Paul-Emile Borduas: Ecrits I by André-G. Bourassa, Jean Fisette, Gilles Lapointe (review)

236 LETTERS IN CANADA 1988 and reveals the skill and care that the authors and other contributors to the catalogue applied to their material. (LORA SENECHAL CARNEY) Paul-Emile Borduas: Eerits I, edition critique par Andre-G. Bourassa, Jean Fisette et Gilles Lapointe Presses de l'Universite de Montreal 1987. 700. $55.80 This book is the result of a very large collective research project begun in 1979, and is to be followed by Eerits I1~ presenting Borduas's journal and letters. Many of the documents in Eerits Ihave been widely disseminated since Borduas's death in 1960, most notably in the 1978 anthology Paul Emile Borduas: Eerits/Writings 1942-1958, editedbyFran<;ois-Marc Gagnon, with translations by Gagnon and Dennis Young (Press of the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design/New York University Press). This anthology provided little explanatory text or annotation but did begin to develop connections among the texts. The writings were further discussed and quoted extensively in Gagnon's Paul-Emile Borduas: Biographie critique et analyse de l'oeuvre (Fides 1978), a book still central to the study of Borduas and a key reference work for Eerits 1. The central Automatiste writings - the 1948 Refus global texts and Projections liberantes (1949) - are particularly famous. In fact, the bibliography in Eerits I lists twenty-five separate appearances in print of all or part of the Refus global (counting English translations) followip.g the manifesto 's original issue. One of the stated objectives of the critical edition stems precisely from that fact. A Borduas myth, the editors conclude, has developed over the years, largely through the frequent appearance of Refus global in varied contexts, contexts which have associated the manifesto with 'toute ideologie reclamant la liberation des contraintes de tous ordres, artistique, politique, voire nationaliste.' The editors propose to replace this mythical perspective with a 'connaissance scientifique' in the course of carrying out their main task: the definitive, scholarly presentation of the texts based on analysis ofall existing versions, and the establishment oftextual interrelationships in such a way that the writings will shed new light on each other and encourage historically correct readings. We are invited to re-evaluate Borduas's title essay for the Refus global manifesto on pages 314-51, for instance, as a series of eight existing states, the final two of which were not typed by Borduas but by Pierre Gauvreau, and which contain, probably as a result ofthis, a couple ofvery significant differences from the earlier versions written or typed by Borduas. The third section of the book also establishes this essay in the context of thought expressed throughout the 1947-8 writings, including two previously unpublished texts. HUMANITIES 237 All of the texts are presented with their 'final' versions intact except for spelling and punctuation corrections, with variant wordings from other states painstakingly set out in the annotation, or, in the case of long variant passages, in appendices at the back of the book. With the 1943 article 'Manieres de gotHer une oeuvre d'art,' the editors found it particularly inappropriate to view the final text as an absolute, and thus included, in addition to the usual annotation and appendices, two full, previously unpublished versions which are strikingly different from the well-known one that appeared in Amerique franraise. One could criticize the book's organization for offering the reader only inadequate direction through all this complex textual material; but the criticism is a minor one given the importance of its accomplishments. The volume's annotation also supports the writings and the editors' presentation texts, through the inclusion of material such as relevant biographical details and references to closely related primary sources and other publications. Especially enriching are the many brief (five to thirty lines), tightly focused biographies of people mentioned in Borduas's texts or otherwise essential to them. Both Bourassa and Fisette have published work on Automatiste literature before; most notably, there is Bourassa's Surrealisme et litterature quebecoise (rev ed, Herbes rouges 1986), itself a monumental book. Ecrits I takes its place as the fruit of much distinguished scholarship in Quebec, theirs and others.' As part of the 'Bibliotheque du Nouveau Monde,' a collection of critical editions ofwritings basic to Quebec's cultural history, it makes a great contribution to that history. (LORA SENECHAL CARNEY) Fran<;ois-Marc Gagnon. Paul-Emile Borduas Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. 486. $79.95 Fran~ois-Marc Gagnon's monumental catalogue for the 1988 Borduas retrospective at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is the first large-scale study of the artist to become available in the English language. It is therefore both timely and welcome. It contains handsome, full-page colour plates of all 147 works in the exhibition, and will make evidence of Borduas's achievement as a painter generally accessible. Although colour plates are always only an approximation to paintings, the sumptuousness of this volume is a fitting parallel to the experience of the exhibition. How are the paintings of Borduas framed by the exhibition and by the catalogue text? The curator, Fran~ois-Marc Gagnon, is already author of a monumental 'critical biography and analysis of the work' of Borduas. He has chosen not to duplicate this material here, and has rejected also the usual presentation of an artist's retrospective in terms of formal development , with emphasis on stylistic phases and influences. Instead, Gagnon ...