Summary
Carleton University journalism professor and Globe and Mail editorialist and columnist [Andrew Cohen]'s The Unfinished Canadian is a breadth-and-depth-researched work, as opposed to fellow Globe columnist [Roy MacGregor]'s ambling, anecdote-laden Canadians.
Despite the promise of its subtitle, Canadians isn't so much a portrait of Canadians as a series of loosely linked journalistic vignettes: Trudeau's funeral cortege; Maurice Richard's funeral; Keith Spicer's 1991 Royal Commission Citizens' Forum on Canada's Future; the 1990 Oka crisis that saw an armed stand-off between the army and Mohawks from nearby Kanesatake reserve; and the near-fatal test drive of a Cree motorboat on the treacherous waters of James Bay. One of the better pieces is the tale of how MacGregor, in Winnipeg in 1990 on the eve of the Manitoba legislature's last shot at tabling the Meech Lake Accord for ratification, got access to NDP MLA Elijah Harper -- when no other mainstream media or even desperate federal negotiators could. This was before Harper uttered the fatal "No, Mr. Speaker" that spelled an end to Brian Mulroney's best-laid plans to bring Quebec into the constitutional fold.See the full content of this document
Extract
(Another) Two Views of Canadian Identity
One anthropological, other folksy storytelling
The Unfinished Canadian The People We AreBy Andrew CohenMcClelland & Stewart, 270 pages, $30CanadiansA Portrait of a Country and Its PeopleBy Roy MacGregorViking Canada, 344 pages, $35Review...See the full content of this document
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