L.W. CONOLLY

This volume in the "Longman Literature in English Series" reflects, as W.J. Keith puts it in his preface, "one man's reading of Canadian literature in English from its earliest beginnings." Organized by genre within a chronological framework, Keith's survey doesn't get around to drama until near the end of the book, "Drama in Canada," according to Keith, being "in a very early stage of development" (p 181). One chapter (thirteen pages) is then devoted to drama, and a very odd sort of chapter it is.

It begins with a few brief observations on why drama has (allegedly) progressed so slowly in Canada - a lack of well-populated communities, dependence on touring companies, competition from cinema and television, entrenched puritanism, and "the ethnic complexity of the Canadian population." There is no analysis of these sundry explanations, and put so baldly they inevitably beg many questions. There is good reason to believe, for example, that in helping to destroy the dominance of foreign touring companies, cinema thereby created (rather than hindered) opportunities for the growth of indigenous theatrical activity; and to blame "ethnic complexity" for retarding the development of Canadian drama is to overlook the vibrant activity of ethnic theatrical groups throughout this century, as well as to imply a particular definition of "Canadian". After these somewhat perfunctory historical probes, Keith turns to his forte - literary criticism of dramatic text.

Keith is a sensitive and perceptive reader of plays. His criticism is marked by good sense and revealing insights. It must also be said, however, that he has some blind spots, and there are some startling omissions in the playwrights he chooses to consider.

The nineteenth-century poetic dramatists are quickly dismissed with a paragraph each on Heavysege and Mair (nothing on Campbell, Curzon, Cushing, or Hunter-Duvar). "For every line of sublime effectiveness [in Saul] there are a dozen of doggerel absurdity" (p 182), and Tecumseh is "a classic example of the inappropriateness of Old World forms and language for New World subjects" (p 182). There is not (in my view) much to quarrel with here, but the omission of any reference to early comedy and satire distorts Keith's presentation of the dramatic literature of the period.

There is an unexceptional half-page on Denison, and a good page on Ringwood, Keith being right, I believe, to judge her comedies and fantasies as her greatest strengths - notably Widger's Way, Ringwood's "finest achievement" (p 183). John Coulter gets slightly more space than Denison, though Keith seems unduly generous in his praise of Riel as "Canada's first important play" and "a work of genuine dramatic power" (p 184). The plays of Robertson Davies are discussed in some detail, Keith placing them (despite Davies's opposition) in the tradition of Bernard Shaw. Keith offers a particularly astute way of looking at A Jig for the Gypsy as "a Welsh John Bull's Other Island (p 186). The only playwright to earn more space than Davies is James Reaney (three pages). Keith is not bowled over by Reaney's plays, finding his dramatic effects, for example, "poised on the razor's edge between imaginative charm and irritating silliness" (p 188). The Donnellys is seen as an uneven achievement - which is fair enough; it is disappointing, however (and certainly indicative of Keith's literary emphasis), that no credit at all is given to the involvement of Keith Turnbull and NDWT in the creative process that shaped The Donnellys.

It is at about this point that things begin to fall apart in Keith's survey. Compared to prose, poetry, and fiction, he finds the dramatic literature of the last twenty years to be in a "sorry state of affairs" (p 190). He reaches this mistaken conclusion for three main reasons. To begin with, he applies strictly literary criteria. He recognizes that many productions "have been extremely effective on stage", but still excludes them from consideration - plays like 1837 and The Farm Show (and, indeed, all collectives) are silently dismissed. Secondly, Keith undervalues the achievement of some playwrights. His suggestion that Ploughmen of the Glacier is Ryga's "most artistically satisfying" play is provocative, but his classification of most of Ryga's work as "propagandistic art" betrays an insensitivity to the considerable qualities of at least Indian and The Ecstasy of Rita Joe. The agent in Indian and the magistrate in Rita Joe are more subtle portrayals than the "establishment ... straw-men" that Keith perceives. The most disappointing feature of Keith's survey, however, is the scanty attention paid to other contemporary playwrights. His discussion ends with comments on Cook and French - with Leaving Home and Of the Fields, Lately being judged "the two most accomplished plays in contemporary Canadian theatre" (p 193). And then there is silence. No Freeman, Bolt, Walker, Ritter, or even Pollock or Murrell. Is it any wonder that Keith undervalues contemporary Canadian drama? Or has he read these writers and found them unworthy of comment? In any event, his overall conclusion that French's work "demonstrates that solid dramatic skill is attainable in Canada," and that French "sets a model ... for a healthy native drama in the future" (p 194) seems peculiarly out of touch with the reality of the last twenty years.

The book ends with some brief biographical and bibliographical notes on major authors; fewer than a dozen playwrights are listed. All in all, it is hard not to conclude that drama has been given short shrift in what will likely prove an influential introduction to Canadian literature in English.