Selected Essays

Born to Canadian parents in North Dakota in 1940, Clark Blaise grew up with an outsider's view of America and a romanticized exile's view of Canada. The author of nine story collections, three novels and four previous works of non-fiction, he currently lives in both New York and San Francisco with his wife, Bharati Mukherjee.

"More than any other writer, Blaise has shown how Canada is linked by geography, immigration, and cultural affinity to the wider world..."&#8212The National Post "The biographical bent is just one aspect of Blaise's critical perspective, albeit, I believe, the dominant one. But the book also contains valuable discussions regarding the craft of writing, as well as more general historical/thematic reflections on literature and culture. Particularly good are the observations on how Americans look at Canadians, and how we look at them. Observations that are, in turn, informed by personal experience."--Good Reports "There is much substance in these essays to ponder; and to unsettle our assumptions, as good essays should."--Michael Bryson "Here is something remarkably original about Blaise's work. Blaise is more than just a local colourist who ferrets out the curious details of "marginal" communities in order to delight cosmopolitan readers. Rather, if we consider the full arc of his work, we see that for nearly fifty years he has been challenging the way that we understand the concept of place in contemporary Canadian and American literature."--Alexander McLeod