Title: Tribute to Newfoundland, tribute to fatherland : Michael Crummey's Sweetland in a geocritical perspective
Source document: Brno studies in English. 2020, vol. 46, iss. 2, pp. 119-135
Extent
119-135
-
ISSN0524-6881 (print)1805-0867 (online)
Persistent identifier (DOI): https://doi.org/10.5817/BSE2020-2-7
Stable URL (handle): https://hdl.handle.net/11222.digilib/143210
Type: Article
Language
License: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International
Notice: These citations are automatically created and might not follow citation rules properly.
Abstract(s)
The article invites a reading of Michael Crummey's Sweetland (2014) from the geocritical point of view. The novel is a fictional record of the resettlement of a fishing town situated on an imaginary island off the coast of Newfoundland. The main character refuses to leave his home, and by feigning his own death manages to stay behind when all other inhabitants depart. The proposed analysis employs such geocritical tools as geobiography, cartography, sensory experience of the land and its agency, regionalism as well as Pierre Nora's concept of lieu de mémoire. The article analyzes the geobiographical elements in the novel to underscore the book's status as Crummey's tribute to his fatherland. It investigates the factors that prevented the protagonist from taking the resettlement package and the transformations that the deserted island undergoes. It also elaborates on the motif of the map in the discussed narrative and reflects on the role of Newfoundland literature in preserving regional identity.
Note
The project is financed from the grant received from the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education under the Regional Initiative of Excellence programme for the years 2019–2022, project number 009/RID/2018/19, the amount of funding 8 791 222,00 zloty.
References
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[2] Bagley, Clarence B. (1931) Chief Seattle and Angeline. The Washington Historical Quarterly, 22 (4), 253‒255.
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[4] Bowering Delisle, Jennifer (2016) Michael Crummey The presence of the past. In: Carrière, Marie, Curtis Guillespie, and Jason Purcell (eds.) Ten Canadian Writers in Context. Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 39‒55.
[5] Brinklow, Laurie (2016) A man and his island: The island mirror in Michael Crummey's Sweetland. Island Studies Journal 11 (1), 133‒144. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://www.islandstudies.ca/sites/default/files/ISJ-11-1-H-Brinklow.pdf
[6] Chafe, Paul (2016) 'If I were a rugged beauty …': Contemporary Newfoundland fiction. In: Sugars, Cynthia (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Literature. New York: Oxford University Press, 676–690.
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[14] Fiamengo, Janice (2017) Regionalism and urbanism. In Kröller, Eva-Marie (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Canadian Literature. Second Edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 261‒282.
[15] Foucault, Michel (1997) Of other spaces: utopias and heterotopias. Rethinking Architecture: A Reader in Cultural Theory. NYC: Routledge, 330‒336.
[16] Hulan, Shelley (2017) Canadian criticism in English: Literature and nation. In: Kröller, Eva-Marie (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Canadian Literature. Second Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 283‒299.
[17] Kahn, Jennifer (2019) Learning at the intersection of self and society: The family geobiography as a context for data science education. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 1‒24. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://doi-org.ezproxy.muni.cz/10.1080/10508406.2019.1693377
[18] Lopez, Barry (1996) A literature of place. U.S. Society and Values 1 (10), 10‒12. Electronic Journals of the US Information Agency. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://web-archive-2017.ait.org.tw/infousa/zhtw/DOCS/ijse0896.pdf
[19] Nora, Pierre (1989) Between memory and history: Les lieux de mémoire. Representations 26, 7‒24. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://doi-org.ezproxy.muni.cz/10.2307/2928520 | DOI 10.2307/2928520
[20] Polić, Vanja (2018) The hauntings of Canada in Michael Crummey's Sweetland. London Journal of Canadian Studies 33 (6), 77–93. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://doi-org.ezproxy.muni.cz/10.14324/111.444.ljcs.2018v33.006 | DOI 10.14324/111.444.ljcs.2018v33.006
[21] Sugars, Cynthia and Gerry Turcotte (2009) Canadian literature and the postcolonial gothic. In: Unsettled Remains: Canadian Literature and the Postcolonial Gothic edited by Cynthia Sugars, and Gerry Turcotte, vii‒xxvi. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
[22] Tremblay, Tony (2016) 'People are made of places': Perspectives on region in Atlantic-Canadian literature. In: The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Literature, edited by Cynthia Sugars, 657‒675. New York: Oxford University Press.
[23] Westphal, Bertrand (2007) Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces, transl. by Robert T. Tally Jr. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
[2] Bagley, Clarence B. (1931) Chief Seattle and Angeline. The Washington Historical Quarterly, 22 (4), 253‒255.
[3] Bogdan, Deanne (1986) Moncton, mentors, and memories: An interview with Northrop Frye. Studies in Canadian Literature / Études En littérature Canadienne, 11 (2). Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/SCL/article/view/8052
[4] Bowering Delisle, Jennifer (2016) Michael Crummey The presence of the past. In: Carrière, Marie, Curtis Guillespie, and Jason Purcell (eds.) Ten Canadian Writers in Context. Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 39‒55.
[5] Brinklow, Laurie (2016) A man and his island: The island mirror in Michael Crummey's Sweetland. Island Studies Journal 11 (1), 133‒144. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://www.islandstudies.ca/sites/default/files/ISJ-11-1-H-Brinklow.pdf
[6] Chafe, Paul (2016) 'If I were a rugged beauty …': Contemporary Newfoundland fiction. In: Sugars, Cynthia (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Literature. New York: Oxford University Press, 676–690.
[7] Coleman, Victor (2000) Review of Hard Light. Newfoundland Studies 16 (2), 300‒303. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/NFLDS/article/view/1024
[8] Crummey, Michael (1998) Hard Light. London, Ontario: Brick Books.
[9] Crummey, Michael (2014) Sweetland. London: Corsair.
[10] Crummey, Michael (2014a) In the company of the dead, interview by A. Fitzpatrick. Hazlitt. September 3. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://hazlitt.net/feature/companydead-interview-michael-crummey
[11] Crummey, Michael (2014b) Sweetland, interview by Karin Wells. CBC radio. August 22. Accessed May 28, 2020. https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2495034915
[12] Crummey, Michael and Greg Locke (2004) Newfoundland. The Journey into a Lost Nation. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart.
[13] Donne, John (1923) Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, edited by J. Sparrow. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://openlibrary.org/books/OL7135850M/Devotions_upon_emergent_occasions
[14] Fiamengo, Janice (2017) Regionalism and urbanism. In Kröller, Eva-Marie (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Canadian Literature. Second Edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 261‒282.
[15] Foucault, Michel (1997) Of other spaces: utopias and heterotopias. Rethinking Architecture: A Reader in Cultural Theory. NYC: Routledge, 330‒336.
[16] Hulan, Shelley (2017) Canadian criticism in English: Literature and nation. In: Kröller, Eva-Marie (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Canadian Literature. Second Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 283‒299.
[17] Kahn, Jennifer (2019) Learning at the intersection of self and society: The family geobiography as a context for data science education. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 1‒24. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://doi-org.ezproxy.muni.cz/10.1080/10508406.2019.1693377
[18] Lopez, Barry (1996) A literature of place. U.S. Society and Values 1 (10), 10‒12. Electronic Journals of the US Information Agency. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://web-archive-2017.ait.org.tw/infousa/zhtw/DOCS/ijse0896.pdf
[19] Nora, Pierre (1989) Between memory and history: Les lieux de mémoire. Representations 26, 7‒24. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://doi-org.ezproxy.muni.cz/10.2307/2928520 | DOI 10.2307/2928520
[20] Polić, Vanja (2018) The hauntings of Canada in Michael Crummey's Sweetland. London Journal of Canadian Studies 33 (6), 77–93. Accessed on May 28, 2020. https://doi-org.ezproxy.muni.cz/10.14324/111.444.ljcs.2018v33.006 | DOI 10.14324/111.444.ljcs.2018v33.006
[21] Sugars, Cynthia and Gerry Turcotte (2009) Canadian literature and the postcolonial gothic. In: Unsettled Remains: Canadian Literature and the Postcolonial Gothic edited by Cynthia Sugars, and Gerry Turcotte, vii‒xxvi. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
[22] Tremblay, Tony (2016) 'People are made of places': Perspectives on region in Atlantic-Canadian literature. In: The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Literature, edited by Cynthia Sugars, 657‒675. New York: Oxford University Press.
[23] Westphal, Bertrand (2007) Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces, transl. by Robert T. Tally Jr. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.