Moss, John 1940-

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MOSS, John 1940-

PERSONAL: Born February 7, 1940, in Blair, Ontario, Canada; son of George F. (a poet and businessman) and Mary (Clare) Moss; married Virginia Lavin (a psychologist), May 29, 1965; children: Julie, Laura. Education: University of Western Ontario, B.A., 1961, M.A., 1969; University of Waterloo, M.Phil., 1970; University of New Brunswick, Ph.D., 1973.

ADDRESSES: Home—Bellrock R.R.1, Verona, Ontario K0H 2W0, Canada. Office—316, 70 Laurier Avenue E., Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. E-mail—[email protected]

CAREER: Royal Shakespeare Company, London, England, technician, 1962; Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (CBC), Toronto, Ontario, Canada, studio director, 1963–64; high school teacher of English in Toronto, 1965–67; University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, lecturer in English, 1969; Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, associate professor of English, 1973–76; University of British Columbia, Vancouver, visiting professor of English, 1977–78; Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada, associate professor of English, 1978–80; University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, professor of English, 1980–. Founder and managing editor of Journal of Canadian Fiction, 1972–76.

MEMBER: Writers' Union of Canada, Association of Canadian University Teachers of English, Association of Canadian and Quebec Literatures.

AWARDS, HONORS: Canada Council fellowship, 1971–72, 1972–73; Ontario Arts Council grants.

WRITINGS:

Patterns of Isolation (criticism), McClelland & Stewart (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1974.

The Ancestral Present: Sex and Violence in the Canadian Novel, McClelland & Stewart (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1977.

(Editor, and author of introduction) Here and Now (criticism), NC Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1978.

(Editor and author of introduction) Beginnings (criticism), NC Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1980.

A Reader's Guide to the Canadian Novel (criticism), McClelland & Stewart (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1981.

Modern Times (criticism), NC Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1982.

Bellrock (autobiography), NC Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1983.

Invisible in the House of Mirrors, [London, England], 1984.

Present Tense (criticism), NC Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1985.

(Editor) Future Indicative: Literary Theory and Canadian Literature, University of Ottawa Press (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada), 1987.

Arctic Landscape and the Metaphysics of Geography, [London, England], 1992.

Enduring Dreams: An Exploration of Arctic Landscape, Anansi (Concord, Ontario, Canada), 1994.

(Coauthor) Subject Mentoring in the Secondary School, Routledge (New York, NY), 1997.

The Paradox of Meaning: Cultural Poetics and Critical Fictions, Turnstone Press (Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada), 1999.

Invisible among the Ruins: Field Notes of a Canadian in Ireland, Cormorant Books (Dunvegan, Ontario, Canada), 2000.

(Coeditor) Issues in English Teaching, Routledge (New York, NY), 2000.

Being Fiction, Tecumseh Press (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada), 2001.

Contributor of articles and reviews to literary journals.

WORK IN PROGRESS: A study of language, consciousness, and literary expression.

SIDELIGHTS: John Moss is a professor of English at the University of Ottawa in Canada. He writes in numerous genres, from poetry to memoir to literary criticism. He is also considered to be somewhat of an expert on the Canadian novel, publishing two books on the topic. His book The Paradox of Meaning: Cultural Poetics and Fictions is a collection of essays and rhetoric that Moss names "critical-fiction." The essays deal with Canadian literature and language and are rather unconventional.

Moss is also an outdoor enthusiast, participating in many endurance sports. He has completed a number of Arctic treks and expeditions, which served as fodder for his book Enduring Dreams: An Exploration of Arctic Landscape. The book recounts some of his own adventures in the Arctic, along side a variety of historical adventurers. Michael Peake, writing for All About Canoes, found this book to be a "serious-minded effort." He also noted that "for the right type of reader, this will be a wonderful read, evoking deep and profound thoughts."

In his novel Being Fiction, Moss creates a series of short stories, each framed around a famous literary figure, many being Canadian. Such writers as Margaret Atwood, Carol Shields, and Michael Ondaatje appear, along with some historically great authors like Shakespeare and Jane Austen.

Of Moss's book Bellrock, William French wrote in the Globe and Mail, "John Moss has invented a new literary genre with Bellrock. It could be called the self-interview-while-driving, and kind of auto-biography, or two-cylinder memoir." Moss wrote the book during a long drive from Kingston, Ontario, to Vancouver, British Columbia, recording it on a tape recorder. "A kind of free-form rambling," observed French, "it's intensely personal and self-indulgent." He added, "If there is a coherent theme in [Bellrock], it's metamorphosis: everything evolves into something else, sometimes for the better, sometimes not."

Moss told CA: "Literary criticism is a creative process. Criticism concerned with a national literature is a political act. To be socially responsible, the critic must be a revolutionary. The critic must be a poet, an artist, for the peace of his own mind. It helps me to live in a hand-built log house on an island with my wife and daughters and a variety of animals. The most important thing I've written is the story of Bellrock, and how we've made it home."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Books in Canada, December-February, 2001, review of Being Fiction, pp. 12, 15.

Canadian Literature, spring, 1996, Dale Blake, review of Enduring Dreams: An Exploration of Arctic Landscape, p. 135; winter, 2000, Eve D'Aeth, review of Echoing Silence: Essays on Arctic Narrative, p. 147.

Essays on Canadian Writing, spring, 1990, Lawrence Mathews, review of Future Indicative: Literary Theory and Canadian Literature, p. 162.

Globe and Mail (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), January 14, 1984.

Journal of Canadian Studies, autumn, 1989, Gaile McGregor, review of Future Indicative, p. 156.

University of Toronto Quarterly, fall, 1989, Frank Davey, review of Future Indicative, p 138; winter, 1999, I. S. MacLaren, review of Echoing Silence, p. 162.