Survival: A thematic guide to Canadian literature

Rating:
Summary: A useful way to look at Canadian literature
Review: Atwood's Survival was a seminal book for me back in the 1970's. Her theory that there are national themes in literature is very useful for studying cultures generally. The rap on the book is that she has not done a thorough, scholarly job of research and tends to favour references to books written by her friends or published by her publisher. I think this is unfair. She is a working writer, not an academic, and she herself notes the book's scholarly limitations. The real fun is in taking the book's theses and running with them yourself.

Atwood sees the essential Canadian literary theme as the survival in the title: the survival of winter, imposed on us as Canadians by our geography and climate.

A very thought-provoking book.