Selections from Canadian Poets

Selections from Canadian Poets set an important precedent when it was published in 1864. It was the first anthology of native Canadian poetry and was compiled, as Edward Hartlet Dewart explained, in order to 'rescue from oblivion some of the floating pieces of Canadian authorship worthy of preservation in a more permanent form ...' This anthology, like any other, reflects the tastes of the anthologist and the tenor of the times. Pre-confederation poets had deeply felt ties with other countries f