Though her life was largely circumscribed by domesticity and
poverty both in England and in Canada, Catharine Parr Traill's
interests, experiences, and contacts were broad and various. Her
contribution to our knowledge of nineteenth-century Canadian life,
from a literary, historical, and scientific perspective, was
significant. Chosen from her nearly 500 extant letters, the 136
presented here vividly reflect typical aspects of social and family
life, attachments to the Old World, health and medical conditions,
travel, religious faith and practice, the stresses of settlement in
Upper Canada in the 1830s, and the dispersal of families with the
opening up of the Canadian and American West. Spanning seventy
years, the letters are presented in three sections, each prefaced
by an introductory essay. The first, '1830-1859: "The changes and
chances of a settler's life,"' traces Traill's story from her
emergence as one of the literary Strickland sisters in England,
through the difficult, poverty-stricken years of settlement and
family raising in Canada, to her husband's death. The second,
'1860-1884: "The poor country mouse,"' reveals her quiet life at
Westove (her cottage at Lakefield), her devotion to family and
friends, and the time she spent writing botanical essays and
seeking a publisher for them. A trip to Ottawa in 1884 awakened her
to a recognition of the literary stature she had earned. The third
section, '1885-1899: "The sight of green things is life to me,"'
begins with the publication of her Studies of Plant Life in Canada
and sheds light on the public recognition she received, her
continuing literary productivity, and the strengthening of her role
as matriarch of the Strickland family in Canada. It closes with her
death on 29 August 1899. Together with the introductory essays,
Traill's correspondence offers an intimate and revealing portrait
of a courageous, caring, and remarkable woman-mother, pioneer,
writer, and botanist.
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