The Picture of Dorian Gray was Oscar Wilde’s seminal work. And it was also the story which, in the eyes of his scandalized detractors, helped confirm the belief that older gentlemen of influence and financial means, particularly the nobility, often corrupted younger men of lower social standing by making them the targets of their “unnatural” and self-indulgent sexual vices and…
Author: Christopher Adam
Evelyn Waugh was a master of the English language and of dry, witty writing. He certainly proved as much in his 1948 novel The Loved One: An Anglo-American Tragedy. The novel, based in part on Waugh’s observations during a visit to Hollywood, explores the stuffy pretensions of the British expatriate community in Los Angeles and the cultural divide between Britons and Americans.…
Who hasn’t come into contact with Mormon missionaries–the mostly very young, mild-mannered and smiling men dressed conservatively in a suit and tie, who we are to address as elder? Over the years I have read enough about the ascetic and grueling lives of Mormon missionaries to feel quite strongly that they deserve politeness and compassion from the people they approach…
Author Gene LaLonde is a survivalist from upstate New York and it would appear as though Dave and Becky, the two main characters in his book, A Question of Survival, are very much based on himself and his wife. (The latter is acknowledged and thanked for having proofread this self-published novel.) Set in rural Vermont, LaLonde tells the story of…
It seemed fitting to launch my book in Ottawa and, more specifically, in the city’s east-end, given that the three stories in I Have Demons are so closely intertwined with the social and geographic landscape of the Canadian capital. The book launch took place on Saturday, November 24, 2018 at the Rideau-Vanier Community Centre and included a book signing, a reading,…
A jaded young priest of a dwindling parish faces a man with a terrible secret. A lonely pensioner spends a Thanksgiving she’ll never forget at a local diner, served by an acerbic waitress who has finally found her ticket out of there. A recent university graduate from small-town Ontario leaves home with nothing to his name but the hope of…
One of my favourite weekend pastimes is to take regional road trips, mostly in eastern Ontario and in New York’s North Country. In most cases, my only companion is my camera and my only souvenirs are the photos I take along the way. For well over ten years, photography has been a hobby of mine and with winter now looming…
Jason Moscovitz’s piece on Jacob Weksler – formerly a Polish Catholic priest known as Romuald Waszkinel – who discovered late in life that he is Jewish (“Ideas and Impressions,” Ottawa Jewish Bulletin, April 16), resonated with me. Like many families in eastern and central Europe, mine too decided to conceal its Jewish identity, as well as the family’s tragedy during…