Anne of Tim Hortons: Globalization and the Reshaping of Atlantic-Canadian Literature

Anne of Tim Hortons: Globalization and the Reshaping of Atlantic-Canadian Literature is a study of the work of over twenty contemporary Atlantic-Canadian writers that counters the widespread impression of Atlantic Canada as a quaint and backward place. By examining their treatment of work, culture, and history, author Herb Wyile highlights how these writers resist the image of Atlantic Canadians as improvident and regressive, if charming, folk.

After an introduction that examines the current place of the region within the Canadian federation and the broader context of economic globalization, Anne of Tim Hortons explores how Atlantic-Canadian writers present a picture of the region that is much more complex and less quaint than the stereotypes through which it is typically viewed. Through the works of authors such as Michael Winter, Lisa Moore, George Elliott Clarke, Rita Joe, Frank Barry, Alistair MacLeod, and Bernice Morgan, among others, the book looks at the changing (and increasingly corporate) nature of work, the cultural diversification and subversive self-consciousness of Atlantic-Canadian literature, and Atlantic-Canadian writers’ often revisionist approach to the region’s history.

What these writers are engaged in, the book contends, is a kind of collective readjustment of the image of the region. Rather than a marginal place stranded outside of time, Atlantic Canada in these works is very much caught up in contemporary economic, political, and cultural developments, particularly the broad sweep of economic globalization.

Herb Wyile was a professor of English at Acadia University. His books include Speculative Fictions: Contemporary Canadian Novelists and the Writing of History (2002) and Speaking in the Past Tense: Canadian Novelists on Writing Historical Fiction (WLU Press, 2007). He co-edited, with Jeanette Lynes, Surf’s Up! The Rising Tide of Atlantic-Canadian Literature (2008) and created the website Waterfront Views: Contemporary Writing of Atlantic Canada.