Tea Time

Two little maids in scarlet, and very snowy as to caps and aprons, staggered onto the Circular Porch, one bearing a heavy tray. On it was an enormous “Brown Betty”, nests of cuddling cups, plates of thick bread and butter. The other maid was provided with a folding table. Tea was served on the Circular Porch.

‘Semis’ waited for tea before going back to their rooms. Tea was optional. ‘Ups’ relished its reviving warmth on returning from their walks. Everybody scorned the bread and butter. They read cups and gossiped.

“Didn’t ‘Beautiful Cabbage’ gobble up her favourite at dinner-time? Four helpings no less!”

“Kate sneaked her cabbage over onto her mother’s plate while the old girl and Miss Brown were having that deep discussion ‘cabbage versus sprouts’. Was the old lady furious? Whew!”

“Saw, did she?”

“Rather! Shot the cabbage back onto Kate’s plate with a deadly look, eyebrows tipped clean over the top of her head! A Cranleigh funking! In a tone that would have cracked a bass viol she shouted, ‘Play the game, Kate!’ ”

One gossip handed the other gossip a cup of tea. “One lump or two? Bread and butter?”

“One lump, and don’t mention bread, butter or any form of food. Dinner congealed in cold gravy on my dressing table waiting to be eaten this very minute—supper only two hours off. Oh dear!”

“Same here, potatoes and spinach! Oh, my! Isn’t Doctor’s face . . . when there is food on your bureau . . . ?”

“It certainly is.”

A plaid tam bobbed up the path. “Hello! News everybody! New brand of peppermint bull’s-eyes in the metropolis of Stillfield. ‘That ’ot they blisters,’ says Ma Stocking.” The speaker was always gay; her lungs were making satisfactory progress, her face brick-red, weather-beaten.

“How you can stuff yourselves with those vulgarities on top of our meals, I can’t think!” sneered Mrs. Viney.

“They are for Jinny the donkey, not for us. Great fun, feeding peppermints to Jinny. Crunch, crunch. Jinny hee-haws to high heaven and rushes for the stream.”

“Cold water on top of hot peppermint. Wow!”

“Jinny’s a sport. Back she comes with her tongue and tail lashing furiously—asks for more.”

Clang, clang, clang, the Rest Hour bell!

Cat

“Come on, let’s attack our bureau dainties before Doctor brings her face in.” The little mob pressing through glass doors, clatter, clatter, down bare corridors, opening doors, shutting doors, silence. Every soul seriously sucking a thermometer and staring at the ceiling. Doctor’s heavy tread, her small voice, “How are you? and you? and you?”

Gay answering chirrups, “Fine—fine, Doctor—just fine.” The orthodox sanatorium lie!

Klee Wyck

Emily Carr wrote these twenty-one sketches after visiting and living with Native people, painting their totem poles and villages, many of them in wild and remote areas. She tells her stories with beauty, pathos and a vivid awareness of the comedy of people and situations.

The Book of Small

Emily Carr wrote these thirty-six sketches that relate anecdotes about her life as a young girl in the frontier town of Victoria. She notes: “There were a great many things that I only half understood, such as saloons and the Royal Family and the Chain Gang.”

The House of All Sorts

Emilly Carr wrote these forty-one stories of those hard-working days as landlord and the parade of tenants — young couples, widows, sad bachelors and rent evaders. In an additional twenty-five stories, she describes the mutual bonds of affection between her and her dogs.

Growing Pains

Completed just before Emily Carr died in 1945, Growing Pains tells the story of her life, beginning with her girlhood in pioneer Victoria and going on to her training as an artist in San Francisco, England and France. She writes about the frustration she felt at the rejection of her art by Canadians, of the years of despair when she stopped painting and of the unexpected vindication and triumph she felt when the Group of Seven accepted her as one of them.

Heart of a Peacock

A collection of 51 short stories by the legendary writer and painter Emily Carr, arranged in themes such as her experiences with Native people, her adventures with various beloved creatures and her love of nature. Together, they underline Carr’s place as a writer with the sharp yet tender eye of an artist, with a deep feeling for the tragedies of life and with a rich sense of the comic.

Pause

While studying art in London, Emily Carr seriously undermined her health and was sent to a sanatorium for a complete rest cure. Bridling at the hospital’s rules, which prohibited excitement of any kind, the always rebellious Carr proceeded to make friends, raise birds, and cause trouble. In words and enchanting sketches, in Pause: A Sketchbook, Carr presents a funny, poignant account of her 18-month convalescence,

Hundreds and Thousands

Hundreds and Thousands consists of her journals from 1927 to 1941. She began keeping a journal in 1927, when, after years of her work being derided and ignored, came unexpected vindication and triumph when the Group of Seven accepted her as one of them and encouraged her to overcome the years of despair when she stopped painting.

Opposite Contraries

Collected from Emily Carr’s private and public writings and edited by Susan Crean, these previously unpublished pieces reveal the outspoken artist at her most forthright. Expurgated sections from Carr’s journals detail her anguished meditations on her spiritual mission, musings about Native culture and the white community’s reaction to it, and thoughts about her family. Her groundbreaking 1913 "Lecture on Totems”, her first recorded writing on Native art and people, is also included, as are some of her most fascinating letters to friends and colleagues.

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