Mentors

I was thinking earlier today about the importance of mentors in life. So far, in terms of writing, I've had two - my high-school writer's craft teacher, Joe Webster, and the editor-in-chief of In/Words slash canadian lit prof Collett Tracey. Joe always pushed and encouraged (such is the mandate of the teacher, n'est ce pas?); the support was always reassuring and in conjunction with the subject matter in that course was responsible for swaying me from the field of engineering. Collett has brought to light the invaluable yet overlooked niche of canadian literature and the dire need to not let the literary past be forgotten; too many valuable texts are going out of print and too many people are doing nothing about it. Authors are being forgotten; some who should be known will never be appreciated. An unfortunately small number of people will never get the joy of reading Dudek or Souster, though millions will have read the literary atrocity that is Dan Brown. The onus is on us to preserve canadian literature and celebrate it, not let it dwindle into canonical insignificance.