Word: brebner
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DOUBTING THOMAS, by Winston Brebner. A brief, deceptively simple novel whose hero, a clown, brings a timely reminder that the fatal flaw of any totalitarian regime is its congenitally inhuman disregard of humanity's best impulses...
DOUBTING THOMAS (210 pp.)-Winston Brebner-Rinehart...
...that Agent Thomas must be an imposter pretending to be Clown. He is persecuted by The Agency for being Clown. In scenes that strongly recall the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, Thomas is first brought to despair and then raised to ecstasy. Through a neat twist of his plot, Novelist Brebner turns the tables on The Agency and restores Thomas to his rightful place. The happy ending-inconceivable in Orwell's 1984 or Kafka's The Castle-is in happy accord with the love of man which shines through Brebner's artfully simple writing. To a world...
Canadians, said Brebner, should not be so intolerant of change and "intellectual and esthetic eccentricity." The countries which succeed best in keeping their ablest citizens at home are "those which have given free scope to their poets, artists, philosophers, scholars, inventors; adventurers, and other rebels, critics and innovators. . . . Canadians would do well to make special efforts to understand any freakish compatriot who seems to be receiving more attention abroad than at home...
...levels for Canadian educators, added Educator Brebner, are "stupid"-most Canadian scholars and teachers are paid so little "that a very large proportion of their potential usefulness is continuously being poured down the sewer of . . . drudgery and hackwork for other income." Thus they yield quickly when American universities and laboratories beckon. "One can predict the uproar in the press and parliaments of Canada if the United States tried to buy a single Canadian island. . . . But the never-ending loss of scholars passes without comment...