The Trade

Let's be honest: I'm no expert on 19th Century Canada, or 19th Century Canadian Native Indian - Fur Trader relations. What I do feel I'm a pretty good armchair quarterback about is writing, and Fred Stenson (who's been honing his craft since the 70s, by the way; he's also written for film ususally Candadian documentaries) has a contemplative writing style that suits me - and I think these characters and this subject matter - just fine. But if you're reading this for purely entertainment's sake, you'll probably want something else. If you want a writer who further up the literary scale, Stenson may very well be your thing. The best way to describe his style is actually contained on the back flap of this one: "lyrical." That one word does the whole book justice. Stenson's style impresses, not so much the plot. The book's premise is that the history we receive is false. Literature becomes a way of recapturing the truth. When the book begins with a fur trader's sarcastic remark to a newspaperman's account of the Canadian fur trade's success being attributed to the Governor who lived at the time, you know that this is a novel of recovering what has been lost. If that kind of philospophically-themed novel seems your bent, I don't think Stenson will disappoint you. He also creates some wonderful characters (based more or less on historical personages), here, especially, my favorite, One Pound One. If you're looking for something better than what you'll find on the grocery store shelf, give this a chance.

This book chronicles the lives of three people involved in the Canadian fur trade in the early 1800's. If you are an action fan this book is probably not for you. Rather it gives the reader a look into everyday life in the wildnerness, as well as interactions between fur traders and Indians and outsiders (Americans). Jim Rowand, Chief Trader, Ted Harriott, who works his way up from lowly clerk to being in charge of an outpost, and Jimmy Jock Bird, Half Breed, who has his own agenda regarding the fur trade. The book is well written and, for historical fiction fans, provides a wealth of information, especially concerning the illnesses that plagued people in the early 19th century.

Fred Stenson's "The Trade" is as hypnotic as the war drums of the native American tribes that pound in the background through scene after scene. The novel covers the years 1822-1848 as the Hudson Bay Company of Canada sends out contingents of men to trade beaver skins with the indigenous people of the wilderness. The members of the Hudson Bay Company are as various as the good-hearted, principled Ted Harriott and the bitter, arrogant John Rowand. Rowand's villainous charcter is a substantial threat to his underlings, for he expects not simple loyalty, but also hero-worship. Rowand lost a leg, and his nickname, One Pound One, sets forth the interior man as well as the exterior. Weather in every season, the intrigues of the translators, and the sheer hardship of moving from place to place could drive a man to insanity or to drink. The good and the less good find wives among the Indians, and as time goes on, it is Canada, not England, that is their home. The chapters look at expeditions, the coming of the new governor (an effete and impudent snob), the missonary, and eventually the demise of the once-young administrators. Always in the background, the Indians, their ways and their drums, threaten, for the Company men have been sent to work business transactions with a culture with different customs, where ingenuity and double-dealing are expected. This is not a comic book. It is a realistic history of a time when cultures clashed. The smallpox destroyed entired tribes. American fur traders came to destroy the Hudson Bay Company. In the end, the original workers, the likes of Harriot and One Pound One, reminisce about the good old days when a man could be counted on to walk barefoot through the snow uphill both ways. The audience for this book would be historians, anthropologists, and western lovers. Readers willing to go for a long, cold ride, this book will enthrall you.

This is the story of the Canadian fur trade between the years 1822 and 1848. The Hudson Bay Company has merged with it's rival, The North West Company, and since the best fur trapping in eastern Canada has mostly tapped out, they are forced to look to the West, a largely unmapped region of Canada, mostly in present day Saskatchewan. The Company sends out contingents of fur traders to the indigenous tribes of the area. The story itself is told through the eyes of several people including John Rowand, a bitter Company man who was not chosen to lead an expedition, Ted Harriot, a clerk in the company, and Jimmy Jock Bird, who has made his life as a sort of middleman between the traders and the tribes. The characters, particularly Harriot, has to live through some severe hardships, some dealing with the nature of the Company business such as long treks through bitter snow and ice but also in his personal life. But the real story here is about the evolutionary changes upon the land and among the various interacting societies. The book is told in just a few long chapters, each dealing with a different theme. For example, one chapter, called "The Missionary" deals with the issue of a Methodist missionary coming to teach the native population about his religion. He is successful to some extent but not in the way he hopes. I found the novel to be educational from many perspectives; afterall when I think fur trade and mountain men, I think western America. The writing was well done and very much in the "literary" mold. The characters were OK but to me they were a bit flat. I understand they are true historical characters so perhaps the author wasn't as free to manuever them the way he might have liked. The result, though, was a definite feeling of realness, and not some contrived plot built for pure entertainment.

Having recently read Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, I was interested in finding another, perhaps more compelling, book about the history of West. I would recommend Stenson's book, though with some reservations. I will start with some positive things: the book is quite evocative of the era and the conditions of the Canadian Northwest during the mid-18th century. One garners a real sense of place from his depictions of how fur traders lived and how they interacted with the natives. This versimilitude comes at a price however. Since Stenson draws his stories around actual individuals, he is quite hamstrung in how he approaches their conceptions of the world around them. I felt quite drawn into the world of these characters, but many of their actions ultimately seemed mysterious to me -- as if Stenson found himself unable to reconcile his characters with what their real life counterparts actually did. Many loose ends stay loose, and in his decision to follow his characters throughout their whole lives, the stories become episodic and discontinuous. These frustrations marred, at least for me, an often compelling and exciting narrative. The book is especially strong in its earlier passages, but is worth sticking with until the end. That's more than I can say about McCarthy's book.