Rudy Wiebe and the Historicity of the Word

In her entertaining study of Rudy Wiebe's novels, Penny van Toorn presents a new way of reading his work. She analyzes Wiebe's struggle to control the "socially contested territory" of language and principles that underlie his complex narrative structures. Drawing on Wiebe's manuscript materials, interviews, and Wiebe's Mennonite background, history, and political values, van Toorn gives the first real answer to his famous question: "Where is the voice coming from?"