Featuring articles and poems from such writers as Norman Snider, Irving Layton, Fraser Sutherland, John Mills, Brian Fawcett, and Doug Gibson, this collection addresses numerous facets of Canadian literature, including the Canada Council, Robertson Davies' characters, Robin Mathews and nationalism, Margaret Atwood and Northern Journey, why The Mountain and the Valley became a classic, the problems with Canadian publishing, and how the arts councils steer the arts.

John Metcalf is one of Canada's most distinguished literary editors, writers, critics, and anthologists. He has helped shape the sensibility of an entire group of emerging writers through his work at the Porcupine's Quill press. Known for his strong views about literary standards, Metcalf has nurtured some of our most essential writers, including Leon Rooke, Russel Smith, Terry Griggs, Caroline Adderson, Annabel Lyon, Andrew Pyper, Steven Heighton, Jane Urquhart, Elise Levine, Clarke Blaise, Michael Winter, and Mary Swan, among dozens of other fine authors.John Metcalf is the Senior Editor of Porcupine's Quill. An accomplished writer, editor, and anthologist, he is the author of more than a dozen works of fiction and non-fiction including "Adult Entertainment, The Lady Who Sold Furniture", and "Kicking Against the Pricks: Essays".

John Metcalf's profile page

"Irreverent, engaging, and very funny...Editor John Metcalf, hoping to ‘provoke argument and discussion about our literary cultures,‘ has gathered over thirty essays, poems, jibes, jeers, and cheap shots from some of the sharpest pens in the land." — Canadian Materials

"I'm all for a little shouting in the pews of that pious church called CanLit and I do like to see a pie or two in the faces of the lords and ladies of letters." — Books in Canada