CLASSIFICATION
Swallow ID:
8348
Partner Institution:
University of Calgary
Source Collection Title:
Earle Birney fonds
Source Collection ID:
Source Collection Contributing Unit:
University of Calgary, Archives and Special Collections
Source Collection URI:
Source Collection Image URL:
ITEM DESCRIPTION
Title:
Earle Birney reading from Selected poems 1940-1966 (Tape 6)
Title Source:
Transcribed from the artifact
Title Note:
Label of recording title and included poems taped to box. Box stamped JH 4W8.
Language:
English
Production Context:
Studio recording
Identifiers:
[7.3.6]
Rights
Rights:
The Public Domain Mark (PDM)
CREATORS
Name:
Birney, Earle
Dates:
1904-1995
CONTRIBUTORS
MATERIAL DESCRIPTION
Recording Type:
Analogue
AV Type:
Audio
Material Designation:
Reel to Reel
Physical Composition:
Magnetic Tape
Extent:
1/4 inch
Playing Speed:
7 1/2 ips
Tape Brand:
CBC Radio - Canada
Sound Quality:
Excellent
Physical Condition:
Good
DIGITAL FILE DESCRIPTION
Duration:
T00:28:29
Size:
469.45 MB
Dates
Date:
1966
Type:
Performance Date
Notes:
Date taken from creation dates listed for item level descriptions in archival finding aid for the Earle Birney fonds Item number 7.3.6
LOCATION
CONTENT
Contents:
Earle Birney
[00:00:00]
Reads "Page of Gaspé" from section "Canada: Case History",
Earle Birney
[00:01:23]
Reads "North Star West".
Earle Birney
[00:11:07]
Reads "From the Hazel Bough".
Earle Birney
[00:12:40]
Reads "The Ebb Begins from Dream".
Earle Birney
[00:16:02]
Reads "Way to the West".
Earle Birney
[00:19:58]
Reads "North of Superior".
Earle Birney
[00:25:04]
Reads "Winter Saturday".
Earle Birney
[00:26:32]
Reads "Decomposition".
Earle Birney
[00:27:08]
Reads "Holiday in the Foothills".
Notes:
Title based on contents of file.
- Continuing section “Canada: Case History”
- “Page of Gaspé”: Begun in Québec in 1943, not worked up into a poem until 1950.
- “North Star West”: Plane trip from Montreal to Vancouver in North Star, one of the three prop planes that inaugurated transcontinental flights in Canada. First section “Montreal-Toronto” - [00:01:23] , “Toronto-Winnipeg” - [00:05:05] , “Winnipeg-Edmonton” - [00:06:39] , “Edmonton-Vancouver” - [00:09:11] .
- “From the Hazel Bough”: Scarcely about Canada but happens to contain a memory and in Birney’s private mind is related to Toronto. Began writing in a military hospital in Toronto 1945, completed in Vancouver 1947. “Another way of putting it, all but the last stanza came to me in a half hour. It took me two years keeping the poem aside to get the last stanza the way I wanted it”
- “The Ebb Begins from Dream”: Toronto, but could perhaps be any city. Begun in Toronto 1945, completed Bowen Island on the West Coast 1947.
- “Way to the West”: Moved as far west and north from Toronto as the mining district of northern Ontario. On TransCanada highway 1965.
- “North of Superior”: Much the same country, further along the celebrated Laurentian Shield. One of his earliest poems in the beginnings but not finished until 1946, notes from 1926. From old-time CPR train coming east to Toronto for the first time. Makes note to English Literature students – listen closely for references to examination classics.
- “Winter Saturday”: Moving to the prairies, August 1947.
- “Decomposition”: Explanation comes after reading. An early piece from 1921, touched up in 1941.
- “Holiday in the Foothills”: Written on the foothills on the western edge of the prairies, jotted down in 1921 and revised in Calgary in 1940.
NOTES
RELATED WORKS
Citation:
Selected Poems, 1940-1966