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The AIH Transcript for March 21, 2017

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

CO: Hello, I'm Carol Off.

JD: Good evening, I'm Jeff Douglas. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

JD: Tonight:

CO: The divisive uniter. The late Martin McGuinness was an IRA commander first, and later a key figure in negotiating peace in Northern Ireland. Tonight, one guest says goodbye to a great man -- and the other says good riddance to a scoundrel.

JD: Keep calm and do not carry those things on. The U.S. and the U.K. both announce a ban on laptops and other electronic devices on flights from certain airports in the Middle East and Africa.

CO: Remedial history. The Anglican Church is the latest group to criticize a Canadian senator for her sunny view of residential schools -- and it should know: it ran a lot of them.

JD: Kennel vision. On World Poetry Day, we have an encore presentation of Carol's memorable interview with award-winning Newfoundland writer Michael Crummey -- and his latest poetry collection "Little Dogs."

CO: A world of difference. Boston public schools reject the outdated, distorted Mercator projection world map in favour of a less familiar, more accurate view of Earth -- and now, everything's going according to planet.

JD: And...getting jiggly with it. New research on mice suggests that being subjected to "whole-body vibration" may be as effective as actual exercise -- meaning you can have your body like you have your martini: shaken, not stirred.
As It Happens, the Tuesday edition. Radio that wants to have its quake and keep eating too.

[Music: Theme]

Part 1: McGuinness obit: Sinn Fein, New world map

McGuinness obituary: Sinn Fein

Guest: Martina Anderson, Norman Tebbit

JEFF DOUGLAS: For Martina Anderson the Irish Republican leader Martin McGuinness was like family. So when she heard the news of Mr. Magnus's death earlier today, the Shin Fein member and European parliamentarian flew back home to Northern Ireland from Brussels as soon as she could. We reached Martina Anderson in her hometown of Derry which was also Martin McGuinness’ hometown.

CAROL OFF: Ms. Anderson, first of all I'm sorry for the loss of your friend Martin McGuinness.

MARTINA ANDERSON: Yes our hearts are sore. Martin is going to be sorely missed by all of us who knew him. And I'm honored to be able to say that Martin was my friend and my comrade. I was his junior minister. Martin has inspired me all of my adult life. He is full of jumility and his determination and Republican dedication. If you could have bought it and sold it, we would have had a united Ireland long ago.

CO: Tell us a bit, because you've known him for many years. And what's the most interesting perhaps controversial about Martin McGuinness is his transformation from his role with the IRA with his role in the peace process and the Good Friday agreement. Can you tell us about the man?

MA: Well Martin was a product of the circumstances in which he was born into. Like myself, he was born to Derry and to a gerrymandered state. The nationalist republican constituency make up almost 80 percent of the population here yet we were ruled by a minority 20 percent of unionists. It was a Protestant parliament for a Protestant people and you know, Martin or his generation didn't start the war. The war came to him through discrimination a denial of civil rights and the lack of human rights, poverty and inequality.
And he had a choice. He could confront the state the state. The state was not for turning, and Martin McGuinness was not for turning away, nor people of my generation. And we fought back. And Martin McGuinness took Republicans to a place where some Republicans didn't want to go join the peace process. But it was a place where we ought to be. Because war is a terrible thing and he worked tirelessly for peace and for reconciliation and for Irish reunification.
Martin loved his wife Bernie. On many nights, Martin and I would have been traveling across Ireland or further afield and I would have been very late or the early hours of the morning and you know it would have been easier to stop off somewhere because he would have had to start at 5 or 6 the next morning. And Martin always insisted that he returned home to his wife Bernie, two his sons fake Fiachra and Emmet, and his two daughters Fionnuala and Grainne, and they have a number of grandchildren and all of them are absolutely heartbroken. Our hearts are sore. I have cried a river from the early hours of this morning.

CO: You describe the role he played and the evolution he had, and today we're hearing from all, from most quarters that he was central to the peace process, that without him there wouldn't have been the disarmament program. There wouldn't have been any of the concessions made and that whatever peace was achieved through the Belfast Agreement was hugely because of him and his role. His relationship with Ian Paisley.
But at the same time he does have this past news. You support him. But he did believe in, at one point in that 1980s, that an armed struggle taking up arms, being part of the IRA, was the course of action, was the only way to achieve his objectives and the objectives of the Republicans. Did you agree with him?

MA: Absolutely. Without doubt. You know, the people of Ireland have been impoverished because of the partition of Ireland. The partition of Ireland has been a disaster. And on top of that, the British government put in a system of governance here which embedded intimidation, discrimination, and oppression, and Martin McGuinness and his generation and my generation responded to that. But I repeat: we did not start the war. The war came to us. And we as Republicans are very very proud. Martin McGuinness is the Irish Nelson Mandela. He was a freedom fighter. He was a soldier. He was a leader. And he has spent all his latter years drive in peace and reconciliation.

CO: But people were killed. Innocent people died. He was a senior commander with the Provisional IRA. He has blood on his hands, or had blood on his hands. He was part of those operations where more people died. Did he ever regret that?

MA: If you want to talk about innocent people dying, Martin McGuinness was walking on an internment protest against internment in our city, and 14 innocent people were murdered on Bloody Sunday. I could quote to you endlessly that people who have been killed in the north of Ireland and by the state. Over 25,000 Republican prisoners went to jail for our role in the conflict. And yet in terms of the RUC, the police services as it was in that time, the state, its involvement in the killing and collusion, and all that it did at that time and killing Irish citizens. It has never found itself in the dock. So what Martin McGuinness did in driving this peace process forward, that's the mark McGuinness that will be remembered by all who loved him and cared for him and his family. And no amount of trying to compare Mark McGuinness to what the British state murdered and colluded involved in Irish citizens killings, denial of human rights. All of that was what led to the war and why Martin McGuinness stood up, and we love him deeply and appreciate all that he did for us.

CO: Ms. Anderson, I appreciate you coming on the program. Thank you.

MA: Thank you very much. Take care.

CO: Good night.

JD: Martina Anderson is a member of the Irish Nationalist Party Shin Fein. She is also a member of European Parliament. We reached Ms. Anderson in Derry, Northern Ireland.
Martin McGuinness, as you heard, is being remembered by many as a man who transformed himself, leaving behind the violence that plagued the fight for Northern Ireland's independence for 30 years. But there are still a lot of people who cannot or refuse to forget Mr. McGuinness’ violent past. Lord Norman Tebbit survived the IRA's 1984 bombing of the Grand Hotel in Brighton, England. His wife remains paralyzed from that attack. We reached Lord Tebbit in East Anglia, UK.

CO: Lord Tebbit, what was your reaction when you heard that Martin McGuinness had died?

NORMAN TEBBIT: I thought the world was a nicer and cleaner place.

CO: How so?

NT: McGuinness was a terrorist. When he realised that the IRA was in fact defeated because it had been penetrated by the British intelligence services. And for him, the war was about to be over. He would have been arrested within a very short time. He suddenly decided that he was a man of peace, and a coward that he was, he then went public, said that he wanted peace and found a dupe in Tony Blair, the prime minister, who bought that story, and Martin McGuinness escaped jail for his crimes. So did all his IRA colleagues. But of course they still kept prosecuting the British army and police.

CO: So people understand the history with the IRA, which is that your wife was badly injured in the IRA bombing in Brighton of the of the Grand Hotel, and that was an attempt on Margaret Thatcher's life and five other people were killed along with injuries.
What we do is Martin McGuinness believed to have played in that bombing?

NT: Well he was the leader of the IRA. That bombing would not have happened had he not authorized it and instructed people to do it. He was responsible for it. He exalted the fact that I had nearly killed Prime Minister.

CO: How did that bombing, how did it change your life and the life of your family?

NT: Well my wife was crippled and I decided that my principal task was to look after her and so I left from frontline politics. I resigned from the government in 1987. That was that. But of course McGuinness and his friends had murdered five of my close friends anyway. So I was not unaccustomed to feeling the loss.

CO: I'm sure you know that what we're hearing today from many quarters is that Martin McGuinness may have blood on his hands in his past life with the IRA, but that he was a key person he was central to the peace agreement and the disarmament of paramilitary groups like the IRA. That without him it couldn't have happened. And we're hearing that from all quarters. What do you say to them?

NT: Yes he was key to the peace process, because he realized that if there was not of the ceasefire, that he would have been arrested and tried for his crimes. He was not a believer in peace. He was a runner-away. He was a coward.

CO: But they were successful, were they not? They were able to achieve a peace agreement and the good Friday agreement which ended the troubles.

NT: The end of the troubles? Aren’t there people being killed there now?

CO: But is that Martin McGuinness’ fault? Does he not do what he set out to do?

NT: There are still people being killed there. British soldiers and British policemen are still being put on trial for doing their duty and seeking to prevent civilians from being murdered.

CO: And Martin McGuinness has condemned that, or he did condemn that before he died.

NT: [Sound: laughter] Yes I'm sure he did. But Mr. McGuinness has never apologized for what he did. He has never said a word of regret for the murders that he committed.

CO: Is there anything that Martin McGuinness could have said, or any gesture he could have made before he died, that would have made a difference for you. That would have persuaded you to forgive him?

NT: He could have confessed to the murders that he committed. He could have told people where the bodies of their relatives had been hidden. He could have confessed his sins and prayed for forgiveness.

CO: We have heard in the course of today from many people, other people who lost loved ones because of the IRA, who believe that Martin McGuinness was responsible, but they have forgiven him because they see that he, they believe that he attempted to bring peace to Northern Ireland. I’m thinking of people like Joe Barry, whose father died as well at The Grand Hotel bombing. I'm sure you knew him. Why do you think that those people were able to forgive?

NT: Because they do not understand. And unless we know the truth and face the truth about events in our history, we are doomed to make the same sort of mistakes again.

CO: Do you think that the British government should have rejected Martin McGuinness’ overture of peace?

NT: No I think they should have finished the job. The overture of peace came because his IRA had been defeated. He and his fellow IRA men, his fellow terrorists, got away with it.

CO: You said that they should have finished the job. What would have been finishing the job?

NT: Finishing the job would have meant destroying the IRA. It would have meant not negotiating with McGuinness as a terrorist leader, but arresting him and trying him for his crimes.

CO: Lord Tebbit, I appreciate speaking with you tonight. Thank you.

NT: Not at all. Thank you. Bye bye.

JD: Lord Norman Tebbit is a conservative peer. We reached him in East Anglia, UK.
In 2007, As It Happens spoke with Martin McGuiness after a historic vote by Sinn Fein to formally support the police service of Northern Ireland. From our archives, here is part of what the Irish republican leader had to say about that decision.

SOUNDCLIP

MARTIN MCGUINNESS: This has been a major issue for us going right back to the Good Friday negotiations of 1998. And obviously, our community, the Irish Nationalist Republican tradition, have always been at odds with the forces of the state because the forces of a state where effectively involved in political policing and were seen as effectively the military wing of unionism and the British government in Ireland. And we set out to end all of that in the Good Friday negotiations. And we now believe as a result of the major negotiations we've been involved in that we’ve reached our threshold and we can end forever political policing in the north of Ireland. That we can develop a civic policing service with an emphasis on communities as opposed to one section of the community.
We can bring about a situation where there is a kind of body, and of course the increase in political strength of Sinn Fein are increasing electoral strength, are increasing authority. That puts huge pressure on people with on policing, and people within the British military establishment because I think that we can continue to apply great pressure to rip out the human rights abusers and the colluders that have been there. There's still one or two around and I think what we have to do is ensure that we rip those people out.
Gerry Adams and I will be going to Downing Street on Thursday of this week to meet with the British prime minister, specifically on this issue. And we intend to continue to press to ensure that none of these people remain within the system.

JD: From 2007, that was Carol in conversation with Irish Republican leader Martin McGuinness. The IRA member turned peace proponent and negotiator died today. He was 66 years old.

[Music]

New world map

Guest: Natacha Scott

JD: Public schools in Boston have decided to look at the world.
Specifically, they will look at the world from the perspective of Arno Peters. He was a German historian, and he published a map of the world in 1974. His map is geographically more accurate than the map that Boston public school students, and people around the world, have been using for almost five hundred years.
Beginning this month, students in Boston public schools will start using the Peters map, and phasing out the old one.
Natacha Scott is the director of history and social studies at Boston Public Schools. We reached her in Boston.

CO: Ms. Scott, why have you introduced this new map?

NATACHA SCOTT: So we really looked forward to bringing the Peters projection map to the Boston Public Schools in collaboration with the Office of Opportunity and Achievement Gap. And we were looking at ways to introduce, to explore bias in the curriculum and how we can alleviate that in the classroom, ensuring that we're giving the opportunity for students to look at the world from different perspectives and not just the same traditional narrative.

CO: OK. Maybe it would make better sense if we knew what the Peters map looks like. How does it show the world?

NS: Sure. The Peters map is an equal area map, so it represents the world in comparison to other continents and other land masses to scale with equal area. So that way when you're looking at it, it's not distorted in terms… there are distortions but it's not distorted in terms of the quantity of land that each of the different countries and continents have.

CO: How does that compare with the old map? It's called the Mercator map.

NS: Sure, the Mercator map… the Mercator map was originally used for navigational purposes. So when you look at the map from Mercator, the equator is much lower set on the on the map itself. So what it causes is the poles to really stretch out and elongate. So then you have places like Greenland appearing to be the same size as the continent of Africa. But in reality it's 14 times smaller than Africa. Similarly on the southern hemisphere, you have South America appearing to be just about the same size as Europe but it's really twice as large.
So when you think about those different perspectives, students or have that misconception of what size is in relation to the world and between continents and countries.

CO: And then Mercator map, there's even countries like Germany that are in the wrong place.

NS: Exactly. So, due to a different placement of the different lines of latitude and longitude, different countries are slightly skewed they're kind of shifted over compared to a map that uses the prime meridians in a different spot.

CO: How do we come to be using the Mercator map over all these decades and centuries? Because this goes back to the 16th century, doesn't it?

NS: It does. So the Mercator map was created in the 1500s, and it was originally used for navigational purposes. So thinking about how different people in Europe could travel around the world. So by doing that they came up with the Mercator map and as a result, the Mercator map just kind of stuck with society. So that's the most common that that you're going to see in classrooms. It's what you're going to find most common.

CO: And when you say that the reason why you're getting rid of it, or changing this over to the Peter's map is because, well it's a distortion, but you're also doing it to change perceptions. What perception of the world does the Mercator map create or has it created for generations of people who studied from it?

NS: Sure. The Mercator map, when you think about where you are what's you’re viewing on the Mercator map, the Northern Hemisphere, so Europe, you have Europe, you have Russia, you have North America, seem incredibly large. So when you think about that, people at first glance are going to associate that with power. They're going to say “Those areas are more powerful. They have more. They have more economical power they have more political power.” But not taking into consideration that other areas have actually larger land mass. So when we diminish the other areas across many of our third world countries, it's disempowering them.

CO: What have your students said about it?

NS: The students have been really excited. I think it’s provided them an opportunity to see the world in a new light. They were never aware of the fact that Africa was so large compared to Greenland for example. You know, those were never brought to their attention because in a classroom, the average classroom, they're going to have maybe a Mercator or maybe a Robinson map hanging on the wall. There might be a globe hidden in the back corner of the classroom but not brought out constantly.
So here, providing this conversational piece in the classroom, really provides them an opportunity to kind of question wonder and analyze and try to figure out the intent of the cartographer when they were developing the maps, and kind of the conceptualization of what was its place in society at the time and how that impacted the map development. So they're definitely amazed. Kind of been like a curtain’s been unveiled from their eyes and they look at it and trying to figure out what else has been kind of hidden from them.

CO: What do you hope the kids take away? What do you hope changes in their perception of their world by studying this map, the Peters map, and having it replace in fact, the Mercator map?

NS: So we're actually having them… we're actually keeping the Mercator maps as well in the classroom, because we want to make sure that students are taking the time to compare, contrast, find the similarities and the differences. Every map has its strengths and weaknesses and we really want to make sure that the students take the time to analyze that. Just switching the narrative to another narrative doesn't help them become better historians. So really we want to strengthen those critical thinking skills and that ability to analyze. We're also hoping that they just increase an awareness of the relationship between themselves and other cultures and communities around the world so that they see where they are. You know, what space they're dealing with over here in the northern hemisphere, and what somebody is dealing with in the southern hemisphere, what someone is dealing on other continents. Just to build that perspective and gain that deeper understanding.

CO: That's really neat. And we're going to post pictures of these maps so people can see them and I we hear from listeners, and especially young people who are going to be shocked that they haven't seen his before. It's great to speak to them. Ms. Scott, thank you.

NS: Thank you Carol. It's great to speak with him. Bye.

CO: Bye.

JD: Natacha Scott is the director of history and social studies at Boston public schools. We reached her in Boston.

[Music]

Vibrating study

JD: What if I told you you could improve your muscle mass while lying down and doing nothing? You'd be excited and confused! And what if I magnified your excitement and your confusion by telling you you can shake up your exercise routine by shaking yourself up?
Now you don't know what's going on! And you're right. Because I'm extrapolating from a study on mice, and so everything I say is premature and potentially misleading!
Keep that in mind while I tell you about this new research, published in the journal Endocrinology. It suggests that something called "whole-body vibration" could possibly be as beneficial as exercise.
"Whole-body vibration" is exactly what it sounds like: you lie, sit, or stand on a vibrating platform thing, which causes your muscles to contract and relax over and over again. Some of the obese, diabetic mice in this study were subjected to that vibration, 20 minutes a day, while others walked on a treadmill for 45 minutes a day.
And good news, if you hate using your muscles, and you're an obese, diabetic mouse -- both groups of mice experienced an overall improvement in health, and gained less weight than the obese, diabetic mice who did nothing at all!
"But Jeff," you say. And you're right! There are a lot of caveats! Because, yes, this could be very helpful to people whose state of health makes it hard for them to exercise. But the researchers stress that, if you can actually exercise rather than vibrate, you should. And the American Council on Exercise warns that whole-body vibration can be bad for people with pacemakers, pregnant women, or "anyone with a history of tumors, throbosis, or seizures."
So you may not have to exercise anymore, but you should exercise caution! And actually, for now anyway, if you can, you should probably exercise, exercise. Sorry.

Part 2: New airline security, Anglican Church: residential schools

New airport security

Guest: Philip Baum

JEFF DOUGLAS: Last night, word got out that the United States was banning some electronics including laptops from cabin baggage on flight outbound from 10 airports mostly in the Middle East. And today, while people were still absorbing that, the United Kingdom followed suit. U.S. officials say that terrorism intelligence is behind the shift, but some aviation security experts are asking if this is the right strategy to keep passengers safe.
Philip Baum is one of those experts. He is the editor in chief of Aviation Security International magazine. We reached Mr. Baum via Skype in Bucharest.

CAROL OFF: Philip, what are we to make of these new restrictions on electronics?

PHILIP BAUM: To me it seems that terrorism has one terrorists aim to disrupt our daily lives and that they have succeeded in doing was. Whilst I understand that governments around the world have to respond to threat information and intelligence, we also have to make sure that the measures that they implement make security sense. And I fear that this laptop restriction will be exactly like the liquids, aerosols, and gels restrictions of a decade ago. That they're introduced and very difficult to remove. And that's what our screeners at airports are going to be looking for. They're going to be looking for the laptop that they can stop somebody taking on the airplane rather than the terrorists.

CO: And as you say that the terrorists have won, but I mean the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is saying the reason for this is because they are trying to prevent terrorism. There’s possibly and probably things they know that we don't about what the threat is. Can we not rely on the possibility that they're doing this for good reason?

PB: Well I'm sure that there is a good reason for it. But the reality is that if in the year 2017, screeners at airports, wherever they are in the world, can't distinguish between a laptop that has got a bomb in it and a laptop that hasn't got a bomb in it, we're in a very sorry state of affairs. Meanwhile, those same laptops of course are now going to be allowed to be checked in checked luggage. So it doesn't necessarily preclude the device getting onboard the airplane, albeit that it would make it harder for somebody to detonate it themselves in flight. For me, that's the problem. Surely we ought to be instead of looking for restricted items, or restricting items, what we should be looking for is negative intent, not only in passengers but also in airport employees.
There's been a lot of talk about the Daallo airlines bombing of last year when an improvised explosive device inside a laptop was taken on board a Daallo Airlines flight leaving Mogadishu. But that laptop was given to a passenger after the security checkpoint by an airport security official. And you know, that could happen at any airport still. It's the people we need to look at, not the items.
To me, this is just a measure that is responding to specific threat information, but it doesn't necessarily reduce our exposure to the risk of aircraft being bombed. Because let's face it, what the terrorist organizations of the world are doing, is that they are thinking about how to carry out the next attack. And the best lesson the past has taught us is that next time it's going to be different that we've moved from shoes, to printers, to underpants, to laptops. It will be something different next time.

CO: Now you mentioned their water bottles and gels that people have had to surrender at the airport if they've arrived with them. That’s one thing; it costs a couple of dollars maybe to replace that. But what about arriving at the airport with your laptop and your tablet and things of this nature? I mean how is that going to work. Are people are going to be required to surrender them at the gate if they didn't know the policy or forgot and they carried it in their carry on?

PB: Well time will tell but for now they're going to be asked to actually check the items into checked luggage and I have to say that you know from my own personal perspective, and I fly a lot, I am not prepared to check my laptop in to my checked luggage. Not only because of the fear of damage but the fear of theft. We know that there are criminal gangs working airside at airports looking for valuable items and it's not only the value of the item, it's the value of the data that is contained on these items. As far as I'm concerned, it would preclude me from traveling to certain destinations.

CO: How are travelers likely to respond to this?

PB: Well I think a lot of people will just sort of say “Well, that's the price we've got to pay for our security.” And I would go along with that if I really felt that security was being enhanced as a result. But I don't.

CO: The United Kingdom has joined the United States in having similar policies from many of the same countries in the United States, but they they've left off Morocco, Qatar, and the UAE, and they've added Tunisia and Lebanon. So any idea how they've chosen these countries?

PB: I'm sure to a certain extent it is going to be based on Intel. But I fear that there is also a lot of politics involved. I know that the sheer number of flights that operate between places like Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and Doha in Qatar and the U.K. would make any restrictions extremely difficult for people in business. It's not only not having your laptop and worrying about what happens to your laptop whilst it's in the hold. Is the fact that actually, people do work on board airplanes, particularly business travelers. They use that time in the air to work. And the sheer number of people flying on those routes, it would make it very difficult for them.

CO: Just finally, is there a chance that there might be some tit for tat here, that some of the countries who are part of this restriction will say “OK well then, we're going to do the same for American Airlines and for British airlines”.

PB: That might well be the case. And I wouldn't blame them although obviously it wouldn't be based on the same type of threat analysis. So yeah, I think that a lot of politics going on behind the scenes. I'm sure that the measures were introduced as a specific response to intel. But the measures that have been introduced, I'm afraid are actually a very poor reflection of our expectations of airport security around the world. If we're worried about people with laptops getting onto planes with bombs on in any of those airports then we ought to be seriously questioning whether or not we're operating those airports at all.

CO: Philip thank you very much.

PB: My pleasure.

JD: Philip Baum is the editor in chief of Aviation Security International magazine. We reached him via Skype in Bucharest.

[Music]

Betty Kennedy Obituary

Guest:

JD: If you've been a long-time fan of the CBC, I have some sad news: Betty Kennedy died yesterday at the age of 91.
Betty Kennedy added her perspective, and her solid journalism chops, to the long-running CBC TV news quiz show, Front Page Challenge, as one of its best-known panelists from 1962 to 1995. But, as far as she was concerned, she became the program's voice of reason "quite by accident" -- since the Canadian Broadcasting Hall of Famer hadn't intended to make a career in broadcasting.
She was working for her hometown newspaper when The Ottawa Citizen went on strike. She was asked to host a radio show. She went on to host The Betty Kennedy Show on the Toronto talk radio station CFRB, before joining the team at Front Page Challenge.
She also wrote two books and was named to the Order of Canada in 1982. In the year 2000, Prime Minister Jean Chrétien appointed her to the senate, though she did retire less than a year later, on her 75th birthday.
From our archives, here's Betty Kennedy on an episode of Front Page Challenge from 1974, correctly identifying a rather well-known guest.

SOUNDCLIP

HOST: All right panel, our friends at home and here in the studio know about our first story. I'll tell you that it's an international story. Two minutes to track the story down. Our guest is in place, Gordon would you start please.
The international story. Did some part of this international story happen in Canada?

GORDON SINCLAIR: Nay.

BETTY KENNERY: Does this have anything to do with Canada's recognition of China?

GS: Ya.

BK: And are you the Canadian prime minister who brought that recognition about?

GS: Ya ya.

[Sound: Applause]

HOST: OK What’s the headline, Betty? Panel, I tried to get you off the track. We didn't think that our guest would remain concealed for too long. But Betty of course, you have firsthand knowledge. All right panel, I guess we should start with Betty Kennedy because you were with the Prime Minister on that trip to Peking.

BK: With about 50 or 60 other people. It was quite an entourage.

HOST: But did they ever say “nay” to you like that, that you’d recognize it?

BK: Well there were a number of clues on this event tonight because our schedule is a little unusual and if you started to add up why it might be unusual you came up with that kind of an answer. I wonder when you look at the news that's coming out of China, since we're starting with the China story, whether the news that comes from China today surprises you in any way or whether you had any inkling of the kind of developments that are taking place now during the time you made your visit in October.

PIERRE ELLIOTT TRUDEAU: No I can't say I foresaw the developments that are becoming intensified now…

JD: From the 9th of April 1974, episode of CBC’s long running television quiz show Front Page Challenge, that was broadcaster Betty Kennedy interviewing Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau about developments in China's Cultural Revolution. Betty Kennedy died yesterday. She was 91 years old.

[Music]

Canada Reads: Katherena

JD: Canada Reads kicks off next Monday on CBC. As you know, it brings together five passionate people to defend five different books they think Canadians should read right now. And this year, one of those people is comedian and broadcaster Candy Palmater. And one of those books is The Break.
The Break is Katherena Vermette's debut novel. It's about a terrible crime that takes place in the north end of Winnipeg, and is told through the voices of each of the people affected by that crime. And in weaving those voices together, it reveals the pain, and the resilience, of generations of indigenous women.
To gear up for the annual battle of the books, we are airing readings from the contenders every day this week on As it Happens. Tonight: Katherena Vermette, reading from The Break. This excerpt takes place just before the crime, in a moment of middle-school innocence.

SOUNDCLIP

KATHERENA VERMETTE: Emily has never kissed a boy before. There was this one time, in like grade 5 when that Sam kid gave her a peck, close to her lips but not on her actual lips. It shouldn't count though. It was only a dare that happened after school with everyone gathered around. He had big bucky looking teeth and chapped lips. He pushed his lips out but she turned a bit at the last second so his lips hit her cheek instead. All the kids yelled out like it was a big deal. It left a wet spot but it was nothing, really. Not like a kiss was supposed to be. Emily doesn't think it counts at all.
Her best friend Ziggy has never kissed a boy either but she's different. Zig is tough and doesn't care and thinks guys at their school are all morons. She's probably right, Emily thinks, but some of them, a few of them, are so, so cute.
Clayton Spence is the cutest of them all.
Emily is 13 she feels ugly and fat most of the time it is positive no one has ever, ever liked her. She pretty much believes that she is repulsive and will never get a boyfriend and never get kissed for real. She complains about it a lot to Ziggy, or at least Zig complains that she complains about it a lot. But Emily thinks it's time. 13 is time to have a boyfriend or at the very least, a kiss.

JD: Katherena Vermette reading from her debut novel The Break, which will be defended by comedian and broadcaster Candy Palmater in this year's Canada Reads. And you can tune in to that starting on March 27 on CBC Radio, TV or online for more. Go to cbcbooks.ca.

[Music]

Anglican church residential schools

Guest: Fred Hilz

JD: Almost two weeks ago, Senator Lynn Beyak stood up in the red chamber to talk about residential schools. But her take differed from most of the commentary you may have heard on the subject.
She said she was disappointed that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission didn't focus more on the good things that took place at the schools. She also spoke about the unacknowledged "remarkable works" and "good deeds" of the people who worked there.
Senator Beyak was heavily criticized for those comments. And now, the Anglican Church of Canada, which ran many of the country's residential schools, has added its voice to that critical chorus in an open letter published yesterday.
Fred Hilz is the Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Canada, and a co-author of the letter. We reached him in Toronto.

CO: Archbishop Hilz, what compelled you to write this extraordinary letter to Senator Beyak?

FRED HILZ: What compelled us was our need as a church and our obligation we feel to stand by the survivors of the residential schools given the fact that by far, and I say by far, I mean by hundreds and hundreds of children who were removed from their homes and housed in the schools, actually had a very bad experience. So as one of the churches that ran a number of those schools and has made public apology for our work in those schools and the abuses that took place in the schools, we feel that we need to live that apology. And when it was made in 1993, the [unintelligible]at end of the day was very clear in saying to survivors at the schools “We failed you. We failed ourselves, and we failed God.” But he also said “Words without actions are empty.” So for us, this letter is an attempt to continue to live in to the words of the apology and that commitment.

CO: You're writing to Senator Beyak who said that there were good things that happened at residential schools and positive experiences that were had by First Nations indigenous people who attended those schools. You go much further in pointing out to her that that is, while that may be true, that is largely wrong, and that it was an effort to forcibly remove children from their “evil surroundings” with the intent of “killing the Indian in the child.” So it's very very hard language you're using. Why did you think it was necessary to point that out to the senator?

FH: I think that that language, if we check historic documents, is actually consistent with some of the policies of the day. We do not deny that there are some people that went to the schools and can say they had a positive experience and for them, you know, we're happy. But you know, it's more than clear to us that you know, we're really as a country, we have to come to terms and own this legacy, as painful and difficult and shameful as it is. And we as the church who were involved in running the schools, we have a particular obligation I think, to stand beside the survivors who continue to suffer emotionally particularly from the trauma that they that they went through.

CO: But you have acknowledged what Senator Beyak has said, which is that there were positive outcomes First Nations people did have, experiences that were good. That's what she was saying and you reiterate that. So you do support her statement that there were some aspects of good in residential schools?

FH: We acknowledge that. But I think what we are saying is that if that becomes that becomes the public discourse, the public narrative going forward with respect to the schools, then that does not represent the whole truth about the schools. If you read the report of the commissioners and take seriously the 94 calls to action, you realize that we have a lot of work to do as Canadians in terms of coming to terms with this legacy and forging a new, better, more wholesome, more respect for relationship with the very first peoples of this land. That's a solemn obligation I believe that we have.

CO: All right you have that you have this obligation, you say you've apologized early as 1993. You say in this letter, you acknowledge that there was nothing good about child abuse that was rampant in the schools, that the children went missing, no reports being filed. I'm wondering if you think the church has really done enough. I mean clearly, you're pointing out criminal acts that occurred in those schools. What does become of that? Was anyone ever charged?

FH: Well yes, of course there have been some folks that have been charged. But I think what the church has tried to do is to work alongside and work with survivors of the residential schools, particularly through something we have called the Anglican Healing Fund. And this is a fund which communities that are creating programs for healing and reconciliation including recovery of language and culture. They can apply for grants to fund these programs. And we've got a long history now, 25 years of supporting those kind of community efforts. And in fact we're in, this very year we've, committed to raising a substantial amount of money to replenish the healing funds so that the work can go forward for the foreseeable future.

CO: Have you heard any response from Senator Beyak?

FH: No.

CO: Would you join those who are saying that she should resign from the Senate?

FH: No, I don't think that I would make any kind of a public matter and call for her to resign. I think that we all have a lot to learn in terms of the whole story. And quite frankly the good, not just the good but the bad and the ugly, associated with that legacy. And so the responsibility that we all have is to say let's make sure that the whole narrative is told. And I think to do that is to not only on or the work of TRC, but to actually stand by their call to the whole country and in particular to the churches to really be committed to healing and reconciliation.

CO: Archbishop Hilz, thank you.

FH: You're very welcome Carol.

JD: Fred Hilz is the archbishop of the Anglican Church of Canada. We reached him in Toronto. And we did reach out to Senator back to ask for her response to Archbishop Hilz’s letter. We did not hear back from her. But last week she did release a statement saying that she stood by her comments and that she would not be resigning from the Senate, nor from the Senate's Aboriginal Peoples Committee.

[Music]

Turtle coin obituary update

JD: The medical team that operated on Omsin had high hopes for a full recovery after her surgery just weeks ago. Sadly, the 25 year old green sea turtle succumbed to blood poisoning over the weekend. She had slipped into a coma following a second operation on Sunday to address an acute infection in her intestine.
As we told you earlier this month, Omsin, whose nickname means "Bank" in Thai, was rescued by members of the Thai navy from her pond in the coastal town of Si Racha. They noticed she was struggling to swim properly, and took her to a university animal clinic in Bangkok where a CT scan revealed she had ingested more than 900 coins. Those coins had been tossed into her pond by visitors wishing for good luck and longevity.
Sadly their actions brought neither for Omsin. She underwent a four-hour operation to have the coins removed. The coins had coalesced in her gut into a mass of metal weighing about 5 kilograms. The weight of it caused her ventral shell to crack.
Now, in Thailand, officials hope the extensive media coverage of Omsin’s plight will discourage the practice of tossing coins onto turtles' backs in the future.

[Music]

Part 3: Encore feature interview: Michael Crummey

Thunder Bay jail death

JEFF DOUGLAS: Five years have passed and they are still waiting for justice. Yesterday, relatives and community members gathered to hold a memorial for Sherman Quisses. In 2012, Mr. Quisses was an inmate at the Thunder Bay Correctional Centre, and he was killed there.
Adam Capay, another inmate, was charged with first-degree murder. The trial has not taken place. You may recognize Mr. Capay's name. He's an Indigenous man whose case has garnered public attention following years he spent in solitary confinement.
Now, his lawyers are hoping to have his murder charge stayed, saying his time in custody violated his rights.
Tristan Quisses is the son of Sherman Quisses. He's 18 years old. And yesterday, he told the CBC in Thunder Bay about the effect his father's death has had on him.

SOUNDCLIP

TRUSTAN SUISSES: I couldn’t get over what happened to my dad. I always think about him. Every day. I just wish it didn't happen. Losing a dad in such a young age, it hurts. I won't ever him again. I loved my dad so much. His life was taken.
I went through depression. I nearly committed suicide. It’s because of what happened. My family and my dad deserve justice. I’ve waited for five years for this and I don't want to wait again. I want this nightmare to end.

JD: That was 18-year-old Tristan Quisses speaking with the CBC in Thunder Bay yesterday. He's the son of Sherman Quisses -- an inmate who was killed at a Thunder Bay jail in 2012.

[Music]

Encore: Michael Crummey

JD: In his latest collection, Newfoundland author Michael Crummey gets back to his roots. And not just back to the small mining town of Buchans, where he grew up. In Little Dogs: New and Selected, Mr. Crummey gets back to writing poetry.
Michael Crummey got his start as a poet in the 1980s, years before he wrote award-winning novels like Sweetland, and Galore.
And last May, Carol spoke to Mr. Crummey about this latest collection of poetry, which includes stories of Newfoundland, of fathers and sons, and of the history that shapes who we become.
In honour of World Poetry Day, here is a repeat of that conversation, from May 2016.

SOUNDCLIP

CAROL OFF: Michael Crummey, welcome back to As it Happens.

MICHAEL CRUMMEY: Great to be here again.

CO: And now, this is just a beautifully written collection of poems.

MC: Well, thank you.

CO: But this is where you began isn't it? You started as a poet.

MC: Yeah I did. I started writing my first year university when I was just turning 17. And out of the blue kind of, like I didn't have any notion before the moment I started writing that I wanted to, but it was poetry like that. I went to university with no idea what I wanted to do with my life, took general courses. And we did all poetry in that first term and it just kind of hit me.

CO: Did you think you're going to make money?

MC: I really didn't. I didn't even know what poetry was at the time. But in university there was a point where I entered the Gregory Power Poetry Awards which is a student competition and won first prize and I think first prize was 300 bucks. And that gave me the mistaken impression that there was money to be made.

CO: It’s going to just roll in here.

MC: It was all downhill from that $300 dollar award financially.

CO: But this is I mean it's very that the poetry is different from your fiction. First of all because fiction is invention and products of the imagination but it's your poetry began as very secret as well. This is something… these were very private moments you put into these poems.

MC: Yeah. Well I was writing in secret. Like I didn't tell anybody. In fact the Gregory Power Poetry Awards was my basically my coming out which was a very uncomfortable thing because it was such a private I guess there was… I was just a kid from Buchans. Like who the hell did I think I was? Why would I have anything to say? That was part of it.

CO: Buchans Newfoundland, for anyone who doesn't know.

MC: The little mining town, yeah. And I am still fairly uncomfortable with the notion that I have anything to say that anyone else would be interested in paying attention to. But in those days I just could not call myself a writer in front of anybody. So I did it in secret for years before. And even after I started publishing and journals and things like that, I really did not, I did not volunteer that information very much. But from the beginning too, the poetry was always very different from the fiction because the fiction was about the world out there and the poetry was always really personal.
For me, for whatever reason, poetry is how I access my personal life when I'm writing. Like the fiction has all kinds of bits and pieces that I steal from my world. But I've never put myself or the people I love into the fiction. They're made up people. But the poetry has always been incredibly personal and it's always been about my relationships to my family, or to my wife and the kids for… I don't think that is the difference between poetry and fiction, that's the difference between my poetry and fiction.

CO: But the poems are very intimate and very revealing. I mean you must feel exposed when you write about your wife Holly. You write moments of intimacy in the bedroom in between kids needing you. You write about your father and illness and his death. Do you feel exposed when you do that?

MC: I mean like, I guess when I'm writing poetry I'm not thinking about it anywhere outside of my own head. So there was definitely a period of adjusting to the fact that this this was something that ended up in other people's hands. And I think there was an element of adjustment for the people around me as well. You know, I don't know if I felt exposed, because generally there are intimate moments but there's no big dark secrets being revealed as a rule.
But I do remember my dad saying to my mother one time you know, he said, you've got to watch what you say to them, because you never know when it's going to end up… And there is something to that, you know? I think I have been very careful to make sure that the people I'm writing about see the material before it gets out there in the world. I think I've gotten lazy with that because I've done it for so long. And there were a couple of things that ended up in this book that my wife Holly hadn't seen before the book came out. She's a wildlife biologist and she spends a lot of time at sea doing seabird surveys. And I wrote one about getting these e-mails about her evenings on the ship where she's involved in crib tournaments and drinking with the officers and stuff like that. And she never plays cards at home you know and it was clear that there was a different life on the ship. It made her seem a little bit like a stranger for the first time in a long time. And she was a little taken aback by the poem because I had never talked to her about that, I don't think. I just wrote about it and then published it.
But for me, it was like I guess the reason I didn't feel the urge to make sure she had seen that is, because again it was a love poem. I love that notion that this person who I've been with for 13 years and who I feel a lot of times as if we're a unit as opposed to separate people. I love those moments when I realize, no she is herself, completely separate from me. You know that's the person I fell in love with. So I guess I need to be a little more rigorous than I have been.

CO: Or Holly needs to take your father's advice and not tell you things.

MC: That’s right.

CO: I’m speaking with Michael Crummey, he's in the studio with us at As It Happens and we're talking about his volume of poetry, Little Dogs: New and Selected Poems.
Michael, we've talked a lot about how the poems deal with people, people in your life, but they deal, as your fiction does, so much with place with Newfoundland and Labrador. And the people and the places are inseparable in so many ways. And the need to write about that place, is it nostalgic? Is it pride? Where does that come from?

MC: I mean for me there's definitely always been, I've had a real sense that my parents came from a world that was completely different from the world that I came from because they grew up in outports. My father fished with his father from the age of nine till he was about 16 and I grew up in a mining town in Central Newfoundland post-Confederation. So the world that my parents were born into was what Newfoundland had been more or less on change for a couple of hundred years. And in the space of their lifetimes, that world has almost completely disappeared. And they always felt like living links to this world that I only had access through their stories. I grew up hearing those stories. And so when I started writing, of course, one of the first things I did was I started writing some of those stories down. I guess partly as a way to honor the world that they came out of and also to try and find a place in it for myself.

CO: There's one poem, “What's Lost” is the title. And you're writing about this, what you're saying, the land your father once knew. The harbours and the coves and the clapboard houses. And you end with your father saying this is the end of the poem, “That was 50 years ago as a warning wanting me to understand what's forgotten is lost and most of this he cannot even recall forgetting”. What you fear might be lost, might be forgotten about that Newfoundland and Labrador?

MC: I mean Bernice Morgan says that she writes about the gone world of Newfoundland because it would be such a waste. Like people sacrificed so much and just to get by. And to not remember that and to not remember what was asked of them to make a life in Newfoundland would be such a waste to forget. Everybody I think has that sense in their own families, you know this sense of wanting to remember where they've come from and to remember the people who've made them who they are.
And in Newfoundland it feels like a cultural phenomenon, you know that we've gone through in the past two generations where there's been a huge sea change in the place. That means we are going to be different on the other side of it. And it's a big question I think of how much of who Newfoundlanders were comes forward with us after that change. So I'm interested in asking that question I guess.

CO: What was your father like?

MC: My dad was. That's a difficult question. He was one of the most intelligent people I'd ever met. He was a very smart person who hated school and quit as soon as he could to go fishing. But he had a native intelligence that I really admired, and also was incredibly generous. And if I'm like him in any way at all, it's that he was in many ways and incredibly shy man. Very quiet around people he didn't know well. But there was a ham in there and if he had a couple of drinks, he was a storyteller. And I think he was one of the biggest influences on me as a writer early on especially.
Dad was the kind of guy who had a repertoire, and you could request particular stories you know. And I grew up listening to the same stories and asking for the same stories over and over. And he understood how narrative worked. Like they weren't told word for word the same way, but he had figured out how those stories worked. And so he was in the right circumstances, the life of the party as well.
And I mean I don't want to say, I'm going to sound completely nostalgic and all that sort of stuff, but–

CO: You're allowed.

MC: Yeah. I loved him more than anybody I think I've ever known. You know like, he was an easy person to admire and to want to spend time around. And I still miss him a lot.

CO: Michael, there's one poem I want you to read and talk about it a bit. It's a poem called “Lilacs” about your father and place. If you could read it for us, maybe you set it up a bit.

MC: Sure. My dad was born in a little out-port called Western Bay, in Conception Bay. The house where he was born and raised was still standing up until about 10, 12 years ago but it had been abandoned for a long time before that. So one of the things we did was we went out to spend a night in the old house. Sitting with him and talking with him in that house. It felt like the world that he grew up in was still present in that house. And this is this is what came out of that.

The well is contaminated. And we have to
haul a bucket of water up from the brook;
we pull handfuls of lilacs from the trees
outside the open windows and set them in glassed through the house to mask the smell of rooms shut up with themselves for years
There are old saucers of poison
placed on countertops and mantel pieces, spoor in the pantry
and Dad tells me how he’d chase mice through the house with a stick when he was a boy
although it was considered bad luck for the fishing
and his father forbid killing them during the season;
In Labrador, he says
you could follow the path they'd beaten through the long grass in the dark
but no one raised a hand to them all summer

There are still two beds in the room where my father was born in 1930
and we roll out our sleeping bags there
then walk to the corner store for food and beer;
later I watch his face in the pale light of the Coleman lantern
try to connect him to what I know of that time
dust photographs, soup kitchens
stories of vagrants back doors offering
to chop wood for a meal
but I know I have it hopelessly wrong–
he wanted nothing more for me
than that I should grow up a stranger to all this
that his be one of the lives I have not lived.

After the lights are put out
there is a silence broken only by the sounds
we make as we shift in our beds and the occasional scuffle of mice in the hallway;
the age of the house gives a musty
undertone to the sweet smell of the lilacs
and it seems stronger in the darkness
so that I imagine I am breathing in what's left of the world my father knew
while the part of him that has never
managed to leave here is asleep across the room

CO: That's Michael Crummey reading “Lilacs”, a poem from his collection Little Dogs. Michael did you. Did you ever have any thoughts about living his life?

MC: Well I didn't. I mean the fishery wasn't really an option because things were not great in the fishery even then. And I grew up in a mining town which was nowhere near saltwater. But I was raised in mining towns. My sense of it from my parents was that was never where we were going to be. I think Dad is probably the happiest, he was the most content person I've ever encountered. You know, he seemed completely happy with the life that he had. But I think he wanted us to have options. He ended up where he did because that was all that was available to him, you know, and that he got lucky finding that job after ending up in debt to the merchant. And you know he got laid off when the mine closed at 50, and he thought his life was over. And I don't think he wanted us to be in the same circumstances where we had no control over where we ended up.
After high school we had to pick something. He didn't care what we did, if it was university or trades or something. And from there, it would be up to us but that was going to happen.

CO: We talked about how relationships are so important in these poems and marriages, your own and your father's and his ancestral marriages as well. There's one poem I'd like you to read which is and this is again, so many of the poems are mini short stories. I mean there are entire movies that get played out. And this is, I think one of them is called “Bread”, deals a lot with loneliness as well. And I would just like if you could read that for us and set it up.

MC: “Bread” is a piece I wrote for a book called Hard Light which is mostly about Dad's life growing up in outport Newfoundland. And I realized when I was working on the book how little I knew about my grandparent,s because dad's father died when he was 15, I think 16. And my grandmother died when I was five or six and I have no real memories of her. I knew three things about my grandparents. I knew my grandfather was 20 years older than my grandmother. I knew that his first wife had died and their first child together, a boy died about a week after he was born. So I took those three facts and then I spun a story around it to try and explain my grandparents to myself.
This is told in my grandmother's voice.

I was twenty years younger than my husband, his first wife dead in childbirth. I agreed to marry him because he was a good fisherman, because he had his own house and he was willing to take in my mother and father when the time came. It was a practical decision and he wasn't expecting more than that. Two people should never say the word love before they've eaten a sack of flour together, he told me.
The night we married I hiked my night dress around my thighs and shut my eyes so tight I saw stars. Afterwards I went outside and I was sick, throwing up over the fence. He came out the door behind me and put his hand to the small of my back. It happens your first time, he said. It'll get better.
I got pregnant right away and then he left for the Labrador. I dug the garden, watched my belly swell like a seed in water. Baked bread, bottled bakeapples for the winter store, cut the meadow grass for hay. After a month alone I even started to miss him a little.
The baby came early, a few weeks after my husband arrived home in September. We had the minister up to the house for the baptism the next day, Angus Maclean we named him, and we buried him in the graveyard in the Burnt Woods a week later. I remember he started crying at the table the morning of the funeral and I held his face against my belly until he stopped, his head in my hands about the size of the child before it was born. I don't know why sharing a grief will make you love someone.
I was pregnant again by November. I baked a loaf of bread and brought it to the table, still steaming from the oven. Set it on his plate whole and stood there looking at him. That's the last of that bag of flour, I told him. And he smiled at me and didn't say anything for a minute. I'll pick up another today, he said finally.
And that's how we left it for a while.

CO: That was Michael Crummey reading “Bread” from his collection Little Dogs. And again it's just an entire movie. And also it's, there are these moments of humor. Some of them completely laugh out loud funny poems, like well you know “The Tennessee Waltz”, the recipe for dandelion wine and beer. And humor is, your fiction is everything, you need to be funny, don't you?

MC: Well I think if you're trying to write about Newfoundland honestly there's got to be humor in it. And I think that that was something that I had to learn over time. But everybody I know and everybody I knew growing up, humor was the first line of defense. And even the worst possible things. Like if you're dealing with a death in the family or something like that. In the middle of the horror of that and the grief of that, someone will say something that will crack everybody up. And it's like that moment of release I think is so central to how Newfoundlanders operate in the world. And it was certainly a huge part of my father's way of seeing the world. A lot of his stories are funny funny funny funny funny and then right at the end there's a very dark turn, you know, this acknowledgement that humor is only part of the story but it's a very central part of the story.

CO: But that’s also the irony which is also crucial to Newfoundland writing. It's deeply ironic.

MC: Yeah and I think that's partly because the world is such strange and not particularly friendly place and irony is a way of dealing with how absurd life can be, I think. That seems to be how Newfoundlanders have decided to deal with the life that they've been thrown into.

CO: And nothing is as it appears to be.

MC: Yes or the world as it appears at the moment will appear completely different than the next morning when you wake up.

CO: You told us why, what your father wanted for you, what your father wanted for his sons. What do you want for your children?

MC: I mean I think what Dad wanted was for his kids to be happy. And I think he saw options as one of the things he could offer his kids as a sort of way of ensuring that as a possibility. And I think that that's really that's all I want. Like whenever the kids are asking “What should I do?” My answer is always ”I just want you to be happy”, like find something you love and try to make a life of that.

CO: Do you want them to stay in Newfoundland?

MC: My sense of it, because Newfoundland is still a very isolated place, I think it's a good thing for everybody to live away for a while. Like I lived away for almost 13 years. And I don't regret that. I'm very happy to be back. I remember going to this little place on the south coast called Francois, which is one of the most spectacular physical places. It's about a mile long fjord with 500 600 foot cliffs and a little fishing community in a bowl of hills at the foot of this fjord. Spectacularly beautiful. And as we were coming up on the dock, there was a young guy there talking to us and we're just talking about how beautiful it was. And he said if “I had my way said I'd have every one of them hills beat down so we could see a bit of sunshine”. And someone else with us said “You need to go away. And when you come back, you'll know what you have here.” And I think that that's true of Newfoundland in general. I think that living away is part of how we know what's worth coming home to.

CO: Last thing you wrote, the last words in this book tells of you “Michael Crummey is a nearly full-time writer living something close to a real life in St. John's Newfoundland.” No word of a lie?

MC: Yeah that's pretty close to the truth. I think that's probably the biography that has come closest to hitting the nail on the head as to what the hell my life looks like.

CO: Michael Crummey, it's great to have you in the studio and thank you very much for this collection.

MC: It was a real pleasure to be here. Thanks.

JD: That was Newfoundland author and poet Michael Crummey, speaking to Carol in our Toronto studio in May 2016, about his latest published collection of poetry Little Dogs: New and Selected. We brought you that conversation again to mark World Poetry Day.

[Music]

Double Exposure

[Sound: Double Exposure theme]

SOUNDCLIP

From Vancouver it's Double Exposure starring Bob Robertson and Linda Cullen.

JD: That is a sound I'm sure many of you will remember hearing on the radio. That's the opening of Double Exposure, a comedy show that used to play on CBC, starring the couple whose names you just heard. Half the comedy team, Bob Robertson died this weekend in Nanaimo. He was 71 years old.
Double Exposure was a satire of Canadian politics that benefited from very bang-on impressions by Bob and his wife and comedy partner, Linda Cullen. Bob impersonated everyone from the CBC's Peter Mansbridge and Rex Murphy to Prime Ministers Jean Chretien, Brian Mulroney and Joe Clark.
Here is Bob Robertson as Joe Clark in a skit from an episode of Double Exposure that aired in February of 1993.

SOUNDCLIP

HOST: Joe Clark has entered the room and is about to speak.

BOB ROBERTSON: Good afternoon. The reason I'm here today is….

TECH: It’s not working, your mic’s not on.

BR: Really?

TECH: Turn your mic on.

[Sound: on switch]

BR: Oh. Sorry. Yes. My dear friends, the citizens of Alberta and the people of Canada, many of my friends in politics will be saddened by what I have to say. Not the prime minister of course but hey, do I look like I care? Au contraire, my friends. As has been speculated now for many weeks, I will be leaving federal politics at the end of this mandate. And the question begs what will I do? I haven't got the foggiest. I am planning to write my autobiography. Although at the moment I'm having trouble coming up with the main character for the book, ha ha ha ha. But I will however be looking for new work. That is my challenge now, my friends, finding new work.

[Sound: cymbal clash, New York New York played by a band]

BR: So let's not dwell on my departure today. Let's not mope and hang our heads. Because my dear friends, make sure to me, today is the day I start looking for new work.

BR: [Singing] Start spreading the news I'm leaving today I want to see if I can find new work new work. There's plenty to choose. I've got my B.A. That's all I need to get me some new work, new work.

JD: From February of 1993, that was a clip from the former CBC radio show Double Exposure. Bob Robertson, half of the comedy duo and couple behind that show, died over the weekend. He was 71 years old.

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March 21, 2017 episode transcript

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