The Literary History of Alberta. Volume 2: From the End of the War to the End of the Century by George Melnyk (review)

550 letters in canada 1999 personal and familial identities, thus `domesticating the goods' rather than`commodifying domesticity.' It is from this theoretical position that Parr embarks, in the third and final section of the book, on an exploration of the details and nuances of that process with respect to B in order B electric stoves, washing machines, and the late-arriving dryers and refrigerators. These are perhaps the most original and provocative essays in the book, and the ones that most closely consider the goods themselves in relation to their ultimate owners and users. Overall, the structure of the book enables Parr to present a more multifaceted and nuanced account of the subject than might otherwise be possible with a single sustained narrative, although the format compels a certain amount of repetition and cross-referencing, while intensifying the relative strengths and weaknesses of the various essay-chapters. Certainly, some sections are less compelling than others, notably those on consumer credit and the impact of the `high modernism' movement, but taken in the balance the many strengths of this book far outweigh its weaknesses, especially since the topic has received so little attention to date. Of particular interest are Parr's arguments concerning how the Canadian postwar experience differed in crucial ways from the American, and the extent to which gender was implicated at every level of that experience as it related to the development of a modern consumer market for household goods. Thus, for anyone interested in the postwar years, in gender relations, or in material culture and consumerism generally, this work is an important and timely offering, and one which will hopefully foster increased attention on a vital and fascinating aspect of twentieth-century Canadian history. (G. BRUCE RETALLACK) George Melnyk. The Literary History of Alberta. Volume 2: From the End of the War to the End of the Century University of Alberta Press. xxii, 302. $26.95 The first volume of The Literary History of Alberta, published in 1998, began with aboriginal `Writing-on-Stone' and took the story up to the end of the Second World War. This second volume covers the years from the late 1940s to the late 1990s. George Melnyk insists from the outset that the `primary role of the first literary history of Alberta is to establish texts and players [sic] ... it seeks to define rather than evaluate.' `Literary,' however, is defined very loosely, since it applies to virtually anything printed in book form; oddly, there is a chapter on `The Literary Novel,' but `Popular Fiction,' presumably not`literary,' is also covered. Because Melnyk feels bound to include nonresidents who write about Alberta as well as Albertans who live and work outside the province, and because he becomes increasingly reluctant as the book proceeds to distinguish between major and minor, much of the text humanities 551 consists of the kind of desperate listing and bland commentary that produced so many arid stretches in the Literary History of Canada. Melnyk's earlier books tended to emphasize the political, and this is certainly a highly politicized literary history. (Words like `imperial,'`racist,' and `appropriation' are naturally common.) One could argue, indeed, that it isn't really a literary history at all, for Melnyk is extremely reluctant to risk any literary comment. Thus, after the briefest biographical account and list of works published, he merely remarks of one writer: `Her work is composed of short lines and brief poems.' More often than not, he falls back for the most basic assessment on the authority of earlier literary critics. Above all, he shows remarkably little interest in the way language is employed in the texts he describes. For myself, I found most of the short extracts he quotes to illustrate style devoid of merit. (I should, perhaps, note at this point that I am suspicious of a literary history that can describe W.O. Mitchell's Who Has Seen the Wind as `the western male equivalent of Anne of Green Gables.') When I expected informed literary comment, I got irrelevant chitchat. All we are told, for instance, of Janette Oke's Love Comes Softly is that she `was the mother of four teenagers' when she wrote the...