New, William H. 1938-

(William Herbert New)

PERSONAL:

Born March 28, 1938, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada; son of John (a mechanic) and Edith Annie (a homemaker) New; married Margaret Ebbs-Canavan (a teacher), 1967; children: two. Education: University of British Columbia, B.Ed., 1961, M.A., 1963; University of Leeds, Ph.D., 1966.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of English, University of British Columbia, 1873 E. Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6T 1Z1. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, professor of English, 1975-2003, Brenda and David McLean Professor of Canadian Studies, 1995-97, University Killam Professor, 2001-03, professor emeritus, 2003—. History of the Book Project, member of advisory board, 2001—; McClelland & Stewart (publisher), member of editorial board of "New Canadian Library;" Vancouver Institute, member of council.

MEMBER:

Royal Society of Canada.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Maxwell Cameron Medal, 1961; Killam research prize, 1988; Gabrielle Roy Medal, 1989; Jacob Biely Prize, 1994; Killam teaching prize, 1996; award of merit, Association of Canadian Studies, 2000; career achievement award, British Columbia chapter, College and University Faculty Assembly, 2001; Governor General's Award for International Canadian Studies, 2004; Lorne Pierce Medal, 2004; nominated for Governor General's Award for Poetry, 2005, for Underwood Log; officer of the Order of Canada, 2006.

WRITINGS:

Malcolm Lowry, McClelland & Stewart (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1971.

Articulating West: Essays on Purpose and Form in Modern Canadian Literature, New Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1972.

Among Worlds: An Introduction to Modern Commonwealth and South African Fiction, Press Porcepic (Erin, Ontario, Canada), 1975.

Malcolm Lowry: A Reference Guide, G.K. Hall (Boston, MA), 1978.

Dreams of Speech and Violence: The Art of the Short Story in Canada and New Zealand, University of Toronto Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1987.

A History of Canadian Literature, Macmillan (London, England), 1991, 2nd edition, McGill-Queen's University Press (Montreal, Quebec, Canada), 2003.

Land Sliding: Imagining Space, Presence, and Power in Canadian Writing, University of Toronto Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1997.

Reading Mansfield and Metaphors of Form, McGill-Queen's University Press (Montreal, Quebec, Canada), 1999.

Borderlands: How We Talk about Canada, University of British Columbia Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 1999.

Grandchild of Empire: About Irony, Mainly in the Commonwealth, Ronsdale Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 2003.

Some of New's writings have been translated into Chinese.

POETRY

Science Lessons, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 1996.

Vanilla Gorilla (for children), illustrated by Vivian Bevis, Ronsdale Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 1998.

Raucous, Oolichan Press, 1999.

Stone Rain: Poems, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 2001.

Riverbook & Ocean, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 2002.

Llamas in the Laundry: Poems (for children), illustrated by Vivian Bevis, Ronsdale Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 2002.

Night Room, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 2003.

Underwood Log, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 2004.

Dream Helmet (for children), illustrated by Vivian Bevis, Ronsdale Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 2005.

Touching Ecuador, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 2006.

Along a Snake Fence Riding, Oolichan Press (Lantzville, British Columbia, Canada), 2007.

EDITOR

Four Hemispheres: An Anthology of English Short Stories from around the World, Copp Clark (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1971.

(With Jack Hodgins) Voice and Vision, McClelland & Stewart (Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 1972.

Dramatists in Canada: Selected Essays, University of British Columbia Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 1972.

Critical Writings on Commonwealth Literatures: A Selective Bibliography to 1970, with a List of Theses and Dissertations, Pennsylvania State University Press (University Park, PA), 1975.

(With H.J. Rosengarten) Modern Stories in English, Crowell (New York, NY), 1975, 4th edition, Addison-Wesley (Boston, MA), 2001.

Modern Canadian Essays, Macmillan (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1976.

Margaret Laurence, McGraw-Hill (New York, NY), 1977.

A Political Art: Essays and Images in Honour of George Woodcock, University of British Columbia Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 1978.

(With W.E. Messenger) Active Voice, Prentice-Hall Canada (Scarborough, Ontario, Canada), 1980, 3rd edition, 1991.

(With W.E. Messenger) The Active Stylist: An Anthology of Canadian, American, and Commonwealth Prose, Prentice-Hall (Scarborough, Ontario, Canada), 1981.

Canadian Writers in 1984: The Twenty-fifth Anniversary Issue of Canadian Literature, University of British Columbia Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 1984.

(With W.E. Messenger) A Twentieth-Century Anthology: Essays, Stories, and Poems, Prentice-Hall Canada (Scarborough, Ontario, Canada), 1984, revised edition (with Kevin McNeilly and Noel Elizabeth Carrie) published as Currents, 2000.

Dictionary of Literary Biography, Gale (Detroit, MI), Volume 53: Canadian Writers since 1960, First Series, 1986, Volume 60: Canadian Writers since 1960, Second Series, 1987, Volume 68: Canadian Writers, 1920-1959, First Series, 1988, Volume 88: Canadian Writers, 1920-1959, Second Series, 1989, Volume 92: Canadian Writers, 1890-1920, 1990, Volume 99: Canadian Writers before 1890, 1990.

Canadian Short Fiction: From Myth to Modern, Prentice-Hall Canada (Scarborough, Ontario, Canada), 1986, 2nd edition, 1996.

Literary History of Canada: Canadian Literature in English, Volume 4, University of Toronto Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 1990.

Native Writers and Canadian Writing, University of British Columbia Press (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada), 1990.

Inside the Poem: Essays and Poems in Honour of Donald Stephens, Oxford University Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1992.

(With W.E. Messenger) Literature in English, Prentice-Hall Canada (Scarborough, Ontario, Canada), 1993.

Encyclopedia of Literature in Canada, University of Toronto Press (Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 2002.

(With Marta Dvorak) Tropes and Territories, McGill-Queen's University Press (Montreal, Quebec, Canada), 2007.

Associate editor, World Literature Written in English, 1971-90; editor, Canadian Literature, 1977-95. Member of editorial board of the periodicals Twentieth-Century Literature, 1970-2002, Commonwealth, 1970-2005, Short Story, 1988-2003, and Journal of Caribbean Literatures, 1995—; Canadian Encyclopedia, member of advisory board.

SIDELIGHTS:

Critical reviews of William H. New's Dictionary of Literary Biography volumes, which profile various authors and their literary achievements, have credited the editor with presenting information on both major and lesser-known Canadian writers to achieve a complete picture of his country's literary contributions. In a review of Volume 88, Canadian Writers, 1920-1959, Second Series, a Canadian Literature critic cited New's inclusion of best-selling authors and "unorthodox" and "experimental" writers alike, summarizing: "The book not only yields information that is difficult to come by in comparable handbooks but also sketches a broad cultural profile of the years under scrutiny." The critic similarly reviewed Volume 92, Canadian Writers, 1890-1920, praising New for "recovering authors who, for one reason or another, have been excluded from, or distorted for the sake of inclusion in, the canon," and for "restoring such writers to their proper place."

New also edited Literary History of Canada, Volume 4, Canadian Literature in English. A collection of essays with an emphasis on the literary arts, criticism, commentary, memoirs, and biography, Literary History of Canada is, according to John Moss, writing in the Toronto Globe and Mail, "crucial to an understanding of literary history in Canada, the country. Limited as either reference or resource, it is nevertheless a good starting point in any attempt to comprehend what we have written about ourselves. It has become an institution in its own right." Further approval for Literary History of Canada was issued by Stephen Regan in Canadian Literature. Regan noted that in a country where Canadian books make up only a fraction of the country's book sales, the Literary History of Canada "will, in its own special way, encourage and inform the climate of change."

A History of Canadian Literature is an exhaustive work that discusses the history of Canadian literature in light of social change and European influence, categorizes contemporary styles, and suggests ways to perceive and appreciate modern Canadian writing. (The second edition also deals with ethnic minorities and multicultural influences as well.) In his Canadian Literature review, Arnold Davidson noted New's "thorough understanding of the historical, social, and technological groundings of literature and his ability to draw illuminating connections and/or parallels between cultural facts and texts as cultural productions." Commenting on New's "history in progress," Davidson concluded: "with A History of Canadian Literature, [New] has brought the nation's oeuvre to life."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Books in Canada, February, 1999, review of Vanilla Gorilla, p. 31.

Canadian Book Review Annual, 1998, review of Vanilla Gorilla, p. 533.

Canadian Literature, summer, 1989, Helen Tiffin, review of Dreams of Speech and Violence: The Art of the Short Story in Canada and New Zealand, pp. 131-133; winter, 1990, reviews of Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 88: Canadian Writers, 1920-1959, Second Series, and Volume 92: Canadian Writers, 1890-1920, pp. 202-203; autumn, 1991, Stephen Regan, review of Literary History of Canada, Volume 4: Canadian Literature in English, pp. 208-209; winter, 1991, Arnold Davidson, review of A History of Canadian Literature, pp. 179-183; spring, 2000, Elizabeth Hodgson, review of Vanilla Gorilla, p. 148.

Canadian Materials, September 3, 1999, review of Vanilla Gorilla.

Globe and Mail (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), May 12, 1990, John Moss, review of Literary History of Canada; February 22, 2003, review of Riverbook & Ocean, p. D4.

Quill and Quire, August, 1998, review of Vanilla Gorilla, p. 36; December, 2002, review of Llamas in the Laundry: Poems, p. 26.

Resource Links, February, 1999, review of Vanilla Gorilla, p. 5; June, 2005, Anne Burke, review of Dream Helmet, p. 22.