Book brings Johnson to modern readers

Page 27

E. Pauline Johnson Tekahionwake

Collected Poems And Selected Poetry

Edited by Carole Gerson and Veronica Strong-Boag

University of Toronto Press

343 pages (hc)

$26.95

Carole Gerson and Veronica Strong-Boag have edited a new edition that helps dash a commonly held misconception-that Pauline Johnson can be dismissed as a drawing-room poet whose verse-making lacks relevance for modern readers.

Ninety years after her death, this is the first collection of all the poems written by Johnson, published in a single text along with a selection of some of her finest stories.

As a companion volume to Gerson and Strong-Boag 's first book, Paddling Her Own Canoe, E. Pauline Johnson Tekahionwake, Collected Poems and Selected Poetry opens with an historical introduction exploring Johnson's position as a major writer, cultural figure and Mohawk-Canadian woman whose work has inspired generations of Aboriginal writers, including Rita Joe, Bernice Loft Winslow, Lee Maracle, Beth Brant and Joan Crate.

That Johnson's poetry ranges from brilliant and universal to downright syrupy, the Collected Poems and Selected Verse is highly accessible, opening doors for a popular readership that might otherwise pass over a volume of poetry in favor of a book of short stories.

Significantly, Gerson and Strong-Boag choose to present works of fiction and non- fiction that address hard questions about the cultural survival of Aboriginal peoples pitted against a dominant culture.

They also point out that Johnson had a writing style that lent itself to oral performance, tapping into ancient tradition learned at her Mohawk grandfather's knee that would often bring a haunting spiritual voice to poems such as Legend of the Qu'Appelle Valley, Dwwendine and The Pilot of the Plains.

Long suffering high school teachers, whose job it is to introduce reluctant modern youth to Canadian poetry, can take heart.

Collected Poems and Selected Poetry is very palatable with the added bonus of real life adventure stories in The Shagganappi and We'Hro's Sacrifice, romance and revenge in A Red Girl's Reasoning, travel and exploration in Forty-five Miles On the Ground, Shape Shifting with wolves in The Potlatch, culture and legend in The Siwash Rock, murder and mayhem in As It Was In The Beginning, and a no-holds-barred condemnation of racism in A Strong Race Opinion On The Indian Girl In Modern Fiction, to name a few, which should keep students reading and lead them to a greater appreciation of poetry.