As many of you may have guessed, the authors featured in “Ottawa Postscript” are two of Canada’s most famous.

Photo Credit: Shelley Boyd

Mystery Author #1:      Catharine Parr Traill

Quotation Source:

Traill, Catharine Parr. I Bless You in My Heart: Selected Correspondence of Catharine Parr Traill. Ed. Carl Ballstadt, Elizabeth Hopkins, and Michael A. Peterman. Toronto, Buffalo, London: University of Toronto Press, 1996. 238. Print.

Catharine Parr Traill’s literary celebrity certainly guaranteed her, at the age of 82, an invitation to Rideau Hall for food and winter festivities. Perhaps best known for her collection of letters The Backwoods of Canada (1836), Traill was a significant pioneer writer who emigrated from England in 1832. She authored numerous works of children’s literature, botanical writings, and The Female Emigrant’s Guide, and Hints on Canadian Housekeeping (1854), which contains historical recipes on how to cook (and survive) in the backwoods.

Mystery Author #2:      Stephen Leacock

Quotation Source:

Leacock, Stephen. Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town. 1912. Ed. Carl Spadoni. Peterborough: Broadview Press, 2002. 27, 140. Print.

One of Canadian literature’s most celebrated satirists, Stephen Leacock is best known for Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town (1912). Those interested in cooking literary fare will be excited to hear that this past fall, Old Brewery Bay Press published a cookbook Mariposa at Table  (by Colin Agnew and Dorothy Duncan), featuring recipes in keeping with the spirit and time period of Leacock’s fictional town. We are curious to know if any of you have tried the recipes!

This post brings to a close our initial sampling of Ottawa. We welcome any additional “meals” you think should be brought to the table. Please post below or tweet us @canlitfare.

Now it’s time to pack your books and stock the pantry. Prepare to embark on a transcontinental tour of Canadian literary fare via our capital cities.

Our next stop: Victoria, British Columbia

Written By: Shelley Boyd