The American Drifter - A Canadian Thinking Out Loud

This week I became aware for the first time of Townes Van Zandt and his music.  On YouTube, in listening to a few of his songs, and after having seen a documentary film on his life, I was thinking about his place in American culture and sub culture.

It immediately struck me that in the American narrative, there is a strong mythic theme of the (male) loner drifter.  Perhaps someone will enlighten me, but it seems like there is not similar recurrent archetype in the Canadian narrative.  If I am correct in this regard, it might explain why, while I can appreciate the lyrics and ideas expressed in Van Zandt songs, they at the same time seem to come from a place and a sensibility different than my own.  I listen with interest, but detachment.

Of course, there are all kinds of possible explanations for the fact that the songs apparently don't speak directly to my soul.  It could be because I have never been a drifter -- at least not in the fashion of Van Zandt.  Or that he sings mostly, it seems to me, from the basement of North American, while I live in the Attic.  His southern accent while familiar, is not my own or of my place.  And so on.  But it struck me also that in the Canadian literature, film, music traditions, there are mostly not recurrent characters like Van Zandt, or who generate the kind of reaction to being on the margins and on the road.  Canada, as far as I know, does not have a Jack Kerouac-like icon.

If I am correct in the above claim, let me hasten to add that I am not saying that Canada should have such an archetype as part of our collective narrative; the lack of celebration of such just struck me as I struggled to wonder why the music of Van Zandt did not immediately speak to me directly.  My head can appreciate the ideas about which his songs talk, but they don't reduced me to tears -- at least not so far.

I know that Canadian literature contains such characters, such as "Go Boy" by Roger Caron, or "Waste Heritage" by Irene Baird.  I am sure there are many others.  Perhaps even the film "Goin' Down the Road" by Donald Shebib is of this ilk.  But this nomadic sensibility does not seem to gain much of a foothold in the collective Canadian psyche.

If there was a Canadian equivalent, one certainly would not expect the Canadian soul-worn version to be as dust-caked and as southern-fried as a Townes Van Zandt; but the human parts of the experience likely would be very similar.  I am just wondering out loud whether or not we do, in fact, have a Canadian equivalent.  While I respect and celebrate Canadians musical artists such as Gordon Lightfoot, Leonard Cohen, Stan Rogers, folks such as these seem to me to most often reflect the Canadian archetype pointed out by Margaret Atwood in her book, "Survival".  The Canadian struggle seems mostly against the background of the Canadian geography (with a gentle nod toward Cohen's issues around religion).  Van Zandt's struggles seem to be related to the social world within which he drifted, and from which he was alienated. 

I need to listen and think more......