MARGARET BUFFIE'S WEBSITE/BLOG

Wednesday, April 2, 2025

Hello! I am Margaret Buffie: Published Author, Artist, and Photographer.

This is the "Home Page" on my website. I lost this page somehow, (I have had computers for a long long time, and I still manage to mess something up now, and again! Lol. So I will try to keep it as lean as possible. But it will give you some information about my writing, my paintings and art, my photography, all the books of mine that were published in many countries and how they amazingly won many awards. And I will add the bits of information about what it is like to be a writer.

I was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada and grew up with my mother and my three sisters. After our wonderful father died when I was 12, (he was only in his early forties when he passed away with cancer; caused by the toxic paints and cleansers he work with as a lithographer.)

After his death, my brave mother was determined to hold onto our old two story brick house in the West End of Winnipeg; so her girls would not have to leave "home".

Mom took on two jobs in order to keep us in our much loved house. It was hard work for all of us for many years. But she kept her daughters in good form!

Once I was old about - about 15 - I got a job on weekends and in the summer at Eaton's on their switchboard. I worked there right through university and was able to use pay my way. Somehow, I managed to get a degree in Fine Art at the University of Manitoba. Instead of painting in a garret, I had to find a better job right after I graduated.

Somehow, I got a job as an apprentice fashion illustrator for the Hudson's Bay Company down the street from Eaton's. I still have some of the original art from my time there. In a a few years, I was the main artist there.

I married a fellow artist and we have one daughter. I wanted to be a stay at home mom when she was still young. During that time, I started writing just for fun. This happened from reading to her. When she was a teenager, I started reading the books she was reading and I discovered that some of the best writing I had ever read were stories written for early teens and young adults. I decided I would write a novel of my own for young adults.

A year later, after finishing my first manuscript, I sent it to a company in Toronto, Kids Can Press, and a few others. A week after I sent it out the owner of Kids Can Press called me, and said they would like to publish my new book, Who is Frances Rain? I was shocked! Beside myself! I had been gardening in the back yard and had just walked into the kitchen to get a drink and who was on the phone? Was this happening? Yes!

I was with KCP for over 25 years. They published all of novels except the last one, when sadly, they had already sold their company to someone who did not want to publish novels for old readers. My tenth book Winter Shadows was bought by Tundra Books in 2012.

My husband and I had recently bought a very old Winnipeg two-story house in a lovely treed area. He had gone through a serious cancer surgery, and he said he wanted to buy an old house and spend time working on it, as he had already built our wonderful cabin at the lake district in NW Ontario, and he wanted to focus on the old house. Fine by me! I adored that house.

As he was recovering, I did most of my writing in my office in that old house, during the winter and on the veranda of our lake cottage. It was a good life.

MY NOVELS

My books have been published (of course, in Canada) and also, in the USA, Norway, Italy, Japan, Australia, Great Britain, Germany, China, Korea and other countries.

My novels have been the recipient of the prestigious Vicky Metcalf Award for Body of Work (For Writing Inspirational to Canadian Youth): The Young adult Canadian Book Award; and three time winners of the McNally Robinson Book for Young People Award and have been shortlisted for many other awards and honours.

Readers, teachers and students can contact me at (mabuffie@yhaoo.ca)

AWARDS AND DISTINCTIONS

- SHORTLISTED: The Canadian Library Association's Book of the Year for Young People (WINTER SHADOWS)

- WINNER:  The Silver Nautilus Award for 2100, Teen Category, USA.
From their site: We look for distinguished literary and heartfelt contributions to spiritual growth, conscious living, high level wellness, green values, responsible leadership and positive social change, as well as to the worlds of art, creativity, and inspirational reading for adults, children, teens and young adults."
Winner's Books were featured at Book Expo America 2011  - (Winter Shadows)

Nominated: The 2013 Young Reader's Choice award:  sponsored by the Pacific Northwest Library Association, made up by the libraries from Alberta, British Columbia,
Montana and Washington. (Winter Shadows)

Shortlisted: McNally Robinson for Young People Award : Older Category 2011 - (Winter Shadows)

Nominated: Stellar Award - B.C's Teen Readers' Choice Awards, 2008/9
Novel (Out of Focus)

Chosen: Our Choice (Starred*) YA Fiction Novel (2007) by the Canadian Children's Book Centre (Out of FOCUS) "A star(*) and a book cover in the Our Choice Catalogue signify title of exceptional caliber.

Chosen: PLSA's Young Adult Top Forty Fiction List, 2006/7 (Out of Focus)

Nominated: 2007 McNally Robinson Book for Young People Award : (Out of Focus)

Chosen: OLA Best - Top Ten Canadian books For Young Adults (Out of Focus) Ontario Library Association

Nominated: The Snow Willow Award (Out of Focus) 2007

Winner: 2005 McNally Robinson Book for Young People (THE FINDER)***

Shortlisted 2003 McNally Robinson Book for Young People Award (THE SEEKER)

MORE TO COME>>>>

Wednesday, October 9, 2024

MY PAINTINGS OVER THE YEARS, AND MY NEW WORK AS WELL.

I have a Bachelor in Fine Arts, taught art in a high school, and have been painting for many years.

Joe Pye Weed in the Marsh
Oil Painting

Private Collection

Birch Clump and Misty Island
Oil Painting

Birches From My Veranda Window
Water Colour

Honey Fungus
(Armillaria solidipes Armillaria)

We lived in a 1909 House and we loved it! This was my garden.

Marsh Irises

Self Portrait

Arriving At Our Dock In Dad's Hand-built Boat
Taken from a black and white photo

Angel Mist

Private Collection

Storm Clouds

Private Collection

Winter at Long Pine

Private Collection

My Father and His Three Girls On a homemade saw-horse

Copyright - Margaret Buffie
Private collection

More to come!

Tuesday, December 19, 2023

BEING OURSELVES

Is anyone ever really themselves to others? Or do we try hard to "fit in" even when the binds of that "fitting in" feel like a straight jacket? I have always been an independent thinker, but as I grew older, I found myself noticing the societal buckles had loosened quite a lot over my past 35 years. I wasn't aware when the last buckle snapped open. But that last snap has created an advanced somewhat curmudgeonly freedom that is filled with hazards, but also with my own truths and some surprising results. Margaret Buffie

To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson

This above all: to thine own self be true,

And it must follow, as the night the day,

Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Polonious: via William Shakespeare

Shakespeare in the likeness of Martin Droeshout's etching.

William Shakespeare Artist unknown

There may be a great fire in our hearts, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passers-by see only a wisp of smoke. Vincent Van Gogh

Vincent Van Gogh Self Portrait

Vincent Van Gogh

We only become what we are by the radical and deep seated refusal of that which others have made of us. Jean Paul Sartre

Jean Paul Sartre

Jean Paul Sartre, artist (as yet) unknown

If you don't get lost, there's a chance you may never be found.
Anonymous

I have never listened to anyone who criticized my taste in space travel, sideshows or gorillas. When this occurs, I pack up my dinosaurs and leave the room. Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury by Sci-Fi Artist L.J. Dopp

Ray Bradbury

... no one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt

Anna Eleanor Roosevelt

Eleanor Roosevelt

And, indeed, if you think you're a genius of something, what you achieve is very much according to your expectations; if you think you're no good, you're not going to get anywhere. Diana Wynne Jones

Diana Wynne Jones

Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves; vanity, to what we would have others think of us. Jane Austen

The only two "authenticated" drawings of Jane Austen

Jane Austen

Jane Austen By her sister Charlotte

Two roads diverged in a wood and I
took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

Robert Frost by Ercole Cartotto

Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves.

Henry David Thoreau

------------

I was not designed to be forced. I will breathe after my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest.

Henry David Thoreau

I think the reward for conformity is that everyone likes you except yourself. Rita Mae Brown

Rita Mae Brown

I often warn people: "Somewhere along the way, someone is going to tell you, 'There is no "I" in team.' What you should tell them is, 'Maybe not. But there is an "I" in independence, individuality and integrity. George Carlin

George Carlin

George Carlin by Asamamoru

And my personal favourite!!

The things that make me different are the things that make me.

A.A. Milne

Friday, December 15, 2023

FROM A SAINT - TO A BULLY - WITH A DEVIL IN RED AS A BUDDY - TO THE COMMERCIAL SANTA CLAUS - how things have changed!

I am once again posting this from last year. With all the best wishes for a wonderful holiday season! I have added an addendum in red near the end.

Do you know who the the real St. Nicholas was? I didn't. I was deciding what my Christmas post would be about this year - and I got caught up wondering how a man who was a priest, then a bishop and after death, anointed St. Nicholas, ended up being Santa Claus? Are they one and the same? So I looked up Saint Nicholas. Apparently so. In a way.....

So, the next question is: How did we go from this....

to this....

The "real" St. Nicholas was a Christian bishop born in Patara, (once part of Turkey), around 280 BC. After his wealthy parents died, Nicholas, a priest by then, used his inheritance to give gifts to the poor people of Patara. A devout and dedicated Christian, he later became a bishop of Myra, a city now called Demre. His gifts were usually money, food, and other necessities needed for survival by the poor. After his death and sainthood, the legend of this gift-giving creation became very popular around the Christian world. Portrayed as a bearded bishop in canonical robes, Saint Nicholas's feast day is still celebrated in many countries on the anniversary of his death, December 6th.

Here is a depiction of San Nicola (Italian version) with the saintly bishop dispensing gifts to children.

He is called Saint Nicholas in France, Father Christmas (Britain) San Nikola (Malta), Naomh Nioclás (Ireland), San Nicola (Italy), Sankt Nikolaus (Germany), Sinter Klaas (Dutch). All using the "real" name, except in Britain - and North America where he morphed into Santa Claus.

How did that happen? And this is more or less how it happened...

Over time, St. Nicholas was transformed again and again - very often physically. Because of this, the actual man became more obscured in "homespun" legends developed by various countries.

In May, 1843, Sir Henry Cole commissioned the first commercial Christmas cards in London. They were illustrated by John Callcott Horsley. These cards began with a variety of versions representing of the saint. And there are a huge number of very strange images of St. Nicholas to be found at the. Like these two from France.

What is really interesting to me is that despite all these images of a saintly gift giver, St Nicholas was initially portrayed as a tall, slender stern bishop who visited children to dispense not only gifts, but to dispense discipline.

In the countries of Austria, Bavaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovenia, and Northern Italy there was another character introduced as part of the Christmas "festivities". His name is Krampus and is believed to be a pre-Christian "devil" of some kind - and for some reason he became the shadow of St. Nicholas.

It was this devil-like character who was to be the actual dispenser of punishment to naughty children, and (one assumes) to scare the wits out of children who might be considering becoming naughty.

Many of the images I found on antique cards show that Santa was involved in the punishment side as well.

The first Christmas cards (perhaps as a form of bizarre humour) show Krampus punishing children with great glee. And St. Nick doing his bit as well. Here are a few examples of Victorian Christmas cards showing this tag team punishing naughty children. Not a very happy Christmas for some! Note that St Nicholas/Father Christmas dressed in various forms of clothing and in one is also dressed in red and has a long white beard. The transformation is beginning.

Greetings from Krampus. Ack!

A Merry Christmas????

Now that is just plain child abuse....

"Loving Christmas Wishes"

More like, "Leave the case of ransom money

beside the church stairs!"

So how did this formidable and rather nasty Victorian St. Nicholas with a "vicious devilish sidekick transfigure into a "right jolly old elf" with a belly that jiggled like a bowl full of jelly?

Well, it appears that that Dutch settlers in America were largely responsible for bringing the legend of their Saint Nicholas - known to them as Sinterklaas around the end of the 18th century. According to their folklore, Sinterklaas (or Sinter Klaas) rode a white horse and left gifts in wooden shoes. He could also be quite sinister and even had black ravens who could turn into Black Moors called Zwarte Pieten. (But as these characters are now very controversial which involves using "black face make-up) and they can also be sinister - so I will leave that to you to look up!)

Anyway, it seems that the evolving American version of Sinter Klaas became a blend of both the Dutch and British versions of Sinter Klaas and Father Christmas. Does Sinter Klaas sound a lot like Santa Claus? Yep. The Dutch name name was eventually Americanized to “Santa Claus.” And although there were songs and warnings about being naughty or nice, by the middle 1850's many American and Canadian children began to see Santa Claus as the cheery and benevolent character created in A Visit from St. Nicholas - which weaves a vision of Santa as a "jolly old elf" with a twinkle in his eye. (No idea where all his other helpers elves and Mrs. Claus popped into the myth/legend.)

"A Visit from St. Nicholas" was first published as a poem in New York in 1823. This poem really started the big change from the more austere St. Nicholas and his buddy Krampus into the Santa Claus kids know today.

A friend of the "supposed" creator Clement Clark Moore anonymously sent Moore's poem to a publisher. Moore, apparently, had no idea it had been sent. Mmmm. (Moore's legitimacy as author is under scrutiny as some researchers and scholars believe it was actually written by a distant relative of Moore's wife - a man called Henry Livingston. (But I will leave that one alone as well!)

By 1837 Moore had "claimed it" as his own work and gave quite an elaborate description regarding how the inspiration came to him while going to town in a sleigh to buy a turkey, On hearing the jingle of on the horses and sleigh as they moved over the snow, he said the entire poem just "came to him" and he wrote it then and there. He also claimed that he styled Santa after a Dutchman who worked on his estate and was presumably the driver of the sleigh.

In any case, the poem was first published anonymously in the Troy, New York Sentinal on 23 December 1823. Because it was anonymous, editors from many different publications grabbed it and printed it, and its popularity spread quickly. It's not clear which was the very first illustrated version, however, it appears that the first actual separately published and illustrated book was put out by Henry Onderdonk (love that name!) and illustrated with engravings by Theodore C. Boyd. And, of course, Moore's name was included as the author.

So here it is as it looked then - followed by the final transformation of St. Nick into Santa!

p. 2

p. 3

A VISIT FROM ST. NICHOLAS

by Clement C. Moore, LL.D.

With Original Cuts,

DESIGNED AND ENGRAVED by [Theodore C.] Boyd,

New York:
Henery Onderdonck,
10 John-street.

[1848].

Click to enlarge
Title Page

p. 4

Click to enlarge
Verso

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1847, by Wm. H. Onderdonk, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New. York.

p. 5

A PRESENT FOR GOOD LITTLE BOYS AND GIRLS.

p. 6

p. 7

TWAS the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;
And Mamma in her ’kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's nap;

p. 8

p. 9

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow,
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below,
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny rein-deer,
With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;

p. 10

Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound

p. 11

"Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! on, Cupid! on, Donder and Blitzen!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky;
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of Toys, and St. Nicholas too.
And then in a twinkling, I heard on the roof,
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof—

p. 12

A bundle of Toys he had flung on his back

p. 13

As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound
He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of Toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a pedlar just opening his pack.
His eyes—how they twinkled! his dimples, how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;

p. 14

p. 15

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself,
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And fill’d all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,

p. 16

And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,

“HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT”

Its title, as most of us know, was later turned into "Twas the Night Before Christmas".

No one really knows how the reindeer ended up attached to a flying sleigh. You would think snow geese might have worked better...no? He's drawn, above, as an old bearded uncle in Georgian-style breeches, buckled shoes, smoking a pipe, and carrying a sack over his shoulder - readying himself to climb down the chimney to fill children's stockings. Rather than the big guy in red that we know, St. Nick was a “little old driver” in a “miniature sleigh” decked all in fur from head to foot. Well, he has a fur hat anyway.

But, whomever actually wrote this poem, it appears that their vision of him might have come from the 1809 Knickerbocker’s History of New York, where Washington Irving described St. Nick flying over the treetops, bringing presents, smoking a pipe, and ‘laying his finger beside his nose'! Plagiarism and mystery galore...

Thomas Nast - transformer...

At least we know for certain that Santa finally became today’s large, red-suited hero, thanks in big part to one Thomas Nast's imagination. He was the 19th century cartoonist for Harper’s Weekly. In 1881, Nast drew a very round and jolly character in a fur-trimmed coat with a stocking cap. He had done a couple of earlier drawings of Santa - as early as 1863, but this is the one that fit the bill! Even Coca Cola used this image and tweaked it into a "brand" Santa for advertising their product. So I can't give credit to the CC company for their Santa which is often portrayed as THE "Classic" Santa. Clearly that Santa already existed, in my opinion.

There is a cynical side to all this love and gifts. The sugar snow melts a little when looked at closely. It is rather sad in some ways, that this "kindly and generous" Santa swept the world in the early twnetieth C. and was soon perverted into a commercial give-away creature who lives hidden away all year making toys for girls and boys .... and wives and husbands and nieces and nephews.

Not that I would want the second version with his horrible Krampus dressed in devil red, but let's face it, Santa is out of control.

Yes, the Ho, Ho, Ho, Santa has become TOO generous. He gives far too many gifts - and now the simple nature of a candy cane, a fresh orange, socks and other necessities, and one lovely little toy has been gone for a long time now. Forever, actually.

It is now about wild shopping by millions and millions of people, out-beating each other's gifts and has turned into a cynical and exhausting event in many many ways.

Each of us can try to have a more simple sharing of holiday spirit without going into a year of debt. But will that ever happen? It is like a child's Christmas train running out off the tracks and no one has the energy or will to stop it.