Speaker Biographies

She also teaches "Applied Food History" for George Brown College, serves as Past President of the Culinary Historians of Ontario, and writes the "Food Roots" column for Edible Toronto.

She was the first student to register at the newly created University of Prince Edward Island in 1969 and, from 1995 to 1998, served as its first woman president. She was named Professor Emerita in 2007.

Dr. Epperly has written dozens of articles and six books, including Through Lover's Lane: L.M. Montgomery's Photography and Visual Imagination (UTP, 2007) and has curated four Montgomery exhibitions. Founding chair of the L.M. Montgomery Institute, she serves on its International Advisory Board and on the Anne of Green Gables Licensing Authority. In 2008, Penguin will release her latest book, Imagining Anne: L.M. Montgomery's Island Scrapbooks.

She is the author and editor of eight books including Looking for Anne: How Lucy Maud Montgomery Dreamed Up A Literary Classic (Toronto: Key Porter, New York: St. Martin's Press, 2008), Baroness Elsa-A Cultural Biography (voted one of the top 25 books of 2002 by New York's Village Voice) and several scholarly books of essays, including Making Avonlea (PEI Heritage Award) and The Intimate Life of L. M. Montgomery.

She is the curator of the exhibit Anne of Green Gables: A Canadian Icon at 100 in venues in Vancouver, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Toronto, and Prince Edward Island, May 1, 2008 — March 1, 2009.

He is a graduate of the University of Toronto (B.A. and B.L.S.) and Johns Hopkins University (M.A.), and has been researching a detailed descriptive bibliography of the English language editions and printings of L.M. Montgomery's books for several years. As a result of his research, he has given papers to conferences of the Bibliographical Society of Canada and to the International L.M. Montgomery Conference at the University of Prince Edward Island. In 2004, the Bibliographical Society of Canada awarded him their Marie Tremaine Fellowship in recognition of his important work on the Montgomery bibliography. While engaged in this task, he also is building up the research collection of books in the L.M. Montgomery Collection at Guelph.

Bernard's other scholarly and bibliographical interests include book history, copyright law, intellectual freedom and travel literature.

He is also a Research Associate at the Modern Literature and Culture Research Centre (Ryerson University) and at the Centre for Research in Young People's Texts and Cultures (University of Winnipeg). The editor of Reassessments of L.M. Montgomery (2004), a special double issue of Canadian Children's Literature / Littérature canadienne pour la jeunesse, he has published widely on L.M. Montgomery, most recently in Diversity and Change: Early Canadian Women Writers (2008) and Storm and Dissonance: L.M. Montgomery and Conflict (2008). In addition to preparing Montgomery's rediscovered final novel, The Blythes Are Quoted, for publication, he is editing, with Irene Gammel, a collection of essays on Anne of Green Gables for University of Toronto Press. Web: http://roomofbensown.net/.

He holds degrees from the University of Guelph (BA), the University of New Brunswick (MA), and the University of Toronto(MLS). Previously he held positions at the University of Waterloo and McMaster University.

Mr. Ridley has served as President of the Canadian Association for Information Science, President of the Ontario Library Association, member of the Board of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries and Chair of the Ontario Council of University Libraries. He is currently on the Board of Directors of the Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) and the Canadian University Council of Chief Information Officers (CUCCIO). In 2007 he was named "Academic Librarian of the Year" by the Ontario College and University Library Association (OCULA), a division of the Ontario Library Association (OLA). In 2008 he was awarded the newly renamed "Larry Moore OLA Distinquished Service Award" from the Ontario Library Association.

She was a student in Honours English at UWO and the University of Toronto. Her research interests include reading, and the reading experience, and her many publications include a report on what readers find in the work of L.M. Montgomery. She is co-author of Reading Matters and author of a biography of Alice Munro, that has been translated and re-issued in large print format.

Awards for her writings include a Science Writers of Canada Award for Squares: Shapes in Math, Science and Nature. Catherine's wit and common sense have made her a popular moderator and panelist at many international conferences.

She is a graduate of DePauw University (BA), the University of Illinois (MA), and McMaster University (PhD). She has taught Canadian and children's literature since 1967 and is now a University Professor Emeritus of English at University of Guelph.

Dr. Rubio is editor of The Genesis of Grove's (1983), and Harvesting Thistles: the Textual Garden of L.M. Montgomery (1994), and co-editor (with Glenys Stow) of Kanata: An Anthology of Canadian Children's Literature (1976).

Mary and fellow professor Elizabeth Waterston have collaborated on writing and editing projects since 1975 at the University of Guelph. They are co-authors of Writing a Life: L.M. Montgomery, published in 1995, and co-editors of all five volumes of Lucy Maud Montgomery's Journals (published 1985-2004) as well as the Norton Critical Edition of Anne of Green Gables, published in 2007. Mary is also co-founder and former editor (with Elizabeth Waterston) of the Canadian Children's Literature: A Journal of Criticism and Review.

She holds an M.A. in English Literature and a Master of Library Science degree, both from the University of Western Ontario. Helen is the coordinator for the L.M.M. Research Centre Web site project, with responsibility for identifying, developing and editing the content of the Web site and for ensuring its accuracy and searchability.

She is also engaged in maintaining and adding to the Web site "Bibliography" of works written about Lucy Maud Montgomery, and in overseeing digitization and indexing of the Library’s LMM archival holdings which will be made available through the OurOntario digital collections gateway (www.ourontario.ca).

Paul currently teaches a range of courses in both the Theatre and English programs in the School of English Studies at the University of Guelph and has taught courses in the Media Program at the University of Guelph-Humber since the inception of that institution. He is also Undergraduate Theatre Coordinator in SETS, Associate Chair of the University's Research Ethics Board and a member of the Senate Committee on Open Learning. Paul's current research interests include film director Orson Welles and contemporary national cinemas, particular Canadian and British film. He has published on a wide range of flimmakers, including Alan Clarke, Spike Lee, and Federico Fellini. His article on the trailer for Orson Welles' Citizen Kane receently appeared in the Canadian Journal of Film Studies. He has also contributed several pieces to the online film journal Offscreen.

In Canada, she serves on several corporate boards, including CTVglobemedia, Canada's premier multimedia company with ownership in CTV and The Globe and Mail; Gluskin Sheff & Associates, an investment and wealth management firm; and Oilsands Quest, an energy development company. Pamela is a member of a special Advisory Board for BMO Harris Bank, a co-Chair of the National Strategy Council for the Mazankowski Alberta Heart Institute and a Board member of the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research.

Pamela was recently named an Officer of the Order of Canada. In 2006, she completed four years as the Consul General of Canada in New York. On March 6, 2007 the University of Guelph Senate elected Pamela Wallin as the 7th Chancellor of the University of Guelph since its founding in 1964.

She received her PhD in literature in 2007. In her doctoral thesis "A Tide of Poetry: Collections of Poetry Published in Sweden 1976–1995" she studies the position of poetry in the Swedish book publishing industry in the late 20th century. Warnqvist has taught courses in children's literature, the Swedish publishing industry, and information science at Uppsala University. She is also a critic of children's literature in the Swedish daily newspaper Svenska Dagbladet.

Warnqvist's new research project, "L. M. Montgomery in Sweden", studies the importance of Montgomery's work to Swedish critics, readers and writers. Among other things she looks at how well the books of Montgomery sold in Sweden, how they were received by the critics and the readers, and which Swedish authors Montgomery has influenced and how. Warnqvist has presented results from her new project at three international conferences in Sweden and Canada.

Elizabeth Waterston and fellow professor Mary Rubio have collaborated on writing and editing projects since 1975 at the University of Guelph. They are co-authors of Writing a Life: L.M. Montgomery, published in 1995, and co-editors of all five volumes of Lucy Maud Montgomery's Journals (published 1985-2004) as well as the Norton Critical Edition of Anne of Green Gables, published in 2007. Elizabeth is also co-founder and former editor (with Mary Rubio) of the Canadian Children's Literature: A Journal of Criticism and Review. Elizabeth recently published Magic Island: the Fictions of L.M. Montgomery, an exploration of the "magic" of artistic creation in Montgomery's writings.

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