The small details of life : twenty diaries by women in Canada, 1830-1996 / edited by Kathryn Carter.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Carter, Kathryn, 1966- editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Women--Canada--Diaries.

Women.

Canadian diaries.

Women--Canada--History--Sources.

Women--Canada--Biography.

Canada--History--Sources.

Canada.

Canada--Biography.

Genre:

Sources.

History.

Diaries.

Biographies.

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (499 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Toronto, [Ontario] ; Buffalo, [New York] ; London, [England] : University of Toronto Press, 2002.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

"This anthology presents twenty diary excerpts written between 1830 and 1996, reflecting the upper-class travails of nineteenth-century travellers and settlers as well as the workaday struggles and triumphs of twentieth-century students, teachers, housewives, and writers. The diarists are single, married, with children and without, and range in age from fourteen to ninety years old." "The excerpts - each preceded by a biographical sketch of the diarist - make compelling reading. Elsie Rogstad Jones endures the sudden death of her baby in 1943; Constance Kerr Sissons, writing in 1900, discovers that her husband already has a Metis wife à la facon du pays'; and Dorothy Duncan MacLennan ruminates on her married life with Hugh MacLennan in 1950s Montreal. Writers Marian Engel, Edna Staebler, and Dorothy Choate Herriman contemplate the creative process. Two diarists, Phoebe McInnes and Sophie Alice Puckette, writing in the first decade of the twentieth century, reveal the contradictions and difficulties of their lives as unmarried schoolteachers. In an excerpt from a diary written in 1843, Sarah Welch Hill, a newly arrived settler, describes her violent marriage in what must be one of the few nineteenth-century documents describing domestic abuse in the first person." "With an introduction that examines diary writing by women in Canada from a historical and theoretical perspective, The Small Details of Life represents a significant contribution to the fields of Canadian women's history and life-writing. It enriches our understanding of women's literature in Canada, especially the strong tradition of personal non-fiction writing, and provides compelling glimpses into the lives of a range of Canadian women."--Jacket

Contents:

pt. 1. Turbulent beginnings : Frances Ramsay Simpson: diary, British North America, 1830 / S. Leigh Matthews

Sarah Welch Hill: diary, Canada West, 1843-5 / Robynne Rogers Healey

Amelia Holder: diary, New Brunswick, 1868-9 / Joanne Ritchie

pt 2. Conflict and confusion : Jessie Nagle and Susan Nagle: Jessie Melville Nagle diary, British Columbia, 1869-70, Susan Abercrombie Nagle diary, British Columbia, 1870 / Anita Bonson

Sarah Crease and Susan Crease: diaries, British Columbia, 1878 / Barbara Powell

Constances Kerr Sissons: diary, Ontario, 1901-2 / Rosalind Kerr

pt. 3. Hesitation and pause : Phoebe McInnes: diary, British Columbia, 1901 / K. Jane Watt

Caroline Alice Porter: diary, Saskatchewan, 1907 / Lillian Tuttosi

Sophie Alice Puckette: diary, Alberta, 1908 / Nanci Langford

pt. 4. Exploration : Mina Wylie: diary, Ontario, 1911 / Morgan Holmes

Miriam Green Ellis: diary, Northwest Territories, 1922 / Lisa LaFramboise

Mary Dulhanty: diary, Nova Scotia, 1926-7 / Janne Cleveland and Margaret Conrad

pt. 5. Love, loss, and work : Dorothy Choate Herriman: diary, Ontario, 1932-3 / Albert Braz

Elsie Rogstad Jones: diary, Alberta, 1943 / Maxine Hancock

Dorothy Duncan MacLennan: diary, Quebec, 1953 / Martha Slowe

Marian Engel: diary, Prince Edward Island, 1976 / Afra Kavanagh

pt. 6. Reflective endings : Mary Eidse Friesen: diary, Manitoba, 1990 / Julie C. Chychota

Edna Staebler: diary, Ontario, 1996 / Judith Miller.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-282-02855-3

9786612028557

1-4426-8237-X

OCLC:

979581185