Richard Stursberg’s Lament for a Literature The Collapse of Canadian Book Publishing hit me with a shock of recognition. I’m not in it, but it sounds like the story of my life and career.
When I left the historic sites service of
Parks Canada in the mid-1970s, there were lots of books being published, lots
of publishers, lots of independent newspapers, magazines, radio stations,
bookstores, and libraries to welcome writers and promote their books. I figured
Pierre Berton alone could not fill the demand he had created for Canadian
historical nonfiction. Why shouldn’t I seize a share?
So I did. At the end of the 1970s I became a
freelance writer about Canadian history. My first book was published in 1982 with the contract for
a second already signed, and I had no other career until I decided it was time to let others to take up the torch. If
people ask if I am a famous writer, I usually say “Well, I am if you have heard of
me.” But books I wrote got published and
noticed and promoted and sometimes awarded. And the books led to a host of
ancillary work in historical journalism and broadcasting and to historical
consulting projects large and small in forms I could never have predicted. It was a living.
Richard Stursberg’s slim hundred pages are a explanation of
how that world came to an end. By the
time I was ready to let other aspirants take over, that writing and
publishing world had largely faded away. If I had potential heirs, their path are harder or at least very different than mine.
And boy, does Richard Stursberg show why. In true Canadian spirit, he divides the rise and fall of Canadian writing and publishing into Canada’s five seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, and Even More Winter.
Stursberg is not always persuasive as a cultural critic – he calls Marian Engel’s Bear “a book about bestiality,” cites Solomon Gursky Was Here as Mordechai Richler’s best novel, and thinks Canadian writers should be obliged to set all their stories in Canada. He seems to miss a lot of the sort-of-samizdat by which Canadian writers endure and distribute their works despite the collapse of all the big institutional supports. He even believes ‘wokeism’ and DEI have helped cause the downfall of Canadian nonfiction writing when in reality the reassessment of figures like John A Macdonald is our best hope, not just for reconciliation, but for a new and livelier writing of Canadian history.
But mostly Stursberg has found the causes of Canadian publishing's collapse – and lays them out with copious tables and charts.
Canada fought hard to place a “cultural exemption” in the 1988 free trade agreement. But -- surprise! -- it never took. As soon as it was signed, all the major Canadian publishers were turned into branch plant operations. Soon Amazon and Kindle were given a free hand to undermine Canadian bookselling, tax free. The Carney government’s recent surrender on the Digital Services Tax and its cutbacks to federal cultural agencies suggests the tide has not turned. Significantly, Stursberg notes that where film and broadcasting are governed by an independent commission required to publicize its decisions, decisions to support or undermine Canadian publishing have always been made by secretive bureaucracies.
As he writes, “For over fifty years, the
government has failed to abide by its signature and most basic policy: ensuring
that the Canadian book business, both publishing and retail , is owned and
controlled by Canadians."
If Richard Stursberg’s little book can help stem the ongoing assault on Canadian writing and publishing, he will have done the country a service. Can a book still make a difference in Canada?
