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The Moved and the Shaken: The Story of One Man's Life
256 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1993
3 people are currently reading
30 people want to read
About the author
Ken Dryden
19 books93 followersKenneth Wayne "Ken" Dryden is a Canadian politician, lawyer, businessman, author, and former NHL goaltender. He is an officer of the Order of Canada and a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame. Dryden was a Liberal Member of Parliament from 2004, also serving as a cabinet minister from 2004 to 2006, until losing his seat in the 2011 Canadian federal elections to Conservative Mark Adler.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 16, 2016
This is Dryden’s fourth book and his first novel, a book he said he wrote to better understand some of the constituents he represented following his appointment as The Youth Commissioner of Ontario. Dryden wanted to better understand the people he was acting for and so set out to try and understand the average Canadian man, his thoughts, his dreams and his hopes. He wanted to know how they spent their time and what really mattered to them. So he spent a week living with a man and his family and crafted the fictional biographical character of Frank Bloye, a man who came to reflect what Dryden discovered during his research.
Frank is forty-three years old, has been married for twenty years and has three children. He is a Catholic, is of Irish descent and lives in Scarborough Ontario. He works as a customer service representative for Imperial Oil, nine to five, five days a week, Monday to Friday.
There is nothing outstanding about Frank’s life. He has no special achievements nor has he experienced any devastating tragedies. He is pretty much like most of us, trying to make a life for himself and his family. He pays his bills, watches TV, putters in the garden and does the usual minor repairs to his home. He seldom goes to the movies and is not much interested in politics. The milestones in his life are far from unique. He is simply “everyman”, a reflection of ourselves.
Frank was the second youngest child in a large family and growing up he had a sense of isolation and a depression that occasionally still haunts him. His father was always working, so Frank wants to be sure he is there for his family in a way his own father was not. And so he leaves work at the end of each day without pondering the intricacies of a proposed merger. He’ll leave that to the managers and his company’s employers. He leaves concerns about the recession to the politicians and worries more about the strains on his own personal household budget. His attentions are fixed on issues in his own personal world, his house, his backyard and the needs of his family, especially his eldest daughter who is dyslexic and needs special education classes.
Dryden’s narrative moves back and forth between the first and third person and often lacks quotation marks, so it is difficult at times to know who is really speaking. Whose opinions or interpretations are these? Are they Frank’s, or Dryden’s? A tighter edit might have helped here.
Interestingly Dryden has chosen a white, middle class, heterosexual living in southern Ontario for this portrayal of his “everyman”. Even taking into account the publishing date, the reader might question whether this portrait truly represents the realities of a middle–age, middle-class Canadian. But Dryden still deserves our kudos for his attempt to better understand those he represented. What political appointee has taken the time and energy to do that recently? It provides an interesting read.
Frank is forty-three years old, has been married for twenty years and has three children. He is a Catholic, is of Irish descent and lives in Scarborough Ontario. He works as a customer service representative for Imperial Oil, nine to five, five days a week, Monday to Friday.
There is nothing outstanding about Frank’s life. He has no special achievements nor has he experienced any devastating tragedies. He is pretty much like most of us, trying to make a life for himself and his family. He pays his bills, watches TV, putters in the garden and does the usual minor repairs to his home. He seldom goes to the movies and is not much interested in politics. The milestones in his life are far from unique. He is simply “everyman”, a reflection of ourselves.
Frank was the second youngest child in a large family and growing up he had a sense of isolation and a depression that occasionally still haunts him. His father was always working, so Frank wants to be sure he is there for his family in a way his own father was not. And so he leaves work at the end of each day without pondering the intricacies of a proposed merger. He’ll leave that to the managers and his company’s employers. He leaves concerns about the recession to the politicians and worries more about the strains on his own personal household budget. His attentions are fixed on issues in his own personal world, his house, his backyard and the needs of his family, especially his eldest daughter who is dyslexic and needs special education classes.
Dryden’s narrative moves back and forth between the first and third person and often lacks quotation marks, so it is difficult at times to know who is really speaking. Whose opinions or interpretations are these? Are they Frank’s, or Dryden’s? A tighter edit might have helped here.
Interestingly Dryden has chosen a white, middle class, heterosexual living in southern Ontario for this portrayal of his “everyman”. Even taking into account the publishing date, the reader might question whether this portrait truly represents the realities of a middle–age, middle-class Canadian. But Dryden still deserves our kudos for his attempt to better understand those he represented. What political appointee has taken the time and energy to do that recently? It provides an interesting read.
July 28, 2022
Could identify with the character having grown up in the 50s in Toronto.. Even taught at Don Mills where he went. The parts of him being an altar boy were hilarious...mumbling his responses in Latin not understanding a word ...classic.
September 7, 2025
What makes this book remarkable is that it was written in the first place.
Ken Dryden was a public person with a global reach. He was primarily known as a professional hockey player and rose to the very top of that sport. His championships, awards, and historic victories are numerous. He became a lawyer in the middle of his legendary hockey career, a nearly unthinkable accomplishment. Doing one of those things is remarkable, both is nearly incomprehensible.
After his retirement from hockey Dryden went into politics. While he was Ontario's first Youth Commissioner (1984 - 86) he realized he didn't know his constituents as well as he wanted to. Dryden made it his business to be connected with a constituent that would be representative of the people he would serve in the role of Youth Commissioner. This lead him to the father of a family that lived in Scarborough.
He spent a week sleeping on a couch, in their home, and going to work with the father of the family. His goal was to observe their family life and the father's work at Imperial Oil. The book delves into some of the family's history and simply tries to tell their story; without sensational plotlines or voyeuristic reporting. The book doesn't ever feel inappropriate or exploitive.
Dryden writes with a focus on the family's origins, and their circumstances at the time the book was being written. It is this genuine interest in their lives that gives the book its potency. It's not a thriller, nor is it a triumphant tale of a battle against enormous odds. Rather, its a story of one family's ups and downs, and how their day to day lives unfold.
That a Hall of Fame athlete, and political appointee, would take the time to see what makes someone else tick, to set aside his ego and sleep on a couch in order to accurately portray this family is a tremendous act of humility, care and concern.
In the epilogue Dryden says this about getting to know Frank Bloye, the father of the family, "Yet in the nearly five years I have come to know him, I have learned more about myself and my own life than at any other time."
Ken Dryden was a public person with a global reach. He was primarily known as a professional hockey player and rose to the very top of that sport. His championships, awards, and historic victories are numerous. He became a lawyer in the middle of his legendary hockey career, a nearly unthinkable accomplishment. Doing one of those things is remarkable, both is nearly incomprehensible.
After his retirement from hockey Dryden went into politics. While he was Ontario's first Youth Commissioner (1984 - 86) he realized he didn't know his constituents as well as he wanted to. Dryden made it his business to be connected with a constituent that would be representative of the people he would serve in the role of Youth Commissioner. This lead him to the father of a family that lived in Scarborough.
He spent a week sleeping on a couch, in their home, and going to work with the father of the family. His goal was to observe their family life and the father's work at Imperial Oil. The book delves into some of the family's history and simply tries to tell their story; without sensational plotlines or voyeuristic reporting. The book doesn't ever feel inappropriate or exploitive.
Dryden writes with a focus on the family's origins, and their circumstances at the time the book was being written. It is this genuine interest in their lives that gives the book its potency. It's not a thriller, nor is it a triumphant tale of a battle against enormous odds. Rather, its a story of one family's ups and downs, and how their day to day lives unfold.
That a Hall of Fame athlete, and political appointee, would take the time to see what makes someone else tick, to set aside his ego and sleep on a couch in order to accurately portray this family is a tremendous act of humility, care and concern.
In the epilogue Dryden says this about getting to know Frank Bloye, the father of the family, "Yet in the nearly five years I have come to know him, I have learned more about myself and my own life than at any other time."
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews