Bookworm, no. 78
Alexandra Oliver reviews collected poems by Margaret Atwood. Ximena González on “Nature-First Cities.” Poetry by Ronna Bloom. Inside the January/February issue.
The Indelible Woman
Paper Boat: New and Selected Poems, 1961–2023
Margaret Atwood
McClelland & Stewart
624 pages, hardcover, ebook, and audiobook
One might surmise that poets who become novelists evolve, sloughing off the chrysalis of experimentation for profitable work. Margaret Atwood challenges this assumption. With some 300 poems that span her six-decade career, Paper Boat traces the development of that cool Atwoodian eye and ear, which defines her fiction. As in her most complex novels, her verse explores bodily autonomy, displacement, power, and violence.
Drawing from the cautious lyrics of Double Persephone to the fierceness of Power Politics, from the eroticism in Morning in the Burned House to memories of Atwood’s late partner in Dearly, this collection depicts urgency and intimacy. In “The Last Rational Man,” previously published in 2007, a Roman senator risks execution to defy his violent emperor, Caligula, “who’s telling a lie, / and knows it, and dares contradiction.” As we near next week’s inauguration in Washington, such verse hangs heavy. Meanwhile, newer poems resonate vividly, as they observe, kvetch, and—with Atwood’s particular sangfroid—rejoice at what has passed and what continues. In “Grace before Evening Meal,” an elderly speaker mourns the loss of the “old largesse, / abundance, plenitude” that marked their younger days. But their companion’s gratitude for an ad hoc supper reminds them that the present is hardly diminished: “But this is wonderful! you said / In the evening sunlight. / Thank you. Thank you for making it.”
The acknowledgements, like the poems, follow a chronological progression. Atwood offers a glimpse into her life and recalls the loved ones, writers, and fellow literary minds who have helped her along the way, including her high school English teacher and her parents. “How far we have come / in our boat of paper!” she writes in the title poem. Readers can only hope that the journey continues.
—Alexandra Oliver
Cityscaping
Nature-First Cities: Restoring Relationships with Ecosystems and with Each Other
Cam Brewer, Herb Hammond, and Sean Markey
UBC Press
258 pages, softcover and ebook
Although our neighbourhoods may feature green spaces and trees, we have come to see them as decorative—luxurious, even—and a counterpoint to development. In Nature-First Cities, Cam Brewer, Herb Hammond, and Sean Markey, environmental managers based in British Columbia, challenge this perception and propose nature-directed stewardship as a way to repair ecosystems obliterated by urbanization.
An entrenched disregard for pre-existing ecology allows urban sprawl to swallow fresh air, clean water, and pristine soil—only to spit them out later as harmful refuse. “Those with the least responsibility for the climate emergency not only face some of the greatest consequences but also have the fewest resources available to address them,” the authors note, adding that cities produce some 70 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Drawing from the work of scholars and activists, they stress the importance of restoring urban watersheds, to unlock the benefits of a healthy ecosystem while honouring Indigenous ways of coexistence.
To reintroduce nature into our daily lives, Brewer, Hammond, and Markey propose practical interventions at different scales, from green roofs and walls to urban forests and bioswales that catch runoff. “By inviting nature home, we see nature as the commons in which we all have a stake,” they write. “Everyone in the city can join in the process and share in the outcome.”
—Ximena González
Poet’s Corner
One Night
In one minute, I slept a whole night.
In one night, I slept a whole minute.
The world changed completely
while I was gone.
—Ronna Bloom is the author of the forthcoming In a Riptide. Her recent collection, A Possible Trust: The Poetry of Ronna Bloom, was edited and introduced by Phil Hall. Find more of her work in a physical copy of the latest Literary Review of Canada, on newsstands now.
Inside the January/February Issue
“It’s too simplistic to say that Shields embraced the domestic while Gallant rejected it; that Shields was the matron and Gallant the maverick; that Shields was the thoughtful homemaker and Gallant the calculating home wrecker.” J.R. Patterson reviews Montreal Standard Time: The Early Journalism of Mavis Gallant alongside The Canadian Shields: Stories and Essays.
Martin Laflamme reviews Lloyd Axworthy’s Lloyd Axworthy: My Life in Politics.
“Really an extended essay on waste disposal, overconsumption, and the lives of trash collectors, it is penned by an actual garbageman.” Amanda Perry on Simon Paré-Poupart’s Ordures! Journal d’un vidangeur (Trash! A garbageman’s notebook).
And much more!