Straggle

In this wide-ranging collection of essays Tanis MacDonald walks the reader down many paths, pointing out the sights, exclaiming over birds, sharing stories and asking questions about just who gets to walk freely through our cities, parks and wilderness. Deer move mysteriously through these essays, knowing just when they vanish from sight, as do predators, both human and animal. She walks to begin to understand the place she now calls home in Southern Ontario, catalogues the fauna around her in FaunaWatch and continues walking through illness. From a child spotting a snowy owl on her way to school in Winnipeg, to a young woman watching her own distinctive walk be imitated in an acting class, to a worried daughter helping her mother relearn how to walk after a bad fall on a busy road, MacDonald shares how walking has shaped her life and the lives of many others. Wry, smart, political and lyrical, these essays share the joy of walking as well its danger and uncovers the promise it offers – of healing, of companionship and of understanding.

AUTHOR

Tanis MacDonald

Tanis MacDonald writes, studies and teaches in Victoria, but roams the wild prairie like a bison whenever she gets the chance. Holding Ground was nominated for the League of Canadian Poets’ Gerald Lampert Award, and for the Eileen Sykes MacTavish Award at the Manitoba Writing and Publishing Awards in 2001.

Reviews

“An innovative contribution to the literary tradition in that it is both a memoir that seeks to demystify the art world and, at the same time, a guidebook to daily life as an artist . . . This volume importantly invites readers to reflect on how the social, cultural, and institutional spaces we inhabit – from the educational to the familial – constitute not only who we are but also what we can offer our audiences . . . Out of Line is an essential resource for anyone interested in the Canadian cultural industry.”

– University of Toronto Quarterly

“[MacDonald] roots and plants these poems in the specificity of Toronto’s landscape . . . making sure that we – as readers – know that the sexual politics of taking up space – as feminists – is a challenging, powerful, and absolutely necessary undertaking.”

– periodicities

“This is Toronto, narrated by an incisive feminist wit.”

– Malahat Review

“MacDonald has written a book for the daring, the uninitiated, the outsider in the Canadian literary arts world. . . . Drawing on her varied experience, MacDonald creates a portrait of the education of the artist, a non-fiction Künstlerroman, or artist’s novel, for twenty-first-century Canada.”