Editorial

Journal of Canadian Studies/Revue d'etudes canadiennes Editorial Editor Associate Editor Editorial Assistants Editorial Board DENIS SMITH Redacteur RALPH HEINTZMAN Redacteur adjoint ARLENE DAVIS Assistantes MARGARET PEARCE JEAN-PIERRE LAPOINTE Comite de redaction MARGARET LAURENCE HARVEY McCUE JACQUES MONET, S. J. W. L. MORTON W. F. W. NEVILLE GORDON ROPER DONALD V. SMILEY PHILIP STRATFORD T. H. B. SYMONS W. E. TAYLOR CLARA THOMAS JOHN WADLAND MELVILLE H. WATKINS ALAN WILSON "Canadian business is largely in the hands of a group of publishers in Toronto (some of them branches of English firms) and many of them represent both English and American houses. In proportion to its population Canada is a disappointing market." tion to the cultural implications of communication in fostering a sense of community. English Canadians, traditionally slower to respond to threats to their cultural and communal values, have only now entered upon a new phase in the search for a true cultural nationalism, and for a sound economic base to support it. - Stanley Unwin, "English Books Abroad," in John Hampden, ed., The Book World, London, 1935. Concern for the health and direction of English language publishing in Canada has grown increasingly in recent years. A similar concern in French Canada has been manifested over a period of nearly twenty years, ever since the Quiet Revolution drew attenJournal of Canadian Studies As a contribution to this search, the Canadian Studies Programme of Trent University invited leading representatives of the English s pea k i n g publishing industry, writers, teachers, librarians, printing trade people, and others to a Conference on the State of English Language Publishing in Canada, at Peterborough on January 24 and 25, 1975. Organized under the chairmanship of Pro1 fessor Alan Wilson, Chairman of Trent's Ca n a d i a n Studies Programme, with the special assistance of Mrs. Lynn Neufeld and . the Traill College Visitors Committee, the Conference produced a large number of papers concerned with academic and educational publishing, magazine and periodicals publishing, general trade books, the writer, and the bookseller. The Conference was also the occasion of a long-awaited major statement of federal government policy on Canadian publishing by the Secretary of State, the Honourable J. Hugh Faulkner. These addresses, and comments and questions from the floor, have been brought together in this special issue of the Journal of Canadian Studies as a record of what has been since referred to as "The Trent Conference," a significant occasion for discussion of a major public issue in Canada today. * * * The writing and marketing of books and periodicals through a viable publishing industry is one of the most potent means whereby the goals of nationalism can be achieved. It should be acknowledged, however, that the character of this publishing industry will, to a very large extent, depend upon an already existing sense of nationalism which draws its strength from the corporate consciousness of the nation at large. Let us then distinguish between economic, political, and spiritual or metaphysical nationalism. Economic nationalism tends to make market control and profit its chief goals, thus favouring corporate over independent management and makes ownership, whether foreign or national, the chief issue. Political nationalism attempts to realize both regional and national identities through programmes of subsidization and legislation and makes the protection of sovereignty through the control of content and market accessibility the chief issue. For metaphysical nationalism , however, the chief goals are self-understanding , thoughtfulness, and the sharing of diversity. Let us grant that in any complete defi2 nit1on of nationalism all three sets of objectives must be realized. The question arises, however, which of these three senses should be the controlling sense? By means of what formula or formulae are the genuinely pluralistic aspirations of this nation to be best and most wisely served? Should writers, for example, be forced to write only what publishers - many of whom are branch plants of multi-national corporations - believe they can sell, while booksellers find themselves becoming the agents of incipient chauvinism? Or should not publishers, booksellers and writers alik,e celebrate together the diverse experiences of Canadians on their way to nationhood, inspired not by economic and political considerations alone, but by that habitual vision of...