Should CanLit be more Canadian?

First aired on Q (10/11/11)

Last week, Esi Edugyan won the Scotiabank Giller Prize for Half-Blood Blues. The week before, Patrick deWitt took home the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize for his neo-western novel The Sisters Brothers. Even earlier this year, both titles made the Man Booker shortlist. Both novels have also garnered critical acclaim, but some reviewers have noted their international settings (Germany and Paris for Edugyan, the American West for deWitt).

While Canadian literature has never been as narrow as the "on-the-prairie family drama" cliché, the internationalism of this year's crop of novels sparked some discussion in the Globe and Mail. Is Canadian literature becoming less Canadian? And is this something we should be concerned about?

Author and literary critic Stephen Henighan says yes. Henighan argues that Canadian perspectives and settings are being overlooked, in favour of "pre-digested movie images like the Old West and Nazi Germany" and the result is inferior literature that seems like carbon copies of other books.

However, Henighan is quick to point out that it's not the international setting of these novels that worry him, it's how the setting is approached. Mordecai Richler and Mavis Gallant are two Canadian authors who wrote about international settings, but from a uniquely Canadian perspective. That, Hengihan argues, is what Canadian literature needs more of, and that is what is disappearing. "What troubles me about the current trend is that it is based on a recycling of media images in which Canadianness disappears," he explained to Q host Jian Ghomeshi. "I think we have to ask why they are disappearing."

Nick Mount, a professor of Canadian literature at the University of Toronto, disagrees. He contends that dividing literature on the basis of nationality is really only a convenience for academics, and that Canadian writers shouldn't be limited by their nationality or by public expectation of what a Canadian book should be like. "We've been having this argument since there was a Canadian literature," he argued. "It's insane to suggest that Canadian writers owe us any kind of story in particular."

What Henighan and Mount agree on, however, is that "Canadianness" is more than setting, character or plot, and that writers should tackle subjects that resonate with them.

"We can't tell writers what to write about," Mount said. "That would create ridiculous narratives."

Do you think "Canadianness" is disappearing from Canadian literature? Is this something we should worry about? Share your thoughts on Twitter, Facebook or in the comments below!