Summer People Provides a Current Reading of Prince Edward Island’s Social Issues

Trevor Corkum has written a collection of short stories examining the class and power struggles at the heart of cosmopolitan Island life.

Prince Edward Island as a microcosm

Trevor Corkum’s Summer People is a collection of short stories set in Prince Edward Island. The author explores issues of class, power, migration and resistance via the tensions between longtime islanders, new islanders, and summer visitors. The Island, with its impactful effect on relationships, is symbolically posited as a metaphor for the world—a hotbed of current issues, including migration, xenophobia, poverty, social exclusion, labour inequality, violence, political polarization and LGBTQ+ themes.

Moving away from bucolic clichés

Citing the Island’s growing and diversifying population, the collection also explores the phenomenon of immigration. Trevor Corkum wants to reframe Prince Edward Island in the imagination of Canadians as a complex and cosmopolitan area, far removed from the traditionally innocent and bucolic perspective.