Probably Canada's best known novelist, as well as Canada's less-well-known poet and least-well-known short story writer, Margaret Atwood was born in Ottawa, but had the good fortune to spend much of her youth
with her entomologist father in a log cabin in northern Quebec. There she experienced firsthand the difficulty of survival and the terror of the bush. Her father's specialty was insects, which in his elder daughter's hands would evolve into her own expertise: men who bug women.

Her first collection of poems, The Circle Game, won a Governor General's medal in 1966. The award not only doubled the book's sales (to 103 copies), but gave Atwood enough money to buy a pair of contact lenses. This inspired one of her most famous poems:

You fit into me
like a harpoon
in an eye
a harpoon
an open eye
ow
eh?

Poetry continued to flow from Atwood's old typewriter like bad poems from Irving Layton's: The Animals in That Country in 1968 (it was the men who were usually the animals); The Journals of Susanna Moodie in 1970 (a lot better than the original, if you ask me); Power Politics in 1973 (with the men holding all the power, unfortunately); You Are Happy in 1974 (she would have been happier if it hadn't been for all those damned men); Two-headed Poems in 1978 (and two female heads are better than one ...); True Stories in 1981 (which were true, of course, because a woman told them); and a number of others, all of them fighting against evil and man unkind.

There were short story collections, as well (Dancing Girls and Bluebeard's Castle, which contained few stories that would remind one of Alice Munro, except to make one long for Alice Munro), and even a seminal (if you'll pardon the male image; it might be more correct to say ovumular) book of criticism, Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature. In it Atwood proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Canadians are by nature victims, pathologically attracted to failure. This, of course, is proven not only in this country's writings, but in such Canadawide examples as Montreal's backing of the Expos, Toronto's backing of the Maple Leafs, and all backers of the federal Liberal party west of Manitoba.

But it is with her growing number of novels that Margaret Atwood has gained a name for herself, as well as the one she was born with and refuses to change for any man, even Graeme Gibson: The Edible Woman (which many male critics found inedible); Lady Oracle (which led other male critics to insist "That was no lady; she is my strife"); Surfacing (which yet other male critics claimed was "not deep"); Life Before Man (which was the only time in history when life was worth living, Atwood implies); Bodily Harm (which is all that most women can expect from men); The Handmaid's Tale ("which is only her side of the story," argued some male critics); and Cat's Eye (which was the cat's pajamas to most female critics, who are finally managing to get published, and it's about time, too).

Since Ms. Atwood has become such a major force in Canadian publishing - and, more important, her books are read and even admired in the United States, England, Australia and Europe, so they must be pretty good - I shall attempt to share some of the plots of her most famous novels with you. Of course, I'm only a man, so what the hell could 1 know?

THE PLOT OF SURFACING (1972)

In this story of a young woman's search for her lost father in the Canadian wilderness, the reader wonders why any woman would want to waste her time searching for some lousy man. The unnamed narrator is an artist who takes three friends into the woods to try to find Daddy, who has gone to live alone on a small lake near the Ontario/Quebec border, where even the fish are forced to be bilingual. The four young people are Joe, the boyfriend of our heroine, who is a lousy potter, because that's just the way these men are; Anna, her best friend (but we learn many years later in Cat's Eye just how trustworthy best friends can be); and David, Anna's husband, and therefore not Anna's best friend at all.

This charming Gang of Four spends a week up at the island, maiming fish, picking berries and picking on one another. (You know what these men are like.) The young narrator finds weird and primitive drawings, as weird and primitive as men are, and she eventually must dive off a cliff in order to heal her tortured soul and accept her father's death. Of course, if fathers would only grow up already, their daughters wouldn't all be so tortured. The father's body is eventually dragged up, while the daughter must cleanse herself in the lake to be reborn, which sure sounds like a male-oriented-and-run religion we've read about. But there is still happiness to be found her, if only because the father did not live long enough to suffer through the fiasco of a Canadian movie based on the book, which was so awful that even the Canadian pay-TV movie channels won't play it, and they need all the Canadian content they can get.

FROM LIFE BEFORE MAN (1979)

Chris, the former lover of Elizabeth Schoenhof, the protagonist, kills himself just before the novel begins, which is not surprising, because some men will do anything to avoid their responsibilities to women. Chris had worked in the same natural history museum where Elizabeth and Lesje still work; the latter is about to become Elizabeth's husband Nate's new lover, which only goes to show the importance of safe sex. And if this isn't enough, Nate, Elizabeth's husband, has just finished up a love affair with Martha, a secretary in his law firm, which shouldn't shock any wife who has the misfortune of being married to a lawyer. (And the Canadian Civil Liberties Union questions the importance of mandatory AIDS testing?)

Nate now latches on to Lesje, primarily because only he can pronounce her name, and gets her to leave William, with whom Lesje was living before and an unimportant character, since he's only a man. By the end of the novel, Elizabeth has asked for a divorce from Nate, who shouldn't mind too much because he's got lots of girls, anyway, and Lesje has stopped taking birth control pills, which should come as a nice seven pound, four ounce surprise to the dirty cheater Nate when he finally realizes what she's done. Why women even stay with men, other than to get pregnant, is the key question here, since it is clear that life before man was probably a lot more pleasant when there may have been only self-impregnating women, who didn't have to spend all their time sleeping with the enemy.

FROM THE HANDMAID'S TALE (1986)

It's rough times, as usual, for women. Fanatical Protestant fundamentalists have taken over the United States and established the Republic of Gilead, where, much as in the world of the late 1980s, women have no rights: they can't hold jobs; they are not allowed to have money or property; and they must stay out of sight. Thanks to the pollution of the world - caused by men, natch - there has been a growing sterility, so handmaids are used to bear children for important men - just like today! These uteruses on two legs are given the names of the men who use them: for instance, Ofmordecai, Offarley, Ofpierre - you know.

Our heroine is Offred (since no reader would ever believe a name like Offarley), who must present herself regularly to the commander for sex - one reason this book will never make the Grade Nine Required Reading List in Saskatchewan. Much of the book is taken up with Offred thinking of the good old days, when she had a daughter and when sex was actually fun, even though it was still with men. Things get really sexy when we read how the commander loves to play board and card games with Offred, when all he should really be doing is making nonerotic love to her, just as in most other Canadian novels. Meanwhile, the commander's wife, Serena Joy, is concerned that Offred has not become pregnant, so she fixes her up with the commander's chauffeur, Nick, who actually makes love for fun (!), an idea that had yet to catch on in Canada when the novel was written in the mid-1980s. Offred escapes to Canada, which as the ten million Canadians in Florida at this very moment will be pleased to verify, is no place to escape to, even to get away from the Republic of Gilead. The book ends with a hilarious epilogue in which historians, meeting more than a century after the book takes place, discuss the book in literary terms, ignoring the brutal mistreatment of women during Offred's time. Just like historians and literary critics in the 1990s.

Leonard Cohen (1934-

One of the Montreal Jewish mafia, which pretty well includes most English-speaking writers from that city, Leonard Cohen was born in 1934 and grew up in the affluent Westmount area many years before the boys from the Main sold enough books to move there. Educated at McGill University, he published his first book of poetry, Let Us Compare Mythologies, in 1956. In fact, he wrote most of the poems between the ages of fifteen and twenty, when most other kids his age were still checking for zits.

After a three-week attempt to do graduate studies at Columbia University in New York, Cohen returned in defeat to Montreal. There he read poems in night clubs, wrote unpublishable novels and even worked briefly in the family clothing business. That experience led to one of his most famous poems, "Maria/please find me/I am almost 38 long."

In 1961, Cohen had his first major literary success, The Spice-Box of Earth. Literary success in poetry, of course, means more than 500 copies sold. The collection was not only heavily Jewish in subject matter - already pretty exotic for Canada in the early 1960s - but was filled with lyrics about love, when 90 percent of this country's poetry until that time had been about icebergs moving down from Baffin Island and grizzlies arguing with beavers. The only previous poems about the birds and the bees had described them freezing to death in the bush.

After spending a few years in England, where he spoke the language so well, he published his first novel, The Favorite Game, and eventually moved to the island of Hydra, off Greece, where the weather was more than 750 percent better than on the island of Montreal, in the St. Lawrence. Make that 1,000 percent better. A lot fewer family clothing stores, too.

Not only did Cohen write another successful novel, Beautiful Losers (1966), making the characters "I" and "F" famous across Canada (at least initially), he went on to turn out several more popular collections of poetry, including Flowers for Hitler (1964), Parasites of Heaven (1966), Death of a Lady's Man (1978) and more. Alas, he became a much loved singer/songwriter during this period, as well, recording such best-selling albums as Songs of Leonard Cohen, Songs from a Room, Songs of Love and Hate, New Skin for the Old Ceremony, et al. All his songs showed a striking poetic ability, and were performed in a voice that eerily resembled Bob Dylan's, with laryngitis. Over the years, Cohen regularly visited his native Montreal - "to renew [his] neurotic afflictions," to quote the witty poet - and in the past decade, chose to return permanently to that city, if not to his talents.

Muse, please find him. He'll soon be pushing sixty.

SUZANNE

Suzanne takes you down
To her place by the river
You can see her shop is open,
But she cannot claim "DELIVER"
Since the signs of course are in French
For although Suzanne speaks English
And her clientele is Anglo
She must have her sign en francais
'Cause this is la belle province
And that's how those things are done here. . . .
And you want to go and shop there
And you want to buy some blinds
But you cannot figure out the words -
For they've touched your purse and pocket with their signs.

Jesus was a salesman
And he had a store to sell in
But he knew he'd better speak French
No more English could he yell in
For the government in Quebec
Had made its feelings clear
That all signs must be en francais
Both in front and in the rear . . . .
But you want to shop in English
And you want to read the words
But the PQ and the Liberals
Have said that English rights are for the birds.

FROM BEAUTIFUL LOSERS (1966)

God is ahead. Magic is afoot. God is ahead. Magic is afoot. God is afoot. Magic is ahead. My horse is behind. His horse is ahead. God costs an arm and a leg. Baking soda is arm and hammer. Look at the legs on that chick. God never sickened, but McClelland and Stewart is always in trouble. Many politicians lied. Many potatoes fried. Not enough politicians died. Magic never weakened, but the CBC always did. God never died, but he hasn't been too healthy in this century. God was ruler, but he wasn't afoot, he was a yard. Magic was afoot, which isn't metric, either. Many men bled, but women do it more naturally. Magic always led, but to turn gold to lead is what it's all about. Many stones rolled, but the Rolling Stones go on forever. Many fat men questioned, but the Thin Man knew the answer. Magic was fed, but God wasn't dead. You load sixteen tons and what do you get: another day older and deeper in debt. God rules. Coles rules. Smith rules. Classics once ruled, but now Smith and Coles rule the roost. Roosters crow. A lot of men didn't and a lot of men died. Magic is the end. God is the beginning. Is this the beginning or the end? Is this is the beginning of the end? Is this the promised end? (King Lead, Act V, Scene iii). Magic is no instrument. A flute is no instrument. My voice is an instrument, although it sure as hell sounds out of tune. The police arrested Magic, but Magic would not tarry; he sued for false arrest, won his case, big bucks, and moved to the Eastern Townships. Magic cannot come to harm. Harm, Manitoba, is no longer reached by the CPR, making the railroad out of Harm's way. Weak men lied. Sick men died. They died of athlete's foot, which is afoot yet still near at hand. The mountains danced for they had heard that God was dead. But as long as there are televangelists, God will never die. Magic exists as long as English is spoken in Quebec, which doesn't look too promising; I'd take out insurance if I were Magic. Magic is moving through the world, and the mind is Magic and the flesh is Magic, as Irving Layton has been reminding Canadians for half a century. Magic dances on a clock, but does anybody know what time it is, does anybody really care? And to think that if I had remained in the family clothing business, Magic would never have been alive, God never afoot and the hip bone would still be attached to the knee bone. Let's call the whole thing off.