Reading How I Learned to Swear brought to mind Muriel Rukeyserโs challenge, โwhat would happen if one woman told the truth about her life?”
The answer: โThe world would split open.โ
In telling the story of what it was like to be an Anglophone girl coming of age in the deeply patriarchal, parochial culture of the 1950โs Quebec and Canada, Patricia Dunnigan courageously shares her stories of self-discovery and resistance. English Canada has very few womenโs stories of this time before and during the quiet revolution; this life writing addresses that lacuna in Canadian Literature.
Patriciaโs life writing is even more important and precious now as we enter a time of growing threat against the rights of girls and women.
Jannie Edwards, poet, author: Blood Opera; the Raven Tango Poems, River, River, Slow Dance, and Falling Blues
