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  • Shaping a World Already Made: Landscape and Poetry of the Canadian Prairies by Carl J. Tracie
  • Ken Atkinson
Carl J. Tracie, Shaping a World Already Made: Landscape and Poetry of the Canadian Prairies (Regina, SK: University of Regina Press, 2016), 220 pp. Paper. $27.95. ISBN 978-0-88977-393-6.

The title of this volume reflects the fact that the prairies represent the Canadian ecological region which has been most transformed from its natural state, through agriculture and other uses. Additionally, it is a region where the economy is open to the vagaries of unpredictable climatic impacts and uncertain world trading conditions, and there are also concerns for the welfare of a very significant Aboriginal population. The author’s aim is to discuss the inspirations – complex, paradoxical, mystical – and responses of nine present-day prairie poets in this changed and changing environment. The poets are Di Brandt (southern Manitoba), Dennis Cooley (Estevan), Lorna Crozier (southern Saskatchewan), Patrick Friesen (southern Manitoba), Tim Lilburn (Regina and Saskatoon), Eli Mandel (Estevan, Regina and Montreal), John Newlove (Kamsack), Andrew Suknaski (Wood Mountain), and Jan Zwicky (southern Parkland).

In a two-page foreword, the poet Dennis Cooley distinguishes between the fear and aggression displayed by male-settler and ‘invader’ poets, and the more reciprocal relationships with the land displayed by Aboriginal and female poets. Then follows a ten-page introduction by the historical geographer John Warkentin, who discusses how creative artists can provide insights into our perception and imaginings of the geographer’s natural and cultural regions. [End Page 121]

The book is structured around how particular themes are reflected in the poets’ writings. Chapter 1 sets the parameters for doing this, in terms of definitions and how the geographer traditionally uses scientific and artistic methods of study. Chapter 2 takes up a quarter of the book, and discusses the poets’ responses to the essentials of land and sky, where the eye is lost to distant horizons. Chapter 3 discusses the poets as groups rather than individuals, that is, by race (non-Aboriginal/Aboriginal), gender, and residence (urban/rural). Chapter 4 explores the paradoxes inherent in the prairie landscape, and how poets deal with them. Chapter 5 analyses the poets’ attempts to portray the mystery of special things encountered, for example light, silence, and space. Chapter 6 distinguishes between popular poetry and literary poetry; the former is represented by Edna Jaques, and also by ‘cowboy poetry’ that is often unpublished but recited at ‘gatherings’ and rodeos. Chapter 7 provides a synthesis, and shows how prairie literary poetry transforms physical landscapes into emotional landscapes which lament the destruction of the natural prairie, including its Aboriginal peoples.

Born, brought up, and educated on the prairies, Carl Tracie richly demonstrates his love of the prairies and of its poetry. He shows how the landscape is an inspiration to the poets who have been raised there. He is to be congratulated on producing a work of considerable scholarship, with copious footnotes and a comprehensive index, vital for a work of this structure. Inevitably, with the thematic approach it is possible to detect some overlap and repetition. Also some more expanded quotations of the verse might help the reader, unfamiliar with the works, to enjoy any music and rhythm in the poetry. Overall this is a significant volume for geographers, students of literature, and, not least, those prairie scientists known to the reviewer who also like to express themselves in verse!

Ken Atkinson
York St John University
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