The Icelandic Canadian - 01.04.2009, Qupperneq 17

Vol. 62 #2
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
59
instead a writer who happened to be a
woman. She makes the claim that art and
literature transcend categories, but also that
one must recognize that artists are indeed
informed by the “specifics of race, class,
and gender” (50). So though the specificity
of the experience of growing up a woman,
of an ethnic minority, in poverty, at the
beginning of the twentieth century
strengthened Salverson’s inherited creative
gifts, she must not be identified by these
alone.
It is a shame that Salverson’s contribu-
tion to Canadian Literature often registers
a dull gaze of ignorance. Her literary voice
has been stifled and her reach among read-
ership shortened. The universal feminist
criticism she received of late has not done
her any favours on the matter. But these
criticisms were wholly based on a one-
dimensional and narrow definition of the
concept of “the woman-writer.” In order
to revaluate Salverson’s Confessions of an
Immigrant’s Daughter we need to become
reflexive on these categories of thought.
We must examine Laura Goodman
Salverson’s humanism and social con-
sciousness that was informed by her expe-
rience as a woman of an ethnic minority,
who lived in poverty. Without, of course,
falling into a pattern of thought that cata-
logues personal identifiers first when deal-
ing with literary criticism.
I am very well aware that this should
not be considered the conclusion on the
process of exhuming Laura Goodman
Salverson’s work. Really, at this point, this
is merely the introduction, there is much
more theoretical work to be done on the
subject. But I have attempted, based on a
feminist perspective, to lay down some
tramlines that would facilitate a new criti-
cism of Salverson’s autobiography, and
hopefully raise her name into the proud
company of writers from Canada, who also
happen to be women.
WORKS CITED
Atwood, Margaret. “On Being a
‘Woman Writer’: Paradoxes and
Dilemmas.” 1976. Second Words. Toronto:
Anansi Press ltd. 1982.
Buss, Helen. Mapping Our Selves:
Canadian Women’s Autobiography in
English. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-
Queen’s University Press. 1993.
hooks, bell. “Writing without Labels”.
Remembered Rapture: The Writer at
Work. New York: Henry Holt and
Company. 1999.
Neijmann, Daisy. “Laura ‘Larusdottir’
Sal vers on: Walking in the ways of the
Father.” Rediscovering Canadian
Difference. Ed. Gudrun Bjork Gudsteins.
Reykjavik. 2001.
Powell, Barbara. “Laura Goodman
Salverson.” Canadian Literature.
133(1992): 78-89.
Salverson, Laura Goodman.
Confessions of an Immigrant’s Daughter.
1939. Intro. K.P. Stich. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press. 1981.
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