A Memoir and Poems
Author: James Clarke
Publisher: EXILE Editions, 259 pages
ISBN 978-1-55096-260-4
Before James Clarke arrived in Cobourg to become a poetry-recitingTown Councillor, he began his life in Peterborough
where his wartime experience of childhood becomes the subject of this rich and
compelling memoir.
Our culture is chock-a-block with books about dysfunctional
families written by victims, railing on about their celebrated parents
dereliction of parental duty. This unrelenting glut of grief fuels tv ‘reality’
shows and book sales via the Ms O.
James Clarke’s memoir avoids all of the pitfalls of such a
book. There is no trace of maudlin sentimentality, nor embedded bitterness in
this book. There is no milking for sympathy. There is no wisdom being
proselytized. It is neither cold nor clinical, but warmly human.
Canadian poet, (and Cobourg resident) Ross Stuart, in his
recent book of stories, Buying Cigarettes For the Dog, wrote, ““you never know where life’s journey is going to take
you, like you never know how the years are going to shove you around.”
James Clarke narrates his
childhood turbulence from parental alcoholism. He describes incidents that
shoved him this way and that with clarity and compassion. All too often, life’s
most memorable lessons derive from arbitrary injustices.
Mr Clarke went on to practice law
in Cobourg and became the first Town Councillor to make a motion in rhyme. He
was letting his inner poet out bit by bit. Even more impressive, is that Mr Clarke is now
a retired Judge of the Superior Court of Ontario.
Mr Clarke’s childhood experiences
informed him rather than deformed him. This, in turn, provided for the honest
clarity of his book, as well, I am sure, for his judicial decisions when another
life that had been shoved around by the years and ended up in the prisoner’s
box bound by testimony.
It is the realm of tragedy.
After a lifetime of service to
truth and justice, James Clarke looks back over the horizon to his childhood
and to his father, and how the years dealt with him. The Hon R Roy McMurtry,
former Ontario Chief Justice, Attorney-General and High Commissioner to Great Britain, wrote the Introduction for this enlightened book. Mr
McMurtry highlighted the power of Mr Clarke’s prose-poetry by citing:
“Dad and I had lost each other in
the shadow of each other’s silences. Dad, another child in the house, never did
learn the language of touch. He spurned embraces and other displays of
affection. It was as if after his experiences of war he had built a box and,
gathering all his hurts and silences, had curled up inside it like a shivering
dog, leaving us to pear in through the slats to glimpse his face in blades of
light, to listen to the slow shrivelling of his heart.”
Mr Clarke took a different route.
He emerged from the cocoon of his childhood and took flight into law and
poetry. His memoir ends as he leaves Peterborough to go to university. Fortunately, the book does not end.
The book ends with a flourish of
selected poetry that addresses his relationship with language as a judge and
then as a poet. Mr Clarke is adroit with language, and he dazzles with
simplicity.
READ THIS BOOK!
PS: James Clarke is reading at The
Meet, 66 King St E, 7pm, Thursday,
Sept 20
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment