New Canadian Library: The Ross-McClelland Years, 1952-1978

305 Pages·4.212 MB·English

by  Janet B. Friskney

NEW CANADIAN LIBRARY:
THE ROSS-McCLELLAND YEARS, 1952–1978
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JANET B. FRISKNEY
New Canadian Library:
The Ross-McClelland Years,
1952–1978
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS
Toronto Buffalo London
© University of Toronto Press Incorporated 2007
Toronto Buffalo London
www.utppublishing.com
Printed in Canada
isbn: 978-0-8020-9746-0
Printed on acid-free paper
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Friskney, Janet Beverly, 1968–
New Canadian library : the Ross-McClelland years, 1952–1978 / Janet
B. Friskney.
(Studies in book and print culture)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn: 978-0-8020-9746-0
1. New Canadian Library – History and criticism. 2. Canadian
literature – 20th century – History and criticism. 3. Ross,
Malcolm, 1911–. 4. McClelland, Jack, 1922–. I. Title. II. Series.
z483.m33f75 2007 070.509713(cid:99)541 c2007-903257-5
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to
its publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the
Ontario Arts Council.
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial support for its
publishing activities of the Government of Canada through the Book
Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP).
For Mom,
who has always encouraged me to buy books.
And in memory of Dad,
who introduced me to the wonder of borrowing them.
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If Canadian books are mingled with books from England and the
United States and all the other lands that publish in English, they
are likely to be lost, for their tone is not aggressive or eccentric.
But gather them together as a Canadian library, and consider
them as the production of a land and a people, and they assume
a more impressive stature.
Robertson Davies, ‘The Northern Muse’ (1964)
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Contents
illustrations xi
acknowledgments xiii
abbreviations xvii
Introduction 3
Part One: The Historical Narrative
1 Malcolm Ross, Jack McClelland, and the Launch
of the NCL 21
2 Establishing a Canadian Literary Reprint Series,
1958–1967 44
3 Establishment and Its Discontents, 1968–1978 67
Part Two: Editorial Practices and the Selective Tradition
4 Selection, Rejection, and Compromise 91
5 On the Matter of the Source Text 122
6 Canonical Conundrums 152
Appendix A New Canadian Library Titles, 1958–1978 186
Appendix B Copies of NCL Titles Sold Annually,
1958–1979 196
Appendix C Titles Proposed but Not Included in the NCL
to 1978 205