Emily Chesley, 1904, London, Ontario
(addressing the first Canadian Congress of Speculationists)

Emily of new meanderings

Emily Chutney Chesley is not a typical historical heroine for London, Ontario. Nor is she a typical Victorian "lady." For starters, her background is, well, uncommonly common.

Emily's father was an Irish sergeant famous for drunkenness before he died in battle. Her four aunts were, ah, ladies-of-the-night. Her uncle was an inventor extraordinaire who often had to make tracks because of scandals erupting, literally sometimes, from his inventions.

Early on, Emily revealed her lifelong proclivities: a knee-bending weakness for men, a nasty penchant for "outbursts" (one of which may — or may not — have ignited the great Chicago fire), a legendary defiance of convention. and a fervent need to break every taboo known to man.

When Emily was a tender — but definitely not virginal — eighteen, she was away at school when bandits attacked and murdered her mother.  In The Meanderings of the Emily Chesley Reading Circle, which brings Part One of Emily's heretofore-unknown biography to Londoners - her sad trip home on that occasion vividly illustrates her larger-than-life charms.

"It was on this Great Trek, as the boys often referred to it, that Emily found a new object for her voracious affection and comfort for her broken heart — the Mountie. Emily's 'curvaceous buttocks' quivered like delighted gelatin when she beheld any man astride a horse wearing the becoming red jacket and outlandish pants that comprised the Mountie uniform. Any Mountie. and for some strange reason his horse, were equally delighted to see Emily."

It seems fitting, somehow, that four men are primarily responsible for bringing Emily's amazing story to light. Coauthors of The Meanderings. Mark Rayner, John Sloan, David Lurie, and Malcolm Ruddock, along with other members of the Emily Chesley Reading Circle, have devoted five years to restoring "one of Canada's speculative treasures." For, like them, Emily was a writer of speculative — or highly imaginative — fiction that satirized her era.

"If you look at the stories she was writing at the time, a lot of them are a commentary on London society," Rayner opines. "The moral outrage several of the characters (in her biography) display towards Emily's work — you still see some of those attitudes today."

A medley of Emily's provocative short stories and "poems" also appear in The Meanderings, along with stories by winners of the 2001 and 2002 Tundra Prize. The Maximilian Tundra Memorial Poetry and Short Speculative Fiction Contest is held annually by the Reading Circle to promote speculative fiction and the satirical and philosophical themes Emily espoused.

There is no doubt, however, that the focus of The Meanderings is Emily. Her effervescent personality permeates every page and shapes every story. Her adventures are so extraordinary that you can't help but smile and wonder whatever will happen next.

"It's naughty. It's in questionable taste in places ... but it's quite a bit of fun," says Rayner about the The Meanderings. Emily Chutney Chesley would surely have been thrilled.

— Susan Scott, Scene Magazine
--December 4, 2003
read a scan of the original article

The Emily Chesley Reading Circle is a group of "scholars" and bon-vivants pledged to further the study of Emily Chesley, a speculative fiction writer of the late Victorian period (who lived for some time in the London, Ontario region), who has been long-overlooked by Canadian literature. Our research includes the history, literature, science and speculative fiction, parody and humor of Emily Chesley; we also examine the life of her "uncle", the quirky inventor Michael Flannigan. Indeed, the Circle also studies many of the other literary, historical and scientific figures they met in their lives, such as J.R.R. Tolkein, Lewis Carroll and Mahatma Gandhi.

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