Lost Classics

The editors of "Brick "had the idea of celebrating the new century by asking contributors to the much-loved journal for short essays about their favourite " lost classics" books they treasured and would love to pass on to friends, but that are, for all intents and purposes, forgotten. The next issue contained 32 such essays - pithy, witty, passionate, surprising - which led to the idea of soliciting more, and celebrating again with a book. In "Lost Classics" you will find Margaret Atwood on sex and death in the scandalous "Doctor Glas," first published in Sweden in 1905; Russell Banks on the off-beat travelogue "Too Late to Turn Back" by Barbara Greene - the " slightly ditzy" cousin of Graham; Robert Creeley, who admits that his choice - David Rattray's "How I Became One of the Invisible" - was never quite found, let alone lost; Helen Garner on the delightfully sinister Australian children's epic, "The Journey of the Stamp Animals." You will also find Derek Lundy on two square-rigger sea tales by Frank T. Bullen; Sarah Sheard's hilarious ruminations on "Down and Out in the Woods: An Airman's Guide to Survival in the Bush"; as well as Wayne Johnston on two lost classics of Newfoundland; Ronald Wright on William Golding; Susan Musgrave on A.E. Housman; Jane Rule on Lucrecia P. Hale; Bill Richardson on a children's book for adults by Russell Hoban; Rudy Wiebe's moving appreciation of "The Highwayman" by Alfred Noyes; Harry Matthews on the rarest book he ever stole, and much, much more. "Lost Classics" includes approximately 80 contributors, with brief biographies of each, including an introduction and lost classics by the Brick editors themselves.