History of Canada - recommendations?

July 15, 2015 10:00 PM

Are there any good, entertaining, well-written single-volume histories of Canada? After years of promising myself to do it, I want to learn more about Canadian history. I remember some vague facts from junior high school but ask me about Confederation and I'm mumble city. I'm looking for a survey history, maybe even a good textbook perhaps. Suggestions?

I've gotten recommendations for "Canadian History for Dummies" and "A Brief History of Canada" from a previous Ask about Canadian history books.

posted by storybored to Society & Culture (10 answers total)

"Canadian History for Dummies" (by Will Ferguson) is phenomenal and much better than you would expect it to be. I can't praise it enough, really. Good, entertaining, well-written, and basically a textbook - thorough and progressively sensitive.
posted by flex at 10:12 PM on July 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

While Canadian History for Dummies is definitely not the worst, I really wouldn't call it "progressively sensitive" if that's a priority for the reader. I took a crack at it a few years ago, and while there was a lot I liked (and it was miles ahead of my high school education in a predominantly white school), there was a fair bit of deliberately flip stuff that really turned me off as an aboriginal reader - and wording that made it clear it was written for a white anglo audience.
posted by northernish at 11:03 PM on July 15, 2015

Chester Brown's graphic biography Louis Riel explores a single event from Canada's hisory in great detail. Not the overview you're looking for, but a great read.
posted by biddeford at 11:05 PM on July 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

I would like to hear northernish's opinion but Pierre Berton's books are very good. I'm sure they may be a little out of date by now but he employed historians as researchers and the writing is quite good.

Of course, not single volume. It would be hard to capture the history of a country as diverse as Canada in a single book.
posted by Nevin at 11:10 PM on July 15, 2015

John Ralston Saul's book A Fair Country might be worth your time. Not a "single volume history" in any sense, but he digs around some of that complexity and diversity. More of a rethinking of how we think of ourselves.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 11:48 PM on July 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

Canada: A People's History is not a book, let alone a single volume, but the episodes I saw were good.
posted by girlpublisher at 3:36 AM on July 16, 2015

Desmond Morton - A Short History of Canada

Robert Bothwell - The Penguin History of Canada

Both authors are very well respected academic historians. Morton is professor of history at McGill University. Bothwell is professor of history at the University of Toronto. The Bothwell book is a bit longer, but both are single volume books.
posted by obscure simpsons reference at 9:11 AM on July 16, 2015

While not a single volume - I don't think Canada's history can really be summed up in a single book, mostly because there is no one "Canada" - Pierre Berton's books are must-reads. He will be forever beloved among Canadian historians for hiring actual historians to do the research for his well-written, engaging books.
posted by Nevin at 9:30 AM on July 16, 2015

Response by poster: Thanks everyone! Lots to check out. In digging further, I also ran across, Conrad Black's Rise to Greatness: A History of Canada. Anyone have an opinion on it?
posted by storybored at 1:36 PM on July 16, 2015

I also highly recommend any of John Ralston Saul's nonfiction work, about Canada or anything else.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 9:01 PM on July 16, 2015