REGIONAL COORDINATOR: Elaine Bander; TREASURER: Renée Charron

by Elaine Bander

Following our discussion in June, here is a tentative program for 2008-2009, subject to change, of course. Members will receive email reminders of specific events.

REGULAR MEETINGS usually involve prepared and/or hosted programs, speakers, events, films, etc, and take place bi-monthly between September and June. They are usually held on Mondays at 5 pm.

READING GROUP MEETINGS are cooperative, participatory discussions. This year the READING GROUP wants to explore Austen�s life and times by sharing the contents of relevant articles that they locate, especially but not exclusively in the Persuasions archives. The READING Group meets alternate months on Wednesdays at 5 pm.

Unless otherwise indicated, all meetings take place at 5 pm in the main floor Lounge at 4300 de Maisonneuve in Westmount, just west of Greene Avenue. Tea will be served ($2). (On occasion, extra charges may be necessary.)

SEPT. 22: (Monday) REGULAR MEETING: We will gather to preview the year�s programs and preview discussions for the Chicago AGM: �Jane Austen�s Legacy.�

OCT. 22: (Wednesday) READING GROUP: In honour of the beginning of the new English Country Dance season (first introductory lesson on September 20, see below), our first topic will be �Balls and dancing in Austen�s age.� Please locate a relevant article to read and to report on to the group. You can start by searching the Persuasions archives.

NOV. 17: (Monday) REGULAR MEETING: (1) Report on Chicago AGM and (2) (TENTATIVE): �Jane Austen in the Trenches�: a round-table discussion about Kipling�s short story, �The Janeites.� Anyone interested in contributing to this session should let Elaine know. Long-time members may recall discussing this story of competing brotherhoods in the Great War; its themes are relevant to next year�s AGM on �Brothers and Sisters.�

DEC. 16: (Tuesday) ANNUAL BIRTHDAY TEA: in Ethel Kesler�s apartment at 4300 de Maisonneuve, time TBA. TENTATIVE: Prof. Peter Sabor will speak to us on �What Jane Austen Wrote: issues of attribution.�

JAN. 21: (Wednesday) READING GROUP: Members are invited to read and to prepare a report on a translation of an Austen novel.

FEB. 16: (Monday) REGULAR MEETING: Three weeks after Burns Day, Elaine Bander will preview the talk on Austen and Burns that she will give in Toronto in March: � �O Leave Novels�: Jane Austen, Sir Charles Grandison, Sir Edward Denham, and Rob Mossgiel.�

MARCH 25: (Wednesday) READING GROUP: TOPIC: Organization of domestic life in Austen�s day: food, housing, servants, hygiene, etc. Please locate a relevant article to read and to report on to the group. You can start by searching the Persuasions archives.

APRIL 20: (Monday) REGULAR MEETING: Prof. Jan Fergus, our newest regional member and a distinguished Austen scholar, will speak on a topic TBA.

MAY 20: (Wednesday) READING GROUP: TOPIC: The legal position of women in Austen�s age: marriage laws, property laws, criminal laws (Jane�s aunt Perrot was imprisoned for shop-lifting), etc. Any lawyers, or friends of lawyers, in our group who can advise us?

DONWELL ABBEY STRAWBERRY PARTY: Sunday, 14 June 2009 in Elaine�s garden, 4395 Hingston Avenue, NDG. We will brainstorm possible endings to Sanditon in preparation for writing a conclusion to Austen�s final, unfinished novel. Members should prepare by reading the Sanditon fragment and possibly some of the endings written by others. The brothers and sisters in this fragment will also get us in the mood for next year�s AGM.

Reminder: The Montr�al-Qu�bec City Region of the Jane Austen Society of North America does not charge membership dues. We encourage our participants to become members of JASNA. .

Discovering JASNA in Vancouver

by Claire L. Duteau, October 2007

For the past two years I have been a phantom member of the Montr�al-Qu�bec region of JASNA. This despite notes sent dutifully by Ren�e Charron inviting me to gatherings which sounded really exciting. Excuses? Distance, general laziness and, last year, a broken leg which slowed me down quite dramatically.

The AGM in Vancouver, however, was something for which Air Canada would provide comfortable transportation. I went, and have returned much enriched.

Now it will be a pleasure to recognize names and even faces to go with them, read about in Highbury Gossips or JASNA News. Emma will bring me new joys as I pick up on details pointed out in Vancouver.

What shall I remember most of all? Literally running from one Breakout Session to the next in order to miss nothing. My youngest sister and I shared a room and had wisely arranged to attend different sessions so that we could share notes. I liked the generally spirited exchange which followed each 45-minute talk and was proud of Elaine Bander who managed gracefully to keep her group on topic.

A very moving experience was that of hearing Mrs. Nora Foster Stovel read her late husband�s paper on �The New Emma in Emma�. The clarity of that paper made me regret never having known Bruce. Alas, my studies at the U. of Alberta occurred before his time there.

The Regency Ball transported me to the 18th century. How I would have loved to move to those stately rhythms chatting with my friends as we performed the beautiful dance patterns. Each possible partner I had accosted was already promised to someone else. It also seemed written on my forehead that I had not taken Friday night�s lessons and that my poor right leg was still in the throes of healing. I sat there anyway till 11:15 enjoying this special treat of sights and sounds, happier than had I been sitting at home beside the fire with Mr. Woodhouse.

The three Plenary speakers I heard were excellent: Janet Todd from Aberdeen who made me want to go out and purchase her recently published nine-volume Cambridge Edition of the works of JA; Juliet McMaster whose pixie looks hide a brilliant mind and whose memories of Bruce Stovel were so touchingly expressed; Jocelyn Harris from New Zealand who mesmerized me to the extent that I took only a few notes as she hopped among the three Janes: Austen, Fairfax and Eyre. Will we have the joy of seeing her talk published in Persuasions?

Sunday morning brought us across Georgia Street for a Thanksgiving Service at Christ Church Cathedral. The minister, recently arrived from England, might well have shocked Highbury society. A young lady covered in alb and chasuble? I could feel Emma all eyes and ears as she listened to a sermon on the joys and woes of 2007. Jane Austen sat a few pews ahead of me nodding frequently in agreement and, I�m sure, taking mental notes for her next novel soon to be published by Heavenly Press.

Perhaps we�ll be discussing that one in Chicago next October 2-5. I certainly intend to be there and hope to meet more Montr�al-Qu�bec members.

English Country Dancing

Michel Landry and Arduina Alonzo launch the new season of English Country Dancing with a Beginner�s Session on Saturday, 20 September 2008, from 1 to 4 pm, in room C-5.05 of the Cegep du Vieux Montr�al Sports Centre, 225 Ontario East, cost $10. We loved it when they came to Dawson College to give us a lesson last winter, and many of us planned to attend the monthly dance sessions in 2008-2009. For more information, visit http://www.cvm.qc.ca/mlandry/folklore/ENGL2008-2009.htm

JASNA Membership reminder:

Join JASNA and receive three JASNA Newsletters and the excellent journal Persuasions for $38 ($23 for students, $56 for families). Send cheques to Nancy Stokes, 105-195 Wynford Drive, Toronto, Ontario, M3C 3P3. .

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