Edited by author 06-22-2004 03:42 PM
W.O. Mitchell's "Who Has Seen the Wind" remains prophetically Canadian. Some of the characters in it - with comments, in their own words or words describing them -parallel precisely the personalities and political posturings of present-day pretenders.

Liberal: School principal James Digby ("security from actual want, but not security from the nagging little worries of not quite enough money").

Conservative: Doctor Peter Svarich ("his need for respect and attention and his distrust of it when it was given him").

NDP: School teacher Ruth Thompson ("ain't been in the town two months an' she's tryin' to run things").

Green Party: Saint Sammy Belterlaben ("there is sorra an' sighin' over the facea the prairie - herb an' the seed thereof thirsteth after the water which don't cometh!")