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The Big Idea in Canadian history circles in 2013 was probably the Warrior Nation.

It popped up most provocatively in the 2012 book by Ian McKay and Jamie Swift, Warrior Nation: Rebranding Canada in an Age of Anxiety, but it also figures in the complaints about the federal government's War of 1812 commemorations and the reconceptualizing of the Canadian Museum of Civilization as the new Canadian Museum of History.

I wrote about this issue in a...

It is the time of year when the media is filled with lists of the "best" books of the year so I thought I'd try something a little different. Here are my favourite blogs about Vancouver history, in no particular order.

Not so long ago I mentioned Lani Russwurm's new book, Vancouver Was Awesome, which is a follow on from his blog of the same name. Lani tells great stories about city personalities and...

Much of last week I spent preparing an index for my latest book, an illustrated history of prohibition in Canada titled Closing Time: Prohibition, Rum-runners and Border Wars. It will appear next autumn from my friends at Stanton, Atkins and Dosil. Indexing is pretty much the last job before the manuscript goes off to the printer.

Given that indexing, while necessary, is also finicky, time-consuming and boring, most writers have someone else do it for them. But I...

So often when one is travelling the most popular tourist sites turn out to be the most disappointing.

In Vienna recently I took the train out to visit the Schonbrunn Palace, home to the Habsburgs until their empire crumbled during World War One. It is apparently the most visited site in Austria but I was disappointed, make that angry, at the banality of the interpretation. Walking through the spacious rooms, audio guide pressed to my ear, I was treated to a barrage of trivial...

Friday evening found me downtown at the annual Mayor's Arts Awards. This year's award for achievement in the literary arts went to my pal George Fetherling so I went along to raise the general noise level.

The Science Centre is a weird venue for such an event, formal and distant. But host Bill Richardson was his usual...