The Quebec Anthology: 1830-1990

Introduction

that exist have been so controversial. Although Quebecois literature flourished during the first half of the nineteenth century, its principal genre was the conte, an oral not a written form—which presents a distinct problem for the anthologist. French Canada did not really have a written literature until the publication of Frangois-Xavier Garneau's Histoire du Canada, the first volumes of which began appearing in 1845. One needn't go as far as Gerard Tougas, in his Histoire dela litterature canadienne-fran$aise, in condemning "the numerous versifiers, storytellers and memorists" who preceded Garneau for churning out works distinguished mainly by their "mediocrity of thought and invention," but it is nonetheless true that Garneau's rich collection of historical sketches instilled in his many readers a sense of their own past, and created an intellectual fervour capable of leading to a more mature literary output. The literary group Les Soirees canadiennes, founded by Garneau's followers in 1860, published the review Les Soirees canadiennes the followingyear; it included many of the early works of this naissance of Quebec writing. As Camille Roy, who has been called Quebec's first literary critic, has put it, "with [Garneau's] work the second period of French-Canadian literature opens—the period of its development." Perhaps ironically, this development began by looking back to earlier days, a theme that still echoes throughout the literature of Quebec. The motto of Les Soirees canadiennes wastaken from the words of the critic Charles Nodier: "Let us make haste to write down the stories and traditions of the people, before they are forgotten." Such was the spirit that moved Philippe Aubert de Gaspe, the Elder, to write Les Anciens canadiens, for as he stated, his purpose was merely "to note down some episodes of the good old times." At least, he did note them down so they could be read and even INTRii INTRODUCTION tie literature of French Canada has always been difficult to summarize and encapsulate, which may be why there ire so few anthologies of it, and why the critical histories xist have been so controversial. Although Ouebecois T vii translated (as Canadians of Old, by Sir Charles G.D. Roberts), and thus reach a wider audience. De Gaspe and those who followed him had not yet created "unelitterature en ebullition" a literature in ferment, as Gerard Bessettewas to call the work of a later period, but theirs was definitely a literature in the throes of birth. During this second period, a whole school of writers began to make contributions to the national oeuvre: Paul Stevens, whose twists on older themes created a new kind of folktale; Faucher de Saint-Maurice, who tried to unite fact and fiction to forge a kind of historical ethos; Robertine Barry, the fiery female journalistand writer of closely observed short stories; and of course Louis Frechette, perhaps Quebec's best-known writer of the nineteenth century, whose forward-lookingevocation of the past seemed the perfect vehicle for easing Quebec into the brave new world of the future. There followed, however, a period of relative obscurity in the literature of Quebec. As the indefatigable critic and anthologist Adrien Therio observed (in his Conteurs quebecois 1900-1940),"It is no exaggeration to say that the period 1900 to 1940 is the least known in our literature , even though the teaching of Quebec literature has taken a considerable upward swing in our colleges and universities." The literary lights that did shine during those four decadesshone primarily through the novel—Therio cited especially Louis Hemon's Maria Chapdelaine (1914), Albert Laberge's La Scouine (1918), and Marie le Franc's Grand Louis Vinnocent (1927). But even those important works were problematic, since both Hemon and le Franc were born outside of Canada,and La Scouine was not published until nearly twenty years after it was written, and then in a small, private edition of only sixtycopies! But if novels were not thick on the ground, the short story seemed to fare somewhat better. Perhaps the Depression, coming as it did after a cataclysmicworldwar, instilled in writers a sense of the desperation inherent in everyday life, a desperation that can be caught so much more subtly in the short story than in the novel. Whatever vi" INTRODUCTION the cause, it is in the short stories of such writers as Laberge, Jean-Aubert Loranger, and Harry Bernard that the social realist writing of...