Love Strong as Death: Lucy Peel’s Canadian Journal, 1833-1836 (Studies in Childhood and Family in Canada) - Softcover

J.I. Little is a professor of history at Simon Fraser University. He has published four previous books and thirty journal articles on the history of the Eastern Townships during the nineteenth century.

``Love Strong as Death is the unabridged, annotated collection of Lucy Peel's journals home. And this little volume is a real treasure. For the first time we have an extensive and often quite detailed account of everyday life of British settlers on the Lower Canadian frontier, interspersed with commentary about the social and cultural mores of the community. What is more extraordinary is that Love Strong as Death recovers a voice `rarely heard in the official records' and offers a glimpse into one woman's world of emigration and settlement.... Historians of nineteenth-century colonial life, women's and social historians, and the general reader are fortunate that Little was able to persuade the Peel family to publish these recently discovered journals. And Jack Little is to be congratulated for bringing them to our attention.'' (Jane Errington The Canadian Historical Review, 83:4, 2002)

``Unlike Moodie and Traill, Lucy Peel was not a professional writer, and her intended audience was only her family. Nonetheless, her account of life in the strange new world is vivid and ultimately affecting to a contemporary reader, and will provide historians with many insights into domestic and social life, particularly for upperclass women, in pre-Confederation Canada...fascinating reading and will no doubt aid historical research into the period.'' (Moira Farr University Affairs, December 2001)

``Little's meticulous editing makes Love Strong as Death an important addition to our knowledge of the writing of early settlers and to the history of women's writing in Canada.... Peel's ironic retelling of anecdotes sometimes makes her writing lively, and, with Little's contextualization, stories about events like the death of her first child are memorable and historically significant, making this publication worthwhile.'' (Julie Rak Canadian Literature, 178, Autumn 2003)

``Peel's journal, which was recently discovered in a descendant's house in Norwich, is a welcome addition to the published letters and diaries of her Upper Canadian counterparts, not least because it helps to broaden geographically our understanding of the pioneer experience in the 1830s.'' (Lori Williamson British Journal of Canadian Studies, Vol. 16, No. 3, 2003)

``The domestic details are fascinating.... Eminently readable.'' (Montreal Review of Books, Spring/Summer 2002)

``Increasingly women's voices are becoming part of the historical record of social and family relaitons. Lucy Peel's Canadian Journal, depicting life in the Eastern Townships of Quebec in the early 1830s, is a unique and valuable addition to this literature.... [The journal] presents a rich and engaging commentary upon a privileged but hardworking and remarkably competent colonial couple and their associates. One is reminded of another Canadian colonial commentator, Susanna Moodie, but without the disillusionment which corroded the latter's earlier enthusiasm.... Peel's style is engaging [and she] offers real insight into the bonds which shaped family and community among early nineteenth-century immigrants. Little and Wilfrid Laurier University Press are to complimented for their decision to bring this rich source of colonial life and women's history to a wider audience.'' (Marguerite Van Die International History Review, XXI: 2, September 2002)