For their contributions to this book I am grateful to the following: Lee Robinson, for her ongoing advice and encouragement; Janet Irving and Peter Robinson, for their patience and support; Peter Day, Jan Geddes, and Greg Kelly, for their helpful suggestions; Veronique Naster for her expertise in childrearing; Alex Schultz, for his scrupulous eye; and Ellen Seligman, for editorial assistance above and beyond the call of duty.
I would also like to thank Mary Di Menna, Rosella Mattei, Lily Policella, and Elizabeth Puglia, with whom I worked in 1979 researching the history of the Italian community in the Leamington, Ontario, area, and Professor Walter Temelini, who oversaw that research and from whose writings I drew one of this book’s epigraphs.
The epigraph from Crime and Punishment follows the Constance Garnett translation (Modern Library).
For their financial support over the seven years in which this book and the trilogy it forms part of have been taking shape I thank the Explorations Program of the Canada Council, the Multiculturalism Directorate of the Secretary of State, the Ontario Arts Council, and the Arts Award Service of the Canada Council.