"Downtown Canada is a collection of essays that addresses Canada as an urban place. The contributors focus their attention on the writing of Canada's cities - including Vancouver, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, and Halifax - and call attention to the centrality of the city in Canadian literature. They examine how characters are affected by the urban experience in works by authors as diverse as the country itself: Hugh MacLennan, Jovette Marchessault, Michael Ondaatje, Austin Clarke, and Gerald Lynch, to name just a few. Editors Justin D. Edwards and Douglas Ivison have brought together an esteemed group of international Canadian literary scholars.

Together they have created a book that is timely and unique, questioning conventional assumptions about Canadian literature, and Canadian culture more generally."--Jacket.