At Work Upstairs

I’m not a historian by training so when I read histories I find myself swinging wildly between grasping the overall flow of events and hunting out tiny details.  This makes reading books like Michael Petrou’s Renegades: Canadians in the Spanish Civil War especially pleasurable.

On the one hand reading Petrou’s meticulously documented account reveals the vistas of my ignorance—take Morocco, for example. I had no idea that Franco’s coup began in Morocco and that many of the Nationalist troops were from North Africa.  I was also surprised, but probably shouldn’t have been, to learn that much of the Spanish Civil War was trench warfare. Being sent into an International Brigades disciplinary unit (euphemistically referred to an engineering, fortification, or labour battalion) meant night work repairing often too shallow trenches and a very high casualty rate. Hard to tell if disappearing into one of the Republicans’ secret, extra-legal prisons—Prevention Houses—was a worse fate. Hugh Garner ended up in a labour batallion for attempted desertion but accusations of Trotskyism could also have near fatal results.

Detail from photo taken near Teruel, probably in January or February 1938

On the other end of the scale, there are tiny details derive ultimately from Petrou’s work with Comintern records and in other archives.

Petrou’s research turned up this photo from the Imperial War Museum—an ambulance named after Tom Ewen (also known as Tom McEwen), father of Jean and of two sons who fought in Spain.

It also turns out that Stewart “Paddy” O’Neil—one of the leaders of the On-to-Ottawa Trek—was born Stewart Homer. (He died on July 6, 1937 during the Brunette offensive.)

Like O’Neil many of the Canadians fighting in the International Brigades had spent the early 30s as itinerant workers and logged time in Bennett’s work camps. Having lived rough for many years, the Canadians were unlikely to leave their bedrolls or shovels behind because they were too heavy. They left that particular mistake to those they dismissed as “New York ice cream boys”. Not surprisingly the American and Comintern officers of the International Brigades thought the Canadians had an attitude problem.

Over the last three years or so I’ve become interested in the people whose lives were shaped by the Communist Party of Canada (CPC). (Three shelves of books dealing with Edwardian Antarctic endeavours testify to my attraction to somewhat obscure bits of history).

Doug Smith’s Zuken: Citizen and Socialist lacks of notes and bibliography but it filled in a few gaps in my understanding of Winnipeg history and the lives of a few people involved in the mid-20th century CPC.

Joe Zuken, a lawyer and CPC member, was a long-time Winnipeg school board and city council member. What’s stuck with me the most is Zuken’s work in defending the people arrested in 1940 under the Defence of Canada Act Regulations. Passed in September 1939  (and subsequently revised to limit some of its draconian measures), the Act permitted the arrest and indefinite detention of people perceived to be a threat to national security.  The state swung the net wide and caught up members of political, religious, and ethnic groups. Many of those detained did not go through any formal court process (most notably Japanese Canadians).

Those that did go through the court system found the process lacking in a few niceties. Those passing through R.B. Graham’s court in Winnipeg discovered that the judge had a habit of sentencing people in public court to jail time and then when the paperwork was being drawn up adding an additional qualification of hard labour. Tom McEwen was one of those sentenced in November 1940 to this combination of jail time and hard labour.

Joe Zuken in 1940

Graham’s hard labour additions led to legal challenges, not the least of which was that the Defence of Canada Act didn’t have provisions for hard labour.  Graham’s sentencing practices were curtailed but Joe Zuken, acting as McEwen’s lawyer, did some diligent legwork and discovered that Graham and jail officials had tried to tidy up after themselves by crossing out the phrase “hard labour” in one or more copies of the warrants that sent McEwen to jail. Worse the warrants would sometimes be re-typed to remove the offensive, extra-legal sentence of hard labour.

Zuken’s persistence led to the September 1941 filing of a writ of habeas corpus for McEwen.  After a period of judical review, McEwen was released in October 1941. He was free the length of time it took to walk out the door of the Headingley Jail.

The RCMP immediately detained him and interned him first in Petawawa and then in the Hull Jail before the shifts the war led to a release of most of the Canadians interned for being Communists.

I’m trying to wean myself off of murder mysteries. For years they’ve been at the heart of the bulk reading I use to cope with stress.

Photo: xxrobot

I started reading mysteries in graduate school. Mysteries stood outside the prescribed reading routine and were something I could enjoy without having to be too serious or analytical about the texts. Other popular genres didn’t appeal.

I’d had my fill of popular novels dominated by romance plots in my adolescence when I read my mother’s copies of Helen MacInnes, Jean Plaidy, Mary Renault, and others. Science fiction didn’t attract me strongly since the technology-dominated and hyper-masculine stories were off-putting.

I was too stubbornly interested in rationality and realistic plots to be able to suspend disbelief and enjoy fantasy novels.  Mystery novels, though, suited me: mostly realistic, plot-driven, puzzle-based, and, if I chose carefully, strong female characters.

My pattern in television watching was much the same, with a larger dose of science fiction and fantasy given the company I keep. That started to shift earlier this year as we were getting ready to put the television away for several months. Often I’d catch myself noticing that I was only watching a murder mystery because I was bored.

A common enough experience but one day I stopped long enough in the noticing to ask myself what exactly was entertaining about watching fictions founded on watching someone’s pain. To relieve boredom I was treating cruelty and death and assault as a form of entertainment.

The television’s been packed away for many months now. Occasionally in a fit of frustration or boredom I’ll watch a crime show online but I’ve more or less eliminated the genre from my view.  Reading material is a different matter and I’m making much slower progress there.

Last year’s reading total was made up of 18% mysteries. This year I’m looking at 21% so far.  The reason’s not hard to discern: at the library my hand still goes to formulaic mystery novels. The branch I use has a large mystery collection, a good-sized romance collection, and a smaller collection of literary fiction: that’s what suits the majority of its users.

I’m not sure what I’ll shift to for light reading. Romance novels and plots still don’t interest me much. Not interested in adding more fear into my life with horror fiction. I’m more open to fantasy than I once was and I’m slowing reading through Terry Pratchett—slowly because I am going to run out soon. I’m not particularly drawn to vampire/werewolf/zombie fiction. Military or imperialistic fantasies disguised as space opera won’t do it for me. Short stories are, well, too short.

I’m difficult.

And in need of reading suggestions. Basic requirements: light reading that passes the Bechdel test, has a good plot that doesn’t pose marriage as the solution to the characters situations, and doesn’t position conquest, pain, or death as the key entertainment. Bonus points for comedy.