Montréal Its Past and Its Future, What It Is and What It Could Have Been, and How It Could Help Redefine What Cities Are in the 21St Century
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GAZINE C A AN M A U D D IE IX N R P S E 3 9 9 T 3 H N A S T D I O R N A A W L A M E A N I G Z A Montréal Its past and its future, what it is and what it could have been, and how it could help redefine what cities are in the 21st century. Publisher and editor-in-chief An initiative of Nicolas Langelier DES VILLES CITIESFOR About this POUR TOUS PEOPLE Deputy editor publication Judith Oliver 156 Beaubien Street East Montréal (QC) H2S 1R2 Cities for People is an initiative of the Amplifier Montréal is a movement The articles presented in this booklet Coordinator Canada were originally published in French Valérie Deault J.W. McConnell Family Foundation launched by several partners from in the Fall/Winter 2016 issue of (514) 270-2010 Editorial committee Nouveau Projet magazine. that aims to foster more inclusive, various backgrounds in the city Marie-Claude Beaucage, [email protected] innovative and resilient cities across of Montreal to influence the city’s Guillaume Bourgault-Côté, www.nouveauprojet.com Nouveau Projet is a general-interest Julie Buchinger, Miriam Canada. Following an experimental ongoing transformation. The goal is biannual publication launched Fahmy, Alain Farah, Émilie — phase, in 2016 we have refocused our to rethink the way we see ourselves in Montréal in 2012. It aims to offer Folie-Boivin, Lisa-Marie Quebecers a high-quality magazine Gervais, Clément Sabourin, ©2016, Nouveau Projet and efforts on four priorities: 1) Increasing and the way we should go about that showcases the best writers, Patrick Turmel contributors thinkers, and visual artists. It supports Equality, 2) Strengthening the Civic transforming Montréal into a more Contributors, texts — progressive forces at the social and Éric Bédard, Violaine Charest- Commons, 3) Enabling City Labs, inclusive, resilient and innovative cultural levels, and seeks to contribute Sigouin, Olivier Choinière, and 4) Supporting Urban Innovation city. We achieve this by listening to to a dynamic and creative society. Eric Deguire, Félix-Antoine Joli-Coeur, Nicolas Langelier, Networks. A Cities for People platform all, particularly those who voices Nouveau Projet has received many Mathieu Lapointe, Julien Lefort-Favreau, Jonathan provides backbone functions to are unheard, in order to collect awards over the years, including the Livernois, Mani Soleymanlou, Canadian Magazine of the Year title Laurent Turcot, Élise Turcotte, facilitate learning, communications, and promote the diversity of cities’ — at the National Magazine Awards Emmanuelle Walter and field-building across the system. narratives, and by making a call for in 2015. It was also a finalist for that Through this platform we aspire to action through unlikely collaborations same award in 2014 and 2016. Translators Melissa Bull, Toby Cayouette, collectively advance change and create between various stakeholders. The translation was made possible Jessica McLenaghen, Émilie Robertson conditions for cities to be better by the generous support of Cities equipped to meet the challenges for People and Amplifier Montréal, Copy editor supported by the J.W. McConnell Shanti Maharaj of our times. Family Foundation. — A free digital version of this booklet can be downloaded at montreal. Art director Jean-François Proulx citiesforpeople.ca. Collaborators, visual Clayton Bailey, Mélanie Baillairgé, Olivo Barbieri, DES VILLES CITIESFOR Nicolas Dufour-Laperrière, POUR TOUS PEOPLE Caroline Hayeur Design and production Balistique, Eveline Lupien Cover art Photography: Cindy Boyce Model: Martha Wainwright Makeup: Sarah Ladouceur Styling: Joëlle Paquette Postproduction: Pénélope St-Cyr Robitaille CONTENT On the Cover 6 The mad 31 On the Martha Wainwright adventure Montrealisation Nicolas Langelier Daughther of Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle, of French Martha Wainwright grew up in Montréal and still spends most of her time there. Equally comfortable in French and migrants Engligh, this singer and composer frequently performs 14 Toward a new Emmanuelle Walter with family members, including her brother Rufus and her half-sister Lucy Wainwright-Roche. Her most recent album, collective narrative Goodnight City, was launched in November 2016. for Montréal 34 Montréal’s Photo: Cindy Boyce Félix-Antoine Joli-Cœur extremities Julien Lefort-Favreau Violaine Charest-Sigouin 19 Snapshots Nicolas Langelier Guillaume Morissette Jonathan Livernois Élise Turcotte Eric Deguire Mani Soleymanlou Clayton Bailey Mélanie Baillairgé 40 Literary Montréal 24 Montréal: the city that 44 Glimpses could have been of Park Ex Olivier Choinière 26 375 years of Montréal history, in four parts Laurent Turcot Jean-Philippe Garneau Éric Bédard Mathieu Lapointe 4 5 Photo: Olivo Barbieri THE MAD ADVENTURE Nicolas Langelier 1 Montréal has always been a border town, a relay city. A hub. his landing. The young French girl, working holiday visa in A point of arrival (from La Rochelle, Liverpool, Odessa, hand, stands before a customs agent at Dorval and asks him Guangzhou) and a point of departure (toward Fort Detroit, to repeat his question. Montréal’s history is made up of this Nashua, Calgary, Blainville). A place where languages and accumulation of millions of such stories of brushes between backgrounds, aspirations and inclinations have blended. worlds, cultures, different ways of seeing life, death, and a The Ottawa River, paddled for hundreds of kilometers, bit of every thing in between. offered its furs over to the merchants of Saint Paul Street. This cobbled-together, perpetually patched city has a The Saint-Constant or Lavaltrie farmer, having sold his somewhat slippery, evasive future. The city’s future will meagre possessions, arrived in Pointe-Saint-Charles with emerge from the confusion, maybe, and take an as-yet his family and made the acquaintance of his apartment’s unim aginable, unpredictable shape. Montréal has always landlord, an Anglo, and met the Irish family that shared been an experience of the uncertain. 6 7 When I think of Montréal I think of Samarkand, of far from the limits of their civilization, at the heart of a In 1894, when Télesphore Saint-Pierre wrote his History of Alexandria, of the cantina in Star Wars. It’s about trans- magnificent but inhospitable land (Iroquois raids by day, The Great Lakes, the French Canadian Commerce in Montréal, 1535–1893 (Histoire actions, negotiations, uneasy yet fruitful cohabitations. I glacial floods in spring, never having enough of anything, du commerce canadien-français de Montréal, 1535–1893), think of the city’s slogan, concordia salus—salvation through ever). Montmagny, governor of Québec City, could not help Ohio Valley, the western Montréal was still under the hold of this vision. “Whatever harmony—and I tell myself that the city’s harmony has, but cast a disapproving eye on the whole affair, qualifying the politics of our governors,” he wrote, “it is evident that for 400 years, owed a great deal to the universal language it as a “mad adventure,” giving rise to several centuries of Prairies, the Mississippi Montréal is destined by its geographic position, by its of money. I see something positive in that; a pragma- rivalry between Québec City and Montréal. means of communication with the North-West, by the intel- tism that flattens out differences. This city was never that The Indigenous people, meanwhile, were much more Basin—Montréal was ligence and the energy of its citizens, to become the princi- conducive to ideologies. The conversion of the Indigenous interested in the fur trade than in the whims of the white pal port of the immense and fertile region that extends to peoples, socialism, or nationalism—be it French Canadian, man’s god. Similarly for the Montréalistes, as they were once at the heart of that the north and to the west of the Great Lakes, and the metro- English Canadian, or Québécois—never found any favour- called, who discovered soon enough that the city’s position, polis of one of the largest countries in the world. This is the able ground in this rich black earth. But when the mother at the foot of rapids requiring portage and at the confluence incommensurable firm hope of all its children.” (Of course, at the time, a quar- of a French-Canadian family dresses her family from a of two great courses of water leading straight to the heart of ter of all of Montréal’s children died before the age of one, Jewish-owned shop, when a man born in Calabria rents the continent, offered exceptional business opportunities. at least among the French-Canadian working class. One out out his three-and-a-half to someone from Petit-Goâve, The city soon cast aside the name of Ville-Marie as well as its territory where dozens of four. But let us not allow the hazards of public health in when a Tunisian Montrealer buys a pound of butter at the initial evangelizing mission and its stone fortifications, which the Victorian era to tarnish the author’s lyricism.) Vietnamese depanneur, what might divide us is erased. The had not served against any genuine enemy attack—like the of different languages Until World War I, and even afterwards, Montréal con- essentials, like eating, finding lodging, getting dressed, liv- stretch of the Canadian Pacific railroad, there were a num- trolled the vast majority of the country’s naval, rail, and ing, just living, remain. And dreaming, when time permits. ber of breaches used by people to come and go more easily, were spoken, where banking transactions. The city’s grandiose hopes appeared Of course this coexistence hasn’t always been easy. It’s