Maria Chapdelaine Chez Elle

MARIA CHAPDELAINE CHEZ ELLE ALLAN McANDREW ' MARIA CHAPDELAINE is a novel with a history which has been . frequentJy told. In the provjnce of Quebec, Louis Hernon's tale has been discussed in such a way as to give it a. special history, that of its· reception jn French Canada_: That reception y.ras marked by three stages: the years from 1916 to 1921 before the book was given a French edition; the period immediately following upon the French editions and rhe wide diffusion of the novd throughout the world; and more reGent times---'-a period of belated r·ecogn.ition. French-Canadian criticism of A1aria Chapdelaine is mainly concerned with the question> to what- extent Maria Chapdelaine ls representative of .the province of Quebec; and this ·question falls into the following pr1ncipal divisions: religion, life in· Quebec) the Canadian sout the characters. The general conclusion is inescapable: the verdict of French Canada has not been favourable.1· It will be apparent, I believe, that the FrenchCanadian criticism of Maria Chapdelaine is frequently irrelevant. The novel has not- been studied as a piece of literature; it has been weighed in ·the balance of the French-Canadian conception of the province of Quebec and·has been found wanting> largely because o£ the stress laid by Louis Hernon on th.~ illiteracy of the characters.2 Needless to say~ different critics have 1Artides by Fathu Lama1·che. "Re.cour sur Marie. Chapdelaint" Ehaw:.Jus critiquts, Menard, Montr~ al, 1930; Professor F. C. A. Je.4 Damase Potvin asserted that "1 \1aria Chap'de!aine is a lesson for our Canadian novelists."~ Leon-Mercier Gouin shared ·without hesitation the view of the Abbe Lionel Groulx that l.ouJs Hernon had produced the best and most Canadian of aJI Canadian novels.0 L e Tffroir, publication ofthc Soc.il>:t"' des Arts, Sciences et Lettrcs de Quebec, wis much preoccupied with Louis Hernon and his novel between 1918 and 1920. The dithyrambic praise of Maria Chapdelaine by French critics when the no.vel was first published in· France in 1921 initiates the second stage in our history. Hostile criticism of Maria Chapdelaine now begins to appear in Quebec. Although the French criticism is far superior to the Canadian, one must remember that the emotion arising out of Canaclian participation in the Great \Var colours the French criticism. Jean Bruchesi stated in the Action Franfaise of December, 1921, that the tre.mendous success ations •ince he sets him&elf the task of proving that nothing in Maria Cloapd~lain" does disservice to the French Canadian. M. Ubald P;aquin ho.d complained bitterly in Le Nationa/isle (May 7, 1922) that Maria ChapddaiM does the French Canadian grave injustice because the reo.du is prone to believe that he sees in it "the faithful portrait of a whole race," and that this race is ignorant and lives under the most primitive conditions. •u Na1ionalisu, January 7, 1917. •u Parhr f ranfais, June.August 1917.. . ~"Un P~lerinage au pays de Maria Ch~pdelaine.," Le Ttrroir, July 1918. 6f_e Petit Canadim, October 1918; Ll Tlrroir, December 1918. .. t ~·:; i~ .. .~ ,' I 78 THE UN,IVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTE.RLY which Maria Chapdelaine has enjoy~d in Fra·nce was not anticipated 'when the. nove~ first appeared in 1916.7 Articles by Fran!;ois Veuillat, the French critic, in the Act~·on CatAolique& reflect both the praise ·and the hostility shown 1l!Jaria Chapdelaine in France in answer to an attack on -the novel which had appeared in that paper. Fr~nch-Canadian appreciation of the novd, he states, played no small part' in the creation o( iLS vogue in France, and French Ca.nadians are _no\v reacting ''almost with violence" to the novel's great triumph there.~> Veuillot denies that a disdainful appraisement of French Canadians as a primitive people provoked the 11 cr~ze" for the novel. The Canadian edition of Maria Chapdtlaine did not find a ready market. According to Louvigny de Montigny the enthusiasm of French critics'· assisted _rnateri aHy ·in e.xhausting the 1200 copies of this edition_ A .bitter observation in Lt CC£ur est /e Ma1Jrel by Antonin Proulx, confirms this (ace and, incidentally, suggests...