Book: The Arbutus/Madrone Files:
Reading The Pacific Northwest
Written by Laurie Ricou (Oregon State University Press)
Reviewed by Erick Mertz

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Perhaps it is the lingering presence of a seven-month rainy season that makes the Northwest the sleepy den of readers and writers that it is. While other parts scuttle out from beneath the gray shroud of winter in April or early May to sun, a resident of this water logged corner of the country is privileged with the gift of a few extra weeks - on both ends of summer - of wildly stormy and unpredictable weather.

Just enough time to digest another book or two and pen that chapter.

A careful study of Pacific Northwest writing and cross-border studies lies at the heart of The Arbutus/Madrone Files. Author Laurie Ricou, a Professor of English at the University of British Columbia, uses a lively collection of quotations, poems and visual art to explore the ethos existent between Northern California and Vancouver Island. As the title implies, the book is broken into short "files" - "Salmon" and "Sasquatch" being examples, where Ricou discusses characteristic Northwest phenomenon in the terms of its literary presentation. The "Woodswords" segment carefully examines great timber harvests of the past, drawing largely on logger poetry and Ken Kesey's understated classic Sometimes a Great Notion to frame the industry's impact on local vernacular. Ricou evokes passages from a healthy roster of authors, spanning from luminaries Kesey, Tom Robbins and Ursula Le Guin to the more obscure likes of Peter Trower and David Wagoner for a surprisingly exciting volume of literary criticism. This isn't an elusive piece of scholarly writing - it is a critical exploration and attempt to draw a more natural line than is carved by international border. Ricou eschews the tendency to overly celebrate her more neglected writers; instead she prefers to set them toe to toe with the heavyweights and allows their legacy stand up. In places, there is a wandering quality that loses sight of the author's intent, but these are few and anchorage usually comes within a few pages.

Nary a moss-covered rock goes unturned and by the end of The Arbutus/Madrone Files a reader isn't only wizened to the lay of the land, they are infused with the words that make it magic.

© 2003 - Erick Mertz