The Life of Margaret Laurence

by James King

  Margaret’s account is accurate—to a point. What she omits from her rendition was seventeen-year-old David’s sense of outrage that his mother was casting him out. She was very blunt with him: he was old enough to be on his own, but, if he wished, he was welcome to live with her in Canada. In this instance, Margaret—who herself had undergone similar agonies, torments so excruciating that the memory of them led her to distance herself from others so that she would not re-experience them—was herself perceived as the abandoning mother.

  On March 21, 1973, at the time she sold Elmcot, she regarded her recent luck as a personal triumph, as she boasted to Jack McClelland: “I may seem not too brilliant, finance-wise, but am in fact much brighter than most people realize.” Any appearance that she was not a shrewd businesswoman was, according to her, truly deceptive. And she was also a person who got what she wanted: “I may be able to get to Canada sooner than expected; we’ll see. I am the lady who gets to the airport not one but two hours before required.” Significantly, she added, “I don’t need advice—it’s all going on fine.”

  Everything, however, did not go well in the late spring of 1973 with The Diviners. On June 7, Margaret gave this account to Adele:

  My American editor, Judith Jones, is in England now and came out on Monday. Knopf are enthusiastic about the novel (the title of which is THE DIVINERS), so that is good news. Judith and I had a five-hour nonstop session—she came out bearing Macmillan’s criticisms as well as her own, as we’ve agreed I’ll only have the one editor for this book. Nothing she said surprised me in the least. I knew what the areas of weakness were, but when I handed in the 2nd draft I just could not at that moment face trying to cope with more re-writing. However, Judith and I (and Macmillan’s) are in total agreement this time re: what areas need to be revised or rewritten, and after our session I think I can see more or less how to tackle most of the problems. It will, I think, mean about 2 months of concentrated work, which is kind of awkward at this point, what with moving back to Canada.

  In Dance on the Earth, Margaret, in discussing the short-story versus novel issue regarding A Bird in the House, makes this claim: “Judith Jones at Knopf, my editor of many years, had initially had a major disagreement with me for the first and only time.” In fact, Judith’s objections to A Bird in the House were trivial in comparison to her worries about The Diviners. As an editor, she liked experimental fiction which pushed the reader in new directions by the use of unorthodox narration. (Her favourite book by Margaret was The Fire-Dwellers; she especially admired the enormous technical risks the book took.) However, she was not willing to allow a writer to put into print material which was unfocused and undisciplined. When she read the typescript of The Diviners, she was convinced of two things: it bore the mark of genius and it was an utter mess. During that first reading, she was certain that within the chaos of an enormous typescript was a far more compact and coherent book waiting to be liberated.

  Although she had acted as Margaret’s American editor since A Jest of God, Judith’s role in shaping her work had increased markedly in the following years. By the time of A Bird in the House, she had assumed principal responsibility for the Canadian writer within the Knopf-McClelland & Stewart-Macmillan consortium. In April 1973, she did not shirk that responsibility when she wrote Margaret requesting a meeting. Since no early draft of The Diviners survives, it is impossible to compare the completed novel to the material originally sent to the publishers. What is very clear is that all three houses wanted radical surgery performed before allowing the book to go into production and that Judith Jones had the full backing of Alan Maclean and Jack McClelland when she met with Margaret. Judith Jones’s charm, diplomacy and intellectual rigour worked beautifully during their lengthy meeting because she was able to communicate her enthusiasm for the book at the very same time she laid down the law.

  Judith and Margaret had met before in New York on least one occasion. They liked each other—Margaret feeling that Judith’s childhood in rural Vermont gave her a decided edge in responding to the landscape of Manawaka. During their long meeting in 1973, Judith was startled by what she felt was a considerable deterioration in Margaret’s mental state. More significantly, the novelist’s demeanour that day completely surprised her. A few years before, Margaret had fought with her. On that day, she seemed overly compliant, her manner being that of an extremely young writer grateful for editorial strictures, even of the most radical kind. Judith’s impression was that Margaret was befuddled by her own book and needed all the guidance that could be provided in order to put it into some sort of coherent shape.

  This time round, Margaret did not complain to John Cushman. Her response to the critique she was offered can be seen in a six-page single-spaced letter she wrote to Judith less than a month later on July 2, two and a half pages of which are devoted to “MAJOR CHANGES.” Most of these involve paring the narrative down so that subsidiary stories (by Skinner and Christie) do not interfere with plot coherence. On June 12, Jack McClelland wrote Margaret an uncharacteristically long (six-page) letter in which he expressed sentiments similar to those of Judith Jones:

  Let me start by saying that the manuscript contains some of the greatest writing that you have ever done. I have told you before that you are the only author that has improved every time out and I think you have kept your record intact. I read the manuscript in one sitting from about 9 o’clock at night until 4 in the morning. It’s a very moving experience. I ended up in tears during the last half hour.… This is not to say that I think everything is right about the novel. I don’t. I have your letter. I am totally in accord with its contents and most particularly the plan to work directly and solely with Judith Jones in bringing the script to its final form.

  He went on to underscore the crucial point being made by Judith: “the problem with the novel is essentially that you have larded the script with material that impedes the flow and that really is unnecessary in terms of what you are trying to do. I read every page but I can be honest and tell you that it bugged me as a reader to have to do so because too often I was taken away from the narrative—from your own beautiful writing and characterization—and forced to read background material that I really didn’t want or need.” Her encounter with Judith, McClelland’s letter and her moving plans galvanized Margaret, as can be seen in her letter to the “Boss” of July 4:

  I am enclosing a list of the revisions I’ve now made on THE DIVINERS. Yes, I think I have them all done—please do not shriek in horror; I can explain everything! I don’t think I’ve rushed them. The truth is, Jack, that my well-known punctuality neurosis has become really bad, just lately. About three months ago, when I was fuming and carrying on about how difficult it would be for me to get the fourteen million tons of rubbish cleared out of this house, and actually get moved to Canada, my daughter said with admirable calm, “Ma, we all know what will really happen—you will have your suitcase packed and the house cleared and be ready to move on July 1st, and will be pacing the floor until July 22.” And so it has proved. [After her meeting with Judith, she cleaned the house out and then spent 3-1/2 weeks working non-stop on the novel.] I feel kind of apologetic about getting it done now, because it may seem that I’ve rushed it. But I haven’t.

  “Clearing” Elmcot meant burning most of her correspondence and typescripts, the result being that Margaret Laurence’s literary archive for most of her writing career is, unfortunately, scanty. The only furniture she kept from Elmcot were her desk and two chairs, a chest and a small table made by David.

  Her last night at Elmcot was spent alone (David was visiting his sister and her new husband). She was not unhappy. She said goodbye to the Lady and walked through the rooms touching the bookshelves and the fireplaces, almost as if she wished to take with her the spirit of creativity the house had unleashed within her. “I went to bed and slept peacefully. The house, as always, protected me until the very end of our association.”

  Before her departure, Margaret announced th
at she did not wish to look for a house in the small, pretty town of Lakefield—close to the cottage—until she arrived in nearby Peterborough in January 1974 to be writer-in-residence at Trent University. She intended to be at the cottage at least a month before taking up her post at the University of Western Ontario but had no intention of house-hunting. With considerable knowledge of her mothers frequently precipitous behaviour, Jocelyn informed her: “Mum, I give you two weeks after you get to the shack.”

  Two weeks turned out to be two days. She telephoned a good number of realtors in Peterborough and environs. When these calls did not produce the desired results immediately, she phoned a firm in Lakefield with her list of specifications: “I want an old, two-storey, brick house with three bedrooms and a study. It has to be right in the village. I don’t drive. I’m not a gardener, so I don’t want a big lot. This is probably impossible, but it would also be marvellous to have a small, self-contained apartment that I could rent to a Trent student who could keep an eye on the place when I’m away.” A somewhat startled voice at the other end of the line responded: “Mrs. Laurence, something like that has just come on the market and we haven’t advertised it. Would you like to see it?” If she was taken aback, Margaret tried not to show it: “Yes, please drive out and pick me up this instant.” A few minutes later, it was love at first sight: “There it was, just waiting for me, the very house I had described.” Acting upon the principle that she who hesitates is forevermore lost, she bought the house that day.

  In the cemetery of the village church is the grave of Major Samuel Strickland, a former British army officer, the founder of Lakefield. After establishing a farm in the wilderness there, he wrote of his adventures in Twenty-seven Years in Canada West. As Margaret well knew, his literary sisters, Susanna Moodie and Catharine Parr Traill, came to Upper Canada with their families in 1832, and at various times, lived near their brother. Both women were prolific writers before they emigrated to Canada, but they are best known for their accounts of their adventures in the Canadian wilderness, Susanna publishing Roughing It in the Bush in 1852, Catharine The Backwoods of Canada sixteen years earlier. Catharine, who died in Lakefield in 1899 at the age of 97, was more enthusiastic about her experience in the New World, unlike her sister who, having survived a harrowing forest fire and being chased by a bear, wrote of her new life as being akin to that of a “condemned criminal.” For Margaret, these two women were worthy role models, intrepid emigrant pioneers who responded with considerable dexterity and strength to the challenges that confronted them. In a very real sense, Margaret—born and brought up in the Prairies—saw herself as an outsider to small-town Ontario life and thus a spiritual descendant of the dauntless sisters.

  8 Regent Street, Lakefield. (illustration credit 17.1)

  In January 1974, she was not displeased to learn her Lakefield house “used to be a Funeral Home! I think this is hilarious, but the young tenants told me the fact very tentatively, perhaps thinking I would be horrified. The taxi lady, Mrs. Brethauer, whose husband Elwood owns Elwood’s Taxi in Lakefield, said to me previously ‘You’ve bought the old Anderson place’, but did not say what Mr. Anderson’s work had been.” An elderly resident of Lakefield provided her with even more information: “ ‘The Anderson’s kept it real nice,’ he said. ‘They used that big upstairs bedroom as a sitting room when the downstairs was … urn … er … busy.’ The thought of the departed forefathers of the hamlet does not bother me at all. And seeing that the funeral home comes into all my Manawaka fiction, it seems kind of appropriate, somehow!”

  Three months later, when Margaret got possession of the house, she described her supervision of the necessary renovations very much in the manner of a general summoning her various troops to their appointed rounds:

  The study at 8 Regent Street, Lakefield. (illustration credit 17.2)

  8 Regent Street, Lakefield, is coming along marvellously. I had it planned like a campaign—I got possession of it on March 17, and on March 18 the following were supposed to converge on house to begin work: Paperhanger/painter; carpenter; Bell Telephone; Kawartha Karpet Co (what a name) to measure for rugs in 2 rooms; window company to put on storms & screens, etc etc. And believe it or not, they all converged! I was there at 8.45 a.m. and it was really wild—people pouring in and out with ladders, paint, power-saws and telephones. My deadline for all of them is April 15, and I think they’re going to make it. The carpenter is a great guy—he is about 4 feet tall, but works with a speed and efficiency which is a joy to behold (especially if you’re paying him by the hour). I’m having a hell of a lot of fun over this house. Max Doughty, the plumber, also bowled in to measure for downstairs John—he has done the plumbing for me for years at the shack, and is a really nice guy, darts around like a rather portly leprechaun with a pipe, making witty converse. I’d told him the place used to be a Funeral Home, so naturally he allowed as how I’d have to start writing ghost stories now.

  She took great pleasure in her new home, especially with the various trips in search of antique pine furniture and in the arrival of a wide assortment of different-sized parcels filled with goods ordered from the Eaton’s and Sears catalogues.

  Immediately after Margaret moved to Regent Street, Evelyn Robinson, her next-door neighbour, called on her: “She was the first Lakefield person to visit me. The day I moved into my house, in May, 1974, she came to my door, bearing freshly baked cinnamon buns, and welcoming me to the village. Words really cannot express what this meant to me. I knew all at once that I was truly home.” She took great pleasure in the quiet beauty of Lakefield. In particular, she loved the short walk to the post office to collect her mail (there is no postal delivery in Lakefield) and the easy stroll to the shops on the main street. Many residents remembered her ambling shuffle; some—taken aback by the fact she looked like a peasant woman—were startled to discover she was the famous writer.

  The Margaret Laurence remembered by most Canadians was a portly woman with a slightly severe look. The severity gave way to benignity as soon as the observer’s own eyes focused on her beautiful eyes, which radiated gentleness and compassion. Her lack of attention to some aspects of her appearance was a necessary by-product of getting older and not being able to do too much about it. Two other factors have to be considered, however. After the break-up of her marriage, she did not entertain any real hope of finding a permanent male companion. To a limited extent, she gave up on her sexuality and, as a result, did not care very much about her weight, once a source of considerable preoccupation. Second, as she got older, Margaret had the opportunity to say to hell with the conventions of what is or is not an attractive woman. In her writing life, she had put herself on the line in a series of ambitious books. What did she care what other people thought of her appearance?

  The self-contained apartment was an added bonus, not because it generated income. The presence of a student or other tenant in that part of the house meant Margaret never felt completely isolated. She enjoyed the company of the young people who rented from her, often inviting them to use her washing machine and dryer. In turn, the tenants sometimes provided her with transportation by car, an important consideration in the life of a non-driver.

  Although she gloated over the fact her new home had been a funeral parlour, she did not mention another obvious fact: 8 Regent Street and John Simpson’s house bear an incredibly strong resemblance to each other, especially the interiors, almost as if Margaret could allow herself to return to Neepawa in place as well as in spirit once she had completed the Manawaka cycle. Had she in fact purged the ghosts of the past? Or was she still haunted by them? Could she only return to a small town in Canada once she had dealt some sort of coup de grâce to Neepawa and its inhabitants?

  She certainly loved her new home:

  In all the years I visited Margaret in her Lakefield house [Don Bailey remembered] I think I sat in the living room three or four times. She was a kitchen person, preferring to reign in a kingdom that made her feel secure. It was a
large room with an old [sideboard] near the window where she placed plants to catch the light.… The press-back chairs we sat in were from another time. The original wood flooring had been restored. Even the wallpaper was reminiscent of another era. So although it was a well-lit room with modern appliances, there was a sense of sitting in a farm kitchen from a long ago, safer, past.

  The living room and dining room/kitchen were connected through a large archway, giving the first floor of the house the feel of one large room. Margaret often sat just inside the living room, where the telephone—no longer a vile instrument—was placed. The hallway to the house was spacious, the staircase there leading to one large and two small bedrooms and a large study on the second floor. In many ways, the move to Lakefield was a return home, to a version of Neepawa that was safe.

  Margaret Laurence in her telephone alcove, Lakefield. (illustration credit 17.3)

  In the autumn of 1973, Margaret’s energies were drawn to a series of new projects. One of these was a spin-off of The Diviners. She browbeat a very reluctant Jack McClelland into releasing a small 33-rpm record with the book: this recording—not really intended for sale to the public—was sent to all bookstores retailing the book and contained a recording of her songs. She also tried to induce him to publish Adele Wiseman’s novel Crackpot, which had already been rejected by other houses. She began by explaining that Adele was the type of writer who was “very sensitive about editorial criticism and has never really had a first-rate editor whom she trusted.… I think she’d like to submit the novel to you, but is a bit shy owing to your not having published THE SACRIFICE. I told her (at no extra charge, Boss) that you might be a nut in some ways but you most definitely were not of an ungenerous spirit and would certainly not hold a grudge against her on account of her first novel. However, I think she’d rather you wrote to her about it, if you feel so inclined.” Having attempted to arouse his interest, a somewhat embarrassed Margaret made it quite clear that Adele, unlike herself, would not tolerate major editorial intervention in the event he was inclined to publish: “The thing is this—as I understand the situation, she would not be willing to do major structural changes.”