Fictional epic: three years in the life of Ray Archer. Archer portrays three years in the life of Ray Archer, a fictional Canadian actor/director dedicated to exploring performance styles with his diverse company. Following a Canada-wide tour of King Lear performed in mask, Archer takes his new epic history of Canada across the country and to Ireland, where a strange encounter changes his life in ways he could not imagine. Written in both modern and traditional poetic styles, Archer is Book Three of the epic trilogy On the River of Time, which examines three figures—one mythical (Odysseus), one historical (Edmund Spenser), and one fictional (Archer)—and the links between them across 3,000 years