Читать книгу Highways of Canadian Literature онлайн

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Although William Wye Smith left Scotland in his infancy and was for almost four score years a Canadian by adoption, almost all his writings show the influence of the language, the literature, the history, the religious and philosophic spirit of his homeland. A deep spiritual note is present in many of his lyrics. Yet he did on occasion enter fully into the Canadian spirit and show an appreciative understanding of Canadian conditions, the beauties of Canadian landscape, historic themes and national aspirations. Some of his best known poems are: The Second Concession of Deer, The Sheep-washing, Ridgeway, The Burial of Brock, Here’s to the Land!, Canadians on the Nile.

There was one émigré poet who deserves detailed appreciation as a creative interpreter of Western chevalerie and as a lyrist with an exquisite fancy and delicate artistry. This was Isabella Valancy Crawford. Born in Ireland in 1850, she came to Canada when but a child of eight years, her family settling in Ontario, and, later, moving to the Kawartha Lakes. Her father was a physician and it must be presumed that the daughter came under cultural influences in her home. More important is the fact she lived in Canadian districts which must have peculiarly affected her young, impressionable, and receptive mind. Undeniably she was born a poet; that is to say, she was born with a genius for seeing spiritual beauty and meaning in all common things, natural and human. Thus gifted and thus left free to be impressed by Canadian Nature and life around her, and also by Nature and life in the Western prairie regions, of which she had read, Valancy Crawford set about imaginatively to interpret and express in verse her appreciation of Nature and life in Canada.