Richler, Trudeau, Lasagna and the Others

Levesque. Without them, Canada would bean exceedingly boring and greatly diminished place. If I consider the P.Q. an abomination it is only because, should their policies prevail, everybody in Canada would be diminished. This is still a good neighbourhood, worth preserving. So long as it remains intact. Gurski couldn't have said it better. KENNETH McNAUGHT University ofToronto Richter, Trudeau, Lasagna and the Others For some weeks Mordecai Richler has been the most talked about Quebecois writer. And since the beginning of this business, I have resisted the urge to intervene. Initially I doubted, as did many others, that it was worth theeffort. I said to myself: never mind - ignore the noise, let them fuss. In the final analysis, my resolution was sweptaside by two opinions. The first is Lise Bissonnette's, arguing that one must respond to such attacks; from frequent travels abroad, she knows that this sort of slander costs us dearly. The second opinion leading me to react publicly is that of Steven Davis, in a definitive article published in Le Devoir and entitled"One Does not Fool around with this Word." This word is, of course, "antisemitism ." As long as Mordecai Richler does not range beyond language laws, one can acknowledge that he comes by his role as an intellectual honestly, as a legitimate extension of his position as a writer; he defends, in the name ofwhat he considers fair, his language and that ofthe society he wishes to preserve. After all, there are enough francophone Quebecois, even "independentistes,"who feel that language legislation is an admission of vulnerability rather than an expression of sovereign laws in the strongest sense of the word. Butjust as we are getting ready to listen to the voice ofour guilty conscience, Richler Joumal ofCanadian Studies Vol. 26, No. 4 (Hiver 1991-92 Wimer) invokes "antisemitism," and the argument falters. His project now reveals itself in a different intellectual light, as we find that a great writer has given in to an obscure temptation - one which even he does not completely understand. Indeed, Richler's pen has strayed from his own writerly perspective, all of a sudden blindly and polemically giving himselfover to his demon, and dropping his guard vis-a-vis "the monsters of reason." His logic collapses like a house ofcards. He revisits the moth-eaten antisemitic pronouncements of Henri Bourassa and Andre Laurendeau without taking into account the fact that their long careers soon refuted such misguided youthful enthusiasms, and without considering that one could cite deeply antisemitic statements from all quarters of the globe during their era. Richler wilfully behavesas ifLionelGroulx is still considered a model thinkerby Quebec's intelligentsia, an opinion he rests on the shaky basis of one scanty comment taken from a funeral eulogy by Claude Ryan! Bad reading, Richler! Bad reading, refusing to read; not using the whole mind to appreciate that facts and quotations have more than one connotation; that when a streetor a county is baptised Lionel Groulx the intention should not be taken for granted; that this dynamic entity, "leQuebec fran~is," must be read and interpreted as carefully as a book the sentences of which can be misleadingly quoted outofcontext. Unless, that is, we are actually looking for such a reading. And it is quite clear, Mordecai, that you found, first and foremost, what you were looking for. In Quebec no truly important writer, no influential intellectual or politician harbours antisemitism; in our land, there is not one incidentofracism which would not arouse loud indignation. In fact, one would search long and hard to find any society where antisemitism , racism and intolerance are given less credence or find fewer loud-speakers. Racists and antisemites can be found anywhere. Thepoliticalcultureofthe modem West no longer tolerates the slightest public expression of such sentiments. And the political culture of French Quebec is fully modem today, closer all in all to Zola's ]'accuse than to Abbe Groulx's books. The 143 actual influenceofGroulx amounts virtually to one sentence: "We will have our French state." But then why? Why Richler? Unfortunately, to this question one must answer that Richler found what he was looking for. I say"unfortunately"because it forces me...