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5.
Historical Fiction
There is no self-conscious tradition in Canadian fiction of mythologizing major historical
characters and events as there is in American children's literature. Thus, in historical fiction,
Canadian authors cannot relate their narratives with the confidence that their young readers will
have a general familiarity with major eras or events. Certain periods of Canadian history (eg, the
War of 1812 and the North-West Rebellion) seem to be favourites in novels. The former has been
treated in Barbara and Heather Bramwell's
Adventure at the Mill
(1963) and John F.
Hayes's
Treason at York
(1949); the latter in W.T. Cutt's
On the Trail of Long Tom
(1970) and Jan
Truss's
A Very Small Rebellion
(1977). The Royal Canadian Mounted Police are portrayed in J.W.
Chalmers's
Horseman in Scarlet
(1961); the
LOYALISTS
' escape to Canada in Mary Alice and
John Downie's
Honor Bound
(1971), and the Cariboo Gold Rush in Christie Harris's
Cariboo
Trail
(1957). In
Underground to Canada
(1977), Barbara
SMUCKER
describes the dangerous
journey to Ontario of 3 slaves who have escaped from a Southern plantation. Many contemporary
authors have created historical novels about the first half of this century. Barbara Smucker's
Days of
Terror
(1979) is an account of the struggles of Mennonites who have fled their Ukrainian village
and come to Canada during WWI. Jean Little, in
Listen for the Singing
(1977), details the tensions
of a German-Canadian family during WWII. Myra Paperny's family story
The Wooden
People
(1976) is set in Alberta in the 1920s, and Brian Doyle's
Up to Low
(1982) and
Angel
Square
(1986) are based on the author's 1940s eastern Ontario boyhood.
Set in rural Alberta during the Depression, Cora Taylor's
Summer of the Mad Monk
(1994)
presents a young teenager's encounter with a Russian blacksmith he believes to be the famous
Czarist leader Rasputin. Paul Yee, in
Curses of the Third Uncle
(1986), deals with the impact the
Chinese revolution of 1909 has on a Chinese Canadian girl.
Hockey Bat Harris
(1985), by Geoffrey
Bilson, and Kit Pearson's
The Sky is Falling
(1989),
Looking at the Moon
(1991) and
The Lights Go
On Again
(1993) recount the struggles of British children evacuated to Canada during WWII.
255
Joy
KOGAWA's
Naomi's Road
(1986) is based on the author's own experience of being interned as
a Japanese-Canadian during WWII.
Some of the most distinguished historical fiction for children is found in books dealing with
the native peoples, both before and after European contact. Often these stories centre on the rites of
passage, as in
HAIG-BROWN's
The Whale People
(1962), in which a Nootka youth is thrust into a
position of authority after the death of his father. In Edith Sharp's
Nkwala
(1958), a Salish boy
searches for a vision to guide him into adulthood. Cliff Faulknor's trilogy,
The White
Calf
(1965),
The White Peril
(1966) and
The Smoke Horse
(1968), is set on the prairies just before
and during the arrival of Europeans. Stories dealing with contacts between native and European
cultures include J.F. Hayes's
Buckskin Colonist
(1947), Doris
ANDERSON's
Blood Brothers
(1967)
and Harris's
Forbidden Frontier
(1968). Jan Hudson's
Sweetgrass
(1984) combines historical
research and a feminist viewpoint in detailing the life of a young Blackfoot woman in the early 19th
century. Kevin Major's
Blood Red Ochre
(1989) draws parallels between the life of a contemporary
Newfoundland native girl and her Beothuk ancestors.
Writers of biography and historical nonfiction have always had to avoid the pitfalls of
accurate but dry scholarship, and exciting but inaccurate fictionalization. Among those biographies
that have avoided the dangers are Haig-Brown's
Captain of the Discovery: The Story of Captain
George Vancouver
(1956), Kay Hill's
And Tomorrow the Stars: The Story of John Cabot
(1968) and
Roy
DANIELLS's
Alexander Mackenzie and the North West
(1969). Accurate and lively histories for
young readers include Pierre
BERTON's
The Golden Trail
(1954), T.M. Longstreth's
The Scarlet
Force
(1953) and William Toye's
The St. Lawrence
(1959), and Janet Lunn and Christopher
Moore's
The Story of Canada
(1992). Although native peoples have been sensitively treated in
fiction and in adaptations of folklore, they have not, with the exception of Harris's
Raven's
Cry
(1966), been the subject of major biographies or histories for children.
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