Tag: Canadian history

January 30, 2024

An Interview with Rick Fehr About Canada’s Supernatural History

In this interview, academic and podcaster, Rick Fehr shares some of Canada’s supernatural history exploring some of the strange mysteries that have haunted Canada’s past. Rick Fehr‘s interest in the supernatural has been a longstanding part of his life. Growing up in a town known for an historic poltergeist, the paranormal was normal. Surrounded by good storytellers, Rick’s upbringing was...

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July 1, 2017

Canada Day Complexities and Questioning the 150

By Derek Newman-Stille Like many marginalized Canadians, Canada Day can evoke some complicated feelings. We are often very aware of the oppressions that have been carried out in the name of “Canada”: residential schools for aboriginal people, asylums that perpetuated the torture of people with disabilities, the Pink scare, bathhouse raids, and other attacks on queer Canadians, the razing of...

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May 31, 2016

Putting the Punk Back in Steampunk

Putting the Punk Back in Steampunk A review of Clockwork Canada: Steampunk Fiction Edited by Dominik Parisien (Exile Editions, 2016) By Derek Newman-Stille Steampunk has often struck me as a genre that has tended toward overly rosey views of the Edwardian and Victorian Eras. The steampunk tales I have read have often uncritically represented colonialism as adventure, portrayed technology divorced...

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December 14, 2015

Golden Age Superheroes in Modernity

Golden Age Superheroes in ModernityA Review of Epic Canadiana Volume 1 by Cloudscape Comics, edited by Bevan Thomas. By Derek Newman-Stille Epic Canadiana volume 1 delightfully connects the golden age of Canadian comics (the origin of the Canadian superhero comic) with modernity, creating a link through Canadian comic book history. Epic Canadiana re-introduces readers to an aged Johnny Canuck, modelled...

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January 3, 2015

A Mosaic of Stories

A review of Steve Vernon and Colleen Anderson’s Tesseracts Seventeen: Speculating Canada from Coast to Coast to Coast (Edge 2013) By Derek Newman-Stille It is very exciting to see one of the prestigious Tesseracts books sharing a name with this website. I was quite honoured to see that they had chosen a name that matched the name I created for...

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October 26, 2014

Speculating Canada on Trent Radio Episode 22 Part 2: An Interview with Rachel Richey

At Fan Expo Canada, I ran into Rachel Richey, part of the dynamic duo of women who brought back Nelvana of the Northern Lights. We had a chance to talk about her latest project, bringing the WWII era Johnny Canuck comics back into the public eye, recovering this lost figure in Canadian comic book superhero history. We had a chance...

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July 14, 2014

Speculating Canada on Trent Radio Episode 11: Nelvana of the Northern Lights

For this episode of Speculating Canada on Trent Radio I examine Canada’s first superheroine Nelvana of the Northern Lights. Dressed in Blue and Green with a fur-trimmed skirt and green cape with northern lights dancing around her headband she flew around wielding the powers of the Northern Lights to keep Canada safe from invasion, pollution, and destruction while venturing into...

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July 10, 2014

Resurrecting a Goddess

A review of Adrian Dingle’s Nelvana of the Northern Lights (reprinted by Rachel Richey and Hope Nicholson, CGA Comics, 2014) By Derek Newman-Stille Resurrecting a goddess is hard work, particularly when she is the demi-goddess first Canadian national superheroine, pre-dating the invention of Wonder Woman… but this is precisely what Hope Nicholson and Rachel Richey did this year. Through a...

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September 27, 2013

Interview with Hope Nicholson and Rachel Richey about Nelvana of the Northern Lights

An Interview with Hope Nicholson and Rachel Richey About Nelvana of the Northern Lights By Derek Newman-Stille I met Hope Nicholson and Rachel Richey at the recent Fan Expo Canada where they revealed that they were working on an archival project about the Canadian comic book character Nelvana of the Northern Lights, one of the world’s first superheroines in a...

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September 22, 2013

Upcoming Interview About Nelvana of the Northern Lights with Hope Nicholson and Rachel Richey on Friday September 27th

Have you ever heard of Nelvana of the Northern Lights? Did you know that Canada had one of the first superheroines, predating other women in superheroic roles like Wonder Woman, and paving the way for women in comics? Since so few people know about the history of Nelvana of the Northern Lights, Hope Nicholson and Rachel Richey were inspired to...

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