text bookSection Gault Cinda aut Margaret Laurence rose as a shining star in the Canadian literary world of the 1960s and 1970s, especially appreciated for her portrayals of national and female identity. This claim would prompt few objections among critics then or now, but disagreements do exist about how these portraits should be interpreted. Imre Szeman offers a point of departure with his claim that in this era the concept of nation emerged pre-eminently as a strategy of reading to the point that in Canada the concept of nation [was] articulated differently within literary criticism than within literature (164). A splinter between criticism and literature in the articulation of nation raises the possibility that judgements of works considered central to the category of Canadian fiction might be in part a function of overly enthusiastic criticism that stretched the fiction to represent nationalism. Canadian literature Criticism, interpretation, etc Canadian literature (English) Canadian literature (French) French-Canadian literature Women authors Women authors History and criticism eng fre OCLC: ocn887390772 Library of Congress ISBN book Demers Patricia edt Carrière Marie J. edt First edition Edmonton, Alberta, Canada The University of Alberta Press 2014 monographic 978-0-88864-627-9 PR9194.5.W6 R44 2014 Copyright © 2014 The University of Alberta Press