Ringuet’s Trente arpents (First Part)

12 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, French-Canadian Literature, Quebec, Regionalism

≈ Comments Off on Ringuet’s Trente arpents (First Part)

Tags

cultivateur, Dr Philippe Panneton, exode, Exodus, Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor Coté, Regionalism in Quebec fiction, Ringuet, roman du terroir, Trois-Rivières, United States

Returning from the Field, Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté
(National Gallery of Canada)

Returning from the Field

Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté (6 April 1869 – 29 January 1937)

Sans l’homme la terre n’est point féconde c’est ce besoin qu’elle de lui qui le lie à la terre, qui le fait prisonnier de trente arpents de glèbe. (p. 65)

[Without man, the land is arid. It is because the land needs him that man is tied to it and becomes the prisoner of thirty acres of soil.]

Thirty Acres (Trente Arpents)[i]

by Ringuet (pseudonym of Philippe Panneton), 1938

translated by Felix and Dorothea Walter

Trente Arpents is considered the last of the regionalist novels. It is a gem of a novel and won its author, Ringuet, a pseudonym for Dr Phillippe Panneton (30 April 1895 [Trois-Rivières] – 28 December 1960 [Lisbon]), a medical doctor who went on to write more novels and became a diplomat.

However, among his other novels, none is so moving as the story of the rise and fall of Euchariste Moisan who is wedded to the trente arpents he has inherited from his uncle Éphrem. L’oncle Éphrem and his wife never had children, but they brought Euchariste whose entire family perished in a fire when he was still a tiny child.

Spring

At the very beginning of the novel not only does Euchariste learn that he will inherit his uncle’s land, but arrangements are being made for Euchariste to marry a neighbour’s daughter a neigbours’s daughter who will dutifully have “son nombre,” or the number of children she is destined to bear, as though her numerous and draining pregnancies had nothing to do with sexual intercourse.

Soon after Éphrem tells Euchariste that when he dies he will inherit the thirty acres, he dies and Euchariste finds himself the owner of the thirty acres farmers, the habitants of New France, rented from their SEIGNEUR. Because Éphrem dies, Euchariste and Alphonsine may marry a little earlier than anticipated and occupy the large room: “la grande chambre” The household also includes “la vieille Mélie,” an unmarried elderly woman who simply arrived at Éphrem’s door and never left. Mélie helps Alphonsine until she is very old and dies almost imperceptibly in her chair. As for Alphonsine, she gives birth first to a son, Oguinase, then to a daughter who dies shortly after the birth of the couple’s third child.

Il [Euchariste] les accueillait ces naissances, sans plaisir comme aussi sans regret…. Il fallait qu’Alphonsine eût ‘son nombre’. (p.67)

[He welcomed these births, without pleasure, yet without regret. Alphonsine simply had to have ‘her number’.]

Summer

In the second part of the novel, appropriately divided into the four seasons, Euchariste is more of an owner, but tilling the land and looking after the farm animals is onerous. Despite years of draught, Eucharists prospers. He puts money in the notary’s safe regularly. As for Alphonsine, she is raising her children and still “féconde” (fertile). At this point, Éphrem is asked to see the curé, the parish priest. Oguinase is old enough and sufficiently gifted to be recruited for the priesthood by the curé. He will not have to pay tuition fees.

So Oguinase leaves for the petit séminaire, the private school, now abolished, that allowed graduates to enter the priesthood, le grand séminaire, or university (law or medicine). Euchariste talks about his projetcs. On their way home, they visit a cousin living in a village. The house is more humble than Euchariste had expected. Euchariste talks about his projects: raising hens. Two events now mark the year: Oguinase’s departure for the college and his return.

Euchariste hopes his son Éphrem will now help more and more, but Éphrem is growing into rebel. Moreover, the world is changing. Machines are being used by farmers, machines that can cut fingers off, and cars the kill Euchariste’s hens. The parist has grown to such an extent that a new parish is founded. All around him, Euchariste’s world is changing and his new circumstances cause him to stiffen.

Moreover, it seems Alphonsine is again pregnant, but she feels that something is amiss. She sees her reflection in a mirror and the woman looking at her is no longer Alphonsine. In the mirror she sees an old and sick woman. A doctor is called who tells her to stay in bed, her death-bed.

Alphonsine raises her family; there are good years and years of draught. Euchariste saves his money. Oguinase is sent to the petit séminaire. On their way to the séminaire Euchariste stops in a village to visit with a cousin and says he will be raising hens. Machines, cars, enter the picture and they are very destructive. Machines, cars, enter the picture and they are very destructive. Euchariste will be raising hens. Éphrem turns into a bit of a rebel. Alphonsine dies. An American cousin and his wife visit. We suspect Éphrem will leave for the United States.

(Allow me to pause at this point as this blog is now too long. I am posting a sequel.)

Childhood Remembered

25 Monday Nov 2013

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, Sharing

≈ 16 Comments

Tags

Cathy Bluteau, childhood, Church, exode, fanciful art, my father, Quebec, self-taught

file.2

Living in Colour, Cathy Bluteau

About my father

Childhood

My father was born to a poor family in Cookshire, in the Eastern Townships of Quebec, Canada. He had a French-speaking mother and an English-speaking father. The two divorced when my grandfather decided to move to Massachusetts, where he could earn a living. He could not find work in Canada. That period in Canadian history is called l’Exode. Nearly a million French-Canadians and Acadians moved to the United States.

During that same period in the history of Quebec, the Church was very powerful. It made sure gifted children were educated, but not the son of a divorcée. So my father was entirely self-taught. He started working in a restaurant as cook and factotum at an early age.

Sherbrooke

When he reached adulthood, my father left his village to find employment in Sherbrooke, the nearest city. He was hired by the radio stations: the French radio station and its English-language counterpart. My mother, a singer, had her own radio programme. She presented the music of famous composers. At first, my father was her assistant. He chose records for her and returned them to the proper shelf.

The Lake & Opening Soon, Cathy Bluteau

file.5

World War II

However, my father was soon needed elsewhere. World War II had begun and he had been studying intensively and extensively. He was named chief engineer for both radio stations. They were understaffed, so father was also a speaker and he wrote radio dramas. He loved it.

Love & Marriage

Meanwhile, my mother had fallen in love with the young man from Cookshire. Some members of her family opposed their marriage. He was the son of a divorcée and had been raised in poverty. But my maternal grandmother had liked my father from the moment she met him. She was a strong woman, a widow. After her husband’s premature death, she had run the family business, flour mills, with my grandfather’s partner. She sold her shares when she realized she and her children were financially secure.

When my father’s employers learned that he was marrying into my mother’s family, they raised his salary substantially and housed the young couple where the transmitters were located. We lived in a large brick house. It was a very old house, but it was home. It was destroyed after we left Quebec.

Comfort, Cathy Bluteau

The Children Died

My parents wanted children, but my father was diagnosed with a congenital blood disease. A few of their children were born healthy, but most died. A cure was found so my father’s life was saved, as well as my sister Thérèse’s life. She is now deceased. Every year, we were burying yet another brother or sister. These were the bad old days when one had to buy health-insurance from an insurance company. The company soon refused to pay our medical bills, but my father’s employers were very generous. So life was nevertheless good.

Home Sweet Home, Cathy Bluteau

The 1950s

We had dear friends: a Belgian couple, in particular. We shared a summer home with them near the Benedictine monastery at Saint-Benoît-du-Lac. The arrival in Quebec of a large number of Europeans, French Jews, members of the Vichy government and people who wanted to live in a peaceful country, changed Quebec for the better.

As a sound engineer, my father had built a high fidelity system and aficionados gathered at our house. He also built systems for friends, but he was not comfortable with the latest technologies. He therefore went to visit a friend in Victoria, British Columbia, loved Victoria, found employment, and the family moved.

But that’s another chapter.

file8

Sweet, Cathy Bluteau

My father died as he wished to die, peacefully and painlessly. He had left precise instructions as to how he wanted to die and had paid his final expenses, including a fine dinner. I saw cousins I had not seen in decades.

I hope my father is in a better world. I’ll miss him.

I will conclude here.

_________________________

Cathy Bluteau

http://www.artistsincanada.com/homepage/?id=14155

Berceuses françaises, Colette Magny (French Lullabies)

1 (0:00) Toutouic 2’40
2 (2:42) Le Grand Lustukru (Théodore Botrel) 3’13
3 (5:57) Le P’tit Quinquin (Alexandre Desrousseaux) 3’06
4 (9:05) Le Pardon de Ploërmel (Meyerbeer) 0’54

24 November 2013

WordPress

Regionalism in Quebec Fiction: Ringuet’s Trente arpents (Part One)

27 Friday Jul 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, Canada, French-Canadian Literature, Quebec, Regionalism

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

1938, cultivateur, Dr Philippe Panneton, exode, Exodus, Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor Coté, Regionalism in Quebec fiction, Ringuet, roman du terroir, United States

Returning from the Field by Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté
(National Gallery of Canada)

Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté (6 April 1869 – 29 January 1937)

Sans l’homme la terre n’est point féconde c’est ce besoin qu’elle de lui qui le lie à la terre, qui le fait prisonnier de trente arpents de glèbe. (p. 65)

(Without man the land is not fertile. It is because it needs man that man is tied to the soil, that he is the prisoner of thirty acres of land.)

Trente Arpents (Thirty Acres)[i]

Trente Arpents is considered the last of the regionalist novels. It is a gem of a novel and won its author, Ringuet, considerable acclaim. Ringuet is a pseudonym for Dr Phillippe Panneton (30 April 1895 [Trois-Rivières] – 28 December 1960 [Lisbon]), a medical doctor who went on to write more novels and became a diplomat.

Spring

At the very beginning of the novel not only does Euchariste learn that he will inherit his uncle’s land, but arrangements are being made for Euchariste to marry a neighbour’s daughter who will dutifully have “son nombre,” or the number of children she is destined to bear, as though her numerous and draining pregnancies had nothing to do with sexual intercourse.

Soon after Éphrem tells Euchariste that when he dies Eurcharist will inherit the thirty acres. Éphrem dies and Euchariste finds himself the owner of the thirty acres land the habitants of New France, rented from their SEIGNEUR. Because Éphrem dies, Euchariste and Alphonsine may marry a little earlier than anticipated and occupy the large room: “la grande chambre” The household also includes “la vieille Mélie,” an unmarried elderly woman who simply arrived at Éphrem’s door and never left. Mélie helps Alphonsine until she is very old and dies almost imperceptibly in her chair. As for Alphonsine, she gives birth first to a son, Oguinase, then a daughter who dies shortly after the birth of the couple’s third child.

Il [Euchariste] les accueillait ces naissances, sans plaisir comme aussi sans regret…. Il fallait qu’Alphonsine eût ‘son nombre’. (p. 67)

(He welcomed these births, without pleasure, yet without regret. Alphonsine simply had to have ‘her number’.)

Summer

In the second part of the novel, appropriately divided into the four seasons, Euchariste is more of an owner than a farmer. Tilling the land and looking after the farm animals is onerous. Despite years of draught, Eucharist prospers. He puts money in the notary’s safe regularly. As for Alphonsine, she is raising her children and still “féconde” (fertile).

At this point, Éphrem is asked to see the curé, the parish priest. Oguinase is old enough and sufficiently gifted to be recruited for the priesthood by the curé. He will not have to pay tuition fees.

So Oguinase leaves for the petit séminaire, the private school, now abolished, that allowed graduates to enter the priesthood, le grand séminaire, or university (law or medicine). Euchariste talks about his projects. On their way home, they visit a cousin living in a village. The house is more humble than Euchariste had expected. Euchariste talks about his projects: raising hens. Two events now mark the year: Oguinase’s departure for the college and his return.

Euchariste hopes his son Éphrem will help him more and more, but Éphrem is growing into rebel. Moreover, the world is changing. Machines are being used by farmers, machines that can cut fingers off, and cars that kill Euchariste’s hens. The parist has grown to such an extent that a new parish is founded. All around him, Euchariste’s world is changing and his new circumstances cause him to stiffen.

There have been good years and years of draught, but Euchariste saves his money. Oguinase is sent to the petit séminaire. On their way to the séminaire, Euchariste stops in a village to visit with a cousin and says he will be raising hens. Machines, cars, enter the picture and they are very destructive. Machines, cars, enter the picture and they are very destructive. Euchariste will be raising hens. Éphrem turns into a bit of a rebel. Alphonsine dies. An American cousin and his wife visit. We suspect Éphrem will leave for the United States.

(Allow me to pause at this point as this blog is now too long. I will publish a sequel.)

_________________________

[i] Ringuet, Trente Arpents (Paris: Flammarion, collection bis 1991[1938])

Winter Landscape, Suzor-Coté, (National Gallery of Canada

Winter Landscape by Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté, 1919 (National Gallery of Canada)

27 July 2012

WordPress

revised

12 January 2014

Winter Landscape

Maria Chapdelaine

26 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, French-Canadian Literature, Quebec, Regionalism

≈ 11 Comments

Tags

Clarence Gagnon artist, colonisation, Curé Labelle colonisation, exode, Louis Hémon author, Maria Chapdelaine, Regionalism, Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, three film adaptations

The Chapdelaine Farm by Clarence Gagnon

Louis Hémon[i]

French author Louis Hémon (12 October 1880 – 8 July 1913) moved to Canada in 1911. By then he had already published several books. As for his Maria Chapdelaine, he wrote it during the winter of 1912-1913, sent his manuscript to France and started travelling west.

Hémon died in a train accident at Chapleau, Ontario. Had he travelled a little further he would have met the descendants of voyageurs, Métis, and aristocrats referred to as “The French Counts.”[ii] They had settled in the Assiniboia region: Count Henri de Soras, the Marquis de Jumilhac, Viscount Joseph de Langle, Count de Beaulincourt and others.

Church at Peribonka by Clarence Gagnon

Historical Background: two choices

L’Exode or Exodus

Louis Hémon came to Quebec during a period of its history when there was very little work for French-speaking Canadians inhabiting Quebec and Acadia. This period of Canadian history is called the Exode. Nearly a million French Canadians and Acadians moved to the United States where they could work in factories.

The Curé Labelle: colonisation

This could not be the Church’s best choice. One priest, the famed Curé Labelle (24 November 1833 – 4 January 1891), was the chief proponent of colonisation. He urged French-Canadians to settle north and “make land,” faire de la terre, faire du pays, as their ancestors had done. This was their mission.

—ooo—

Making Land: Samuel’s Choice

So making land had been Samuel Chapdelaine’s choice. He had taken his family to the Lac-Saint-Jean area where he and his sons were turning inhospitable land into arable soil. I should think Hémon named Samuel Chapdelaine after Samuel de Champlain, whom we could call the founder of New France.

Louis Hémon in the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean

When Louis Hémon arrived in Canada, 1910, he lived in Montreal. But two years later he travelled north and stopped at Peribonka, in the Lac Saint-Jean area. At first, he worked as a farmhand, helping “settlers,” but, as noted above, he spent the winter of 1912-1913 writing Maria Chapdelaine.

Hémon had sent his manuscript to France but he never savored the success of his novel. It was serialized in France in 1914 and published by J. A. Lefebvre in Quebec in 1916, with black and white illustrations by Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Coté. It was an international bestseller. An English translation, by W. H. Blake, was published in 1921.

Maria Chapdelaine

There is summary of Maria Chapdelaine (just click on the title) on the website of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, housed in Kleinburg, a village just north of Toronto. Clarence Gagnon‘s (8 November 1881 – 5 January 1942) 1933 illustrations of Maria Chapdelaine are part of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection.

Napoléon Laliberté by Clarence Gagnon

A Summary of the Plot

However, I will summarize the summary.

Maria is the daughter of a “settler.” She is a little plump, but beautiful. One Sunday, the day on which parishioners get together and chat, Maria meets François Paradis. François is a sort of coureur des bois, voyageur, canoeman, lumberjack: the mythic fearless pioneer.

When François meets Maria, he is attracted to her and tells her that he will stop by her family’s farm before escorting Belgian travelers who are looking for fur. Maria and François fall in love. They will be married when he returns from the logging camp. However, he dies in a blinding snowstorm attempting to visit with Maria on New Year’s Eve.

Eutrope Gagnon and Lorenzo Surprenant: the other suitors

Maria has two other suitors: Eutrope Gagnon, a settler and neighbour, and Lorenzo Surprenant, who has travelled from the United States to find a bride. What Lorenzo has to offer is an easier life: no blackflies, no back-breaking labour, milder weather, nearness to a Church and to stores. She is genuinely tempted to marry him, despite the fact that she is not in love with him. For Maria, love died the day François died.

However, she rejects Lorenzo. She will marry Eutrope Gagnon, a settler, and will live as her mother lived. When she is making her decision, she hears voices telling her that in Quebec, nothing must die and nothing must change: « Au pays de Québec rien ne doit mourir et rien ne doit changer… »

The names are all symbolic: Paradis for paradise; Surprenant; for surprising or amazing; and Gagnon for winning.

Beaver Coin

My summary of Maria Chapdelaine may have diminished Maria’s suitors. But Hémon makes them very real and anxious to live their lives, which means taking a wife. Although it is a simple novel, finding a more focused, but somewhat stylized, account of life as it was in 1912 would be difficult. This novel is a jewel.

Film Adaptations

The novel was an instant, international success. In 1934, Julien Duvivier directed a film adaptation of Maria Chapdelaine starring Madeleine Renaud and Jean Gabin. A second film, entitled Naked Heart, was produced in 1950 by Marc Allégret, starring Michèle Morgan. In 1983, a third adaptation, entitled Maria Chapdelaine, was produced by Quebec filmmaker Gilles Carle, starring Carole Laure.

Folklore: À la claire fontaine, Université de Moncton, Male Choir

Maria Chapdelaine can be read online. It is a Gutenberg Project e-book.

Maria Chapdelaine (Project Gutenberg, FR) [EBook #13585]

Maria Chapdelaine (Project Gutenberg, EN) [EBook #4383]

Maria Chapdelaine PDF

Canadian literature: The Montreal School, 1895–1935

First serialized in Le Temps (1914) (Paris)

Published in book form in 1916

Translated into English in 1921 (W. H. Blake)

Translated in all the major languages

____________________

[i] “Louis Hémon.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2014. Web. 13 Jan. 2014. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/261010/Louis-Hemon>.

[ii] Ruth Humphrys, “Dr Rudolph Meyer and the French Nobility of Assiniboia,” The Beaver (The Hudson’s Bay Company: Outfit 309:1, Summer 1978), pp. 16-23.

Johannes Brahms: Drei Intermezzi, Op 117 No 2