Date/Time
Date(s) - Mon Mar 24 2025
2:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Notes:
Join historian and writer Zac Robinson to explore the real and imagined geography of what is perhaps Canada’s most well-known mountaineering poem, Earle Birney’s 1941 “David”: a story about a climber who, after making the top of a finger-like spire in Banff’s Sawback Range, fell fifteen metres to a narrow ledge, was severely injured, and then would be pushed off that ledge by his friend in an act of mercy. This hauntingly beautiful fiction – one of lost youth and friendship – has a gripping real-world context, with just as many, if not more, historical twists and turns (and falls too!). History, culture, and literature collide with local mountaineering in this new re-examination of Birney’s iconic poem.
About Dr. Zac Robinson:
Zac Robinson is a historian and Associate Professor in the Faculty of Kinesiology, Sport, and Recreation at the University of Alberta, where he teaches and writes about mountain history and literature. His book projects include Conrad Kain: Letters from a Wandering Mountain Guide, Mountain Voices: The Mountain Legacy Project and a Century of Change in Western Canada (co-edited with Eric Higgs), and a forthcoming co-authored monograph, with Stephen Slemon, Behind the Ranges: A History of Early Climbing in the Canadian Rockies. Robinson is a Governor and Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, a co-editor of the Alpine Club of Canada’s State of the Mountains Report, and a regular contributor to both the Canadian Alpine Journal and Canadian Geographic. He lives in Edmonton, Alberta.