Balancing Act

A Letter to America (Margaret Atwood) 

Confused and saddened is Margaret Atwood’s attitude towards our southern brother in her essay “A Letter to America”. Atwood remembers an era gone by as she reminisces about the days of her childhood, and later, her years as a young adult with many references to her favourite parts of American culture.  Atwood segues to her political views of America’s involvement in Iraq and her feelings on the US’ disintegrating culture. Overall, Atwood summarizes her uniquely Canadian point of view by saying that she is dissatisfied with the changes America has undergone since her childhood and young adult years.

The purpose of this beautiful piece of writing is to discuss the massive changes America went through from about the 1940’s to the 2000’s. Atwood sees many of these changes as negative. When she presents questions to Americans (such as “when did you become so scared?”) and by comparing the America she knew in her childhood to the America of today, she really paints a picture of how America’s values have drastically declined. With Canada being so closely tied to America, through our historical ties, and geographical proximity and cultural similarities, could it be said that we too have changed for the worse?

An interesting point concerning this article is how Atwood relates the years of her youth so closely to American culture, and with no reference to Canadian culture, that of her homeland. This is especially evident in the line “We're like Romanized Gauls -- look like Romans, dress like Romans, but aren't Romans -- peering over the wall at the real Romans. What are they doing? Why? What are they doing now?” The truth of this statement hits home, even today. Canadians strive to balance on a precarious line between being Canadian and not being American. With American culture so evident in everything we do, it is hard to remain Canadian. However, we strive to be like the Americans. We are constantly looking at them; questioning what they are doing and asking why, still we do not want to be them, only to be like them. With this balancing act a constant in daily life for many Canadians, I would not be surprised if we lost a true definition of what it is to be Canadian, at least culturally.

While Canada and America are almost identical culturally, we have had decidedly different ways of dealing with very similar problems. Atwood makes mention of how Americans are “torching their economy” and running scared, while Canada really hasn’t had such drastic problems. However, if America continues down this road, and like “Marley’s Ghost” figure out too late that mankind should be everyone’s business, who’s to say that Canadians won’t suffer a joint fate with Americans? Atwood says “people around the world will stop admiring the good things about you. They'll decide that your city upon the hill is a slum and your democracy is a sham, and therefore you have no business trying to impose your sullied vision on them. They'll think you've abandoned the rule of law. They'll think you've fouled your own nest.” Canada and Canadians alike are so closely tied to America and her fate. If America goes “down the drain” so to speak, do you think Canada will go with her?