Butterfly on a Rock: A Study of Themes and Images in Canadian Literature

by Douglas G. Jones

In this volume Douglas Jones considers some of the themes and visages that have taken root in Canadian poetry and fiction during the past three generations. The persistent concern of widely different authors with these similar themes and images suggests that the individual writers share a common cultural predicament. It may also suggest that they participate in and help to articulate a larger imaginative world, a supreme fiction of the kind, that embodies the dream and nightmares of a people, shapes their imaginative vision, dreams and nightmares of a people, shapes their imaginative vision of the world, and defines, as it evolves, their cultural identity. This study makes it clear that the cultural predicament proposing different writers to take up the same themes is not defined simply by a literary tradition, but by the actual experience of many Canadians. This fresh and unconventional discussion, based on the author's wide knowledge of the original works, makes Canadian literature (primarily that written in English) intelligible in terms of its imaginative patters and inner concerns. The approach is cultural and psychological rather than pureply aesthetic or literary. The book is not primarily a survey, nor does it attempt to deal fully with any single author or work. Rather, by isolating certain themes and images it defines more clearly some of the features that recur in the mind, the mirror of our imaginative life.

208 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1971

About the author

Douglas Gordon Jones (January 1, 1929 – March 6, 2016) was a Canadian poet, translator and educator.[1]

Born in Bancroft, Ontario, Jones was educated at the private school of Lakefield College School in Ontario, at McGill University and at Queen's University. He received his M.A. from Queen's University in 1954. Jones then taught English literature at the University of Guelph, then Bishop's University and finally the Université de Sherbrooke. In 1969, Jones co-founded the bilingual literary journal Ellipse, which continues to be the only literary periodical in Canada which provides reciprocal translations, in equal measure, of both English and French Canadian poetry.

Jones has been a member of the Arts and Advisory Panel of the Canada Council. His 1978 collection, Under the Thunder the Flowers Light up the Earth, received the 1978 Governor General's Award for Poetry. His rendition of Normand de Bellefeuille's Categorics One, Two and Three received the 1993 Governor General's Award for Translation.

Considered a seminal figure of the mythopoeic strain of Canadian poetry, Jones is also a highly respected essayist and translator. His key work of critical writing is Butterfly on Rock: A Study of Themes and Images in Canadian Literature (1970).

Reviews

[Pavlina · Rating 3 out of 5]

A compilation of themes and patterns recurrent in Canadian literature up to the 1960s. Jones is a poet, so this book is focused primarily on Canadian poetry, although a decent number of novels are mentioned as well. Some terminology is pretty dated, but the book is 50 years old and the world has changed.

[Abby · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well-considered but ultimately dated essays on prevalent themes in Canadian literature. Considering Jones's prolific experience with translation, I had hoped for more treatment of French language authors or of the traffic (potential or actual) between the two official languages; I'll have to look elsewhere for that I guess.