject matter were unique in Canadian writing at that time. The novel takes the form of a diary written by a disaffected young Toronto bartender, Michael, over the course of his four-month liaison with Terry, a naive teenager who is new to the city. Michael introduces her to his friends and his inner-city haunts, to drink and drugs, and to the nihilist politics espoused by some in his circle. With hard-bitten cynicism and flashes of dark humour, Michael relates the vicissitudes of their summer together. This reissue of Cabbagetown Diary includes a biographical sketch by Charles Butler and an afterword by Tamas Dobozy.

This sampling of the work of J.M.S. Careless in the area of Canadian historical studies was selected by the eminent scholar himself, and represents much of his finest work. The collection spans the years from 1940 to 1990 in the long and distinguished career of one of Canada's best-known historians. In Careless's own words, History is dated. Its very claim is that the past does not fade into nothing but continues to matter, whether or not the purely present-minded are able to recognize that basic fact. These essays cover the main lines of Careless's career in Canadian scholarship. The collection is divided into four general subject areas each covering a main preoccupation in a distinguished career of over forty years. The first section concentrates on the earliest theme in his writing, George Brown and his times. The second centres on exploring various aspects of frontierism and metropolitanism in Canadian history. The third part deals with cities and regions focusing particularly on the West and nineteenth century Ontario. The final section picks up the threads of other themes including limited identities Canada and multiculturalism.

Let's say you want to know which famous Canadian poet lived in the Waverley Hotel for seven years, constantly changing rooms in fear of RCMP bugs. Or you live at 44 Walmer and want to know what on earth they were thinking with those balconies. Or you want to know what's behind (or underneath!) that giant O hanging over Harbord at Spadina. These things were troubling us, too, so we assembled East/West: A Guide to Where People Live in Downtown Toronto. East/West is a guided tour of old stories and fresh perspectives on the architecture and planning of housing and urban development in central Toronto - including both success stories and perennial problems. With specially prepared maps and over 120 photos, and essays - written by 65 of our best architects, historians and planners - exploring the history and development of neighbourhoods and of the individual buildings within them, East/West is a portrait of Toronto like no other. East/West is not your average city guide. It'll take you down alleyways you've never heard of, show you buildings you've never seen, offer you that bit of history you've never been able to access. It tells you how Toronto has tried to house the homeless over the years, how the waterfront evolved (or devolved, depending on how you look at it), and the character of different neighbourhoods has changed. FromAnnex abodes to Rosedale residences, this book will introduce you to a Toronto you only thought you knew.

Canadian Literary Landmarks