Poets of the Country

All literate Canadians know about 1867: Charlottetown, Sir John A., and all that. Yet, if questioned about the beginnings of literature in the newly organized country, how many could provide an adequate answer? Even specialists might hesitate before naming a title published in the first dozen years or so after Confederation. But the very word “Confederation” could well spark a response: “The Confederation Poets”? Yes, indeed, and D.M.R. Bentley has here produced the first detailed account of the group of writers who can be recognized as forming Canada’s first literary movement.

The phrase “Poets of the Confederation” (or “Confederation Poets”) came into circulation after the late Malcolm Ross employed it for the title of an anthology published in the New Canadian Library in 1960—although in The Confederation Group of Canadian Poets, 1880–1897, Bentley, with characteristic thoroughness, has traced its origin back as far as 1922. Thanks to Ross, it is now...