“An’ what might ye be wantin?” said the old man, the king of Rockbound.Despite being published in 1928, I found Rockbound to be a highly interesting read, not as fusty and old-fashioned as classics can sometimes be. In it, the orphan David – determined to claim his rightful 1/10th share of the mile-long island of Rockbound, off the South Shore of Nova Scotia – washes up, keen to prove his worth. Over the next 300 pages and 20 or so years, the boy grows to manhood, ever straining under the island's blood feuds and the constant hectoring of his greedy Great Uncle Uriah; the self-proclaimed king of the realm.
“I wants fur to be yur sharesman,” answered David.
“Us works here on Rockbound.”
“I knows how to work.”
“Knows how to work an’ brung up on de Outposts!” jeered Uriah. “Us has half a day’s work done ’fore de Outposters rub sleep out o’ dere eyes, ain’t it!”
“I knows how to work,” repeated the boy stubbornly.
“Where’s yur gear an’ clothes at?”
“I’se got all my gear an’clothes on me,” said David, grinning down at his buttonless shirt, ragged trousers, and bare, horny feet “but I owns yon dory: I salvaged her from de sea an’ beat de man what tried to steal her from me.”
Uriah’s eyes showed a glint of interest.
Onto this framework, author Frank Parker Day grafts vivid descriptions of the land and sea; the back breaking work of fishing and the cleaning of the catch; and the daily routines of the men and women who would choose this life. The most interesting scenes (for me, at least) were when characters would share the local folklore: describing famous haunts; the shenanigans of Johnny Publicover,the local ghost catcher; and even a conversation with the devil himself.
Well, you'se heard how nigh de Sanford ghost was to ruinin' Sanford. He had all de women an' children skeert, an' de men, too, an' dey was dat skeert, dey was goin' to give up dere fish stands an' move to oder parts o' de main or maybe some o' de islands. Why, dat ghost use' to roll beach rocks down de front hallway when de men folks was away, an' naught but women and children huddled roun' de kitchen stove, and snatch gals away from dere fellers on dark roads, an' he were dat audacious he use to whang on de back o' de church at evening meetin'. One night he gits dat bold, he reach in t'rough de back winder wid a brown skinny arm an' put a glass o' rum on de side o' de pulpit when de minister was a-preachin' a sermon on temperance. Warn't dat audacious?Parker Day also included a fictionalised account of a contemporaneous shipwreck, lost at sea in a sudden hurricane:
The vessel, deep-laden, was travelling at the rate of twenty knots, and a tooth of black bottom rock whipped bottom and keelson from her as cleanly as a boy with a sharp jackknife slits a shaving from a pine stick. Two thousand quintals of split fish and the unwetted salt dropped down upon the yellow sands; out came the spars with a rending crash, and deck and upper hull turned over. Within ten seconds of her striking, every man of the crew was in the sea. Away they went, young Martin still lashed to a bit of bulwark among them, poor scraps of humanity, weighed down with soaked clothing and long boots; a flash of yellow oilskins, hoarse cries that made no sound in the fierce tumult, and they were gone. Some swam a stroke or two, some clung for an instant to trailing rigging or broken dory, but few clung long in that mad breaking sea.Winner of Canada Reads for 2005, with Rockbound Parker Day has memorialised a long gone time and place and I completely enjoyed my time revisiting that world. I note quite a few reviewers say that they couldn't get past the idiosyncratic dialogue and that's why I include samplings of it here; surely that's not incomprehensible to all? I enjoyed every bit of it.
- The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder
- Wintersmoon by Hugh Walpole
- Swan Song by John Galsworthy
- The Greene Murder Case by S. S. Van Dine
- Bad Girl by Viña Delmar
- Claire Ambler by Booth Tarkington
- Old Pybus by Warwick Deeping
- All Kneeling by Anne Parrish
- Jalna by Mazo de la Roche
- The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg by Louis Bromfield
And of those, I can only imagine myself reading the Wilder. Of course, I have an interest in the South Shore of Nova Scotia, as that is where my father is from and where my parents retired to. It's funny that when I read in the endnotes of Rockbound that Parker Day eventually retired to Lake Annis, I assumed that was the same place as Annis Lake, which is attached to the lake my parents live on. But no. Lake Annis and Annis Lake are two very different places, in two different counties. Only in Nova Scotia.
