How has the Dalnavert staff been passing time in lockdown? Below you’ll find the music, podcasts, books, and websites that are keeping us entertained. We hope you get some joy out of them as well!
Podcasts
Literature Out Loud: Listen to classic Victorian stories, accompanied by historical and cultural analysis by experts, with Dalnavert’s own Literature Out Loud podcast. Adults should check out the episodes on H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine, while kids can enjoy Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Museopunks: Suse Anderson interviews museum professionals and academics about the potential for progressive museum spaces.
ArtCurious: Hosted by Jennifer Dasal; fun introduction into art history.
Overdue: “Podcast about the books you’ve been meaning to read”.
Revisionist History: Hosted by Malcolm Gladwell; re-examining history.
Stuff You Missed in History Class: We recommend the old episodes, particularly the ones on The Bloody Benders or H.H. Holmes if you’re into old-timey true crime.
Books (Fiction)
The Law and the Lady by Wilkie Collins: Thought of as the “first full-length novel with a woman detective as its heroine,” The Law and the Lady follows Valeria Woodville as she tries to prove her husband’s innocence. Valeria’s “quest draws her into a maze of false clues and deceptive identities, in which the exploration of the tangled workings of the mind becomes linked to an investigation into the masquerades of femininity.”
People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks: “The story focuses on imagined events surrounding the protagonist and real historical past of the still extant Sarajevo Haggadah, one of the oldest surviving Jewish illuminated texts.”
Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice “A daring post-apocalyptic novel from a powerful rising literary voice. With winter looming, a small northern Anishinaabe community goes dark” (how topical).
Carson Crosses Canada by Linda Bailey and Kass Reich: This is a fun kids book in which Annie Magruder loads up her rattlebang car and sets off from her home in Tofino, BC with her dog Carson to visit her sister Elsie in Witless Bay, Newfoundland. Her journey across Canada is a nice introduction to the diverse geography and cultures of the country.
The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave: A historical fiction novel set in the 1600s on the tiny Arctic island of Vardø, in a fishing village where a storm has wiped away all the menfolk, leaving the women to rebuild their community. Their newfound strength is shaken, however, when the church’s suspicion of witchcraft begins to spread North. The stark seclusion of the setting, combined with the radical strength of the people who persevere despite this, offers a certain comfort as we head into our own cold months of isolation.
Coraline by Neil Gaiman: A darker look at an Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland type of story. For young adults, and young-at-heart adults.
Books (non-fiction)
Stolen City: Racial Capitalism and the Making of Winnipeg by Owen Toews: Stolen City offers an accessible but in-depth discussion of how settler colonialism and racial capitalism have shaped and reshaped the urban landscape of the City of Winnipeg over the past 150 years.
Prairie Fairies: A History of Queer Communities and People in Western Canada, 1930-1985 by Valerie J. Korinek: Focusing on several cities, including Winnipeg, Korinek examines the queer experience in rural and urban people in the prairies. Community, activism and the lived experience of queer people on the prairies challenges the normative perceptions of Winnipeg and prairie histories.
Black on Both Sides: A Racial History of Trans Identity by C. Riley Snorton: Focusing on the intersections of race and transness from the mid-19th century to present, Snorton outlines a thorough and often violent history of trans black people. As violence against black trans people continues and is sadly a near daily occurrence, Snorton’s book feels more important than ever.
The Whole Picture: The colonial story of the art in our museums & why we need to talk about it by Alice Procter: Known for her Uncomfortable Art Tours in London, Procter continues her quest to expose and acknowledge museum’s colonial histories. She encourages readers, and museum visitors, to question what is being told through museum collections, but also what is missing.
Rooster Town: The History of an Urban Métis Community, 1901–1961 by Adrian Werner, Evelyn J. Peters, and Matthew Stock: Rooster Town reconstructs the history of the Urban Métis settlement in Winnipeg, bringing light to the multiple instances of land dispossession that Métis faced during the evolution of the City of Winnipeg.
Songs and Ballads from Nova Scotia by Helen Creighton: Originally published in 1932, this is a collection of 150 folk songs from Nova Scotia which displays the rich heritage of the region, drawing as it does on Gaelic, English, German, Mi'kmaq, Acadian and African influences. The songs themselves are bawdy, bleak, funny and offensive. They include some unique versions of the Child ballads, and I enjoy it for the interpretations of Irish folk songs I grew up with. Having crossed an ocean and settled in the fisherman's cabins of Devil's Island, songs like The Cruel Mother become uncanny but no less enjoyable.
Websites
Dalnavert Museum Virtual Tour: Virtual Reality allows unprecedented access to our heritage house from the comfort of our visitors’ computers or mobile devices.
The Virtual Museum of Canada: Managed by the Canadian Museum of History, this website features digital exhibits from museums all over Canada.
Window Swap: Stuck inside? Open a new window somewhere in the world - WindowSwap gives you the ability to look through others’ windows.
Send in the Clowns: A showcase of Canadian clowns (featuring one of Dalnavert’s own staff members!)
Social Media Accounts
@VictorianHumour on Twitter: jokes from 19th-c books and newspapers.
@BlackCountryMuseum on TikTok: an open-air museum in the English countryside that’s always on top of the trends.
@historycoolkids on Instagram: showcases archival photos, videos, and textual material, while giving well-researched and entertaining context in the captions.
Music
Deep Listening by Pauline Oliveros, Stewart Dempster and Panaiotis: The pandemic has resulted in me listening to fewer podcasts and more music. This album was recorded in 1988 in a cistern 14 feet underground in Washington where the acoustics are, well, cavernous and damp. It's a bit like listening to music from inside a whale. It's at times unsettling, but the experience encourages the listener to calibrate their ears and sharpen their attention. This might be my second wave soundtrack.