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CONCEIVING THE NATION; LITERATURE AND NATION BUILDING IN RENAISSANCE FRANCE AND POST-QUIET REVOLUTION QUEBEC

DISSERTATION

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate

School of The Ohio State University

By

Douglas L Boudreau, M.A.

The Ohio State University 1999

Dissertation Committee: Approved by

Professor Danielle Marx-Scouras, Co-Adviser Q ,

Professor Robert Cottrell, Co-Adviser Co-Adviser

Professor Eugene Holland /c ^ Co-Adviser Department of French and Italian UMI Number: 9941289

Copyright 1999 by Boudreau, Douglas Leonard

All rights reserved.

UMI Microform 9941289 Copyright 1999, by UMI Company. All rights reserved.

This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code.

UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI 48103 Copyright by Douglas Leonard Boudreau 1999 ABSTRACT

Previous studies, especially in the field of French-Canadian literature, have indicated the presence of certain traits within French-Canadian literature that recall the literature of Renaissance France. What has been left largely unexplored is why these two cultures, widely separated in time and space, should demonstrate these traits in common. The present study proposes to examine this question, positing the socio-cultural context of nation-building in

Renaissance France and post-Quiet Revolution Quebec as a possible basis for these resonances. Six authors have been selected, three from each period, and this study demonstrates first, the presence of what may be loosely referred to as the

“national question" in their works and second, the comparability of these texts by examining their treatment of themes allied to nation-building and nationalism. The works of Michel de Montaigne and Jacques Godbout are examined for their exploration of the national identity as a marginal identity.

Noting the prominence of women’s writing in both Renaissance France and post-Quiet Revolution Quebec and the affinity between women’s identity politics and national identity politics, we have selected four women authors to show how nation-building affects the work of the woman writer and interacts with her treatment of women’s identity. Marguerite de Navarre and Anne Hébert are studied for their treatment of the social roles of women, especially family roles, and also for their treatment of personal history. An assessment is made of the role played by these forces in identity. Louise Labé and Nicole Brossard demonstrate In their work the strong presence of desire as a factor in both national and gender identity.

During the course of the examination of these texts, we observe the prominence of images of movement and the presence of biological and especially sexual imagery in the treatment of nation, identity and writing. The study concludes by noting that these six authors are taking advantage of the instability produced in and by their cultural contexts. The destabilization of the old order is exploited as a window of opportunity for social and personal exploration and expansion.

ill ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to thank my advisers, Robert Cottrell and Danielle Marx-Scouras, whose advice and encouragement were invaluable in both the conception and execution of this dissertation and for their patience in reading some very rough drafts of my text I am grateful to Eugene Holland for his feedback in my explorations of nationalism.

I would also like to thank my parents, Robert and Cecile Boudreau, for their encouragement of my academic career, and last but not least I wish to thank my husband, Hayes Biggs, for his understanding and support throughout my pursuit of the degree.

IV VITA

February 22, 1969 ...... Bom- Glens Falls. New York, USA

1991...... B.A., DePauw University, Greencastle, Indiana

1993...... M.A., The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

1991-1993...... Graduate Teaching Associate, The Ohio State University

1993-199 4...... Assistant d’anglais. Lycée Malherbe, Caen, France

1994-presen t Graduate Teaching and Research Associate, The Ohio State University

PUBLICATIONS

Douglas L Boudreau-Tiegezh, “Death in the Quart Livre" Romance Notes. 37.2 (Winter 1997). 183-191.

FIELDS OF STUDY

Major Field; French and Italian TABLE OF CONTENTS

E âqsl Abstract ...... ii Acknowledgments ...... iv

Vita...... V

Chapters; 1. Introduction ...... 1

2. Michel de Montaigne and Jacques Godbout: Spotlight on the Grotesque ...... 33

3. Marguerite de Navarre, Anne Hébert and the Heritage of Eve. 92

4. Louise Labé and Nicole Brossard: Je désire donc je suis ...... 157

5. Conclusion ...... 208

Bibliography ...... 219

VI CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

In 1973, the poet Michèle Lalonde published La Deffence & Illustration de la Langue Quebecauovse. This work presented itself as a response to those who believed the French language of Quebec to be a degraded, corrupted or inferior dialect. Perhaps the most notorious expression of this viewpoint was the 1960 collection of essays Les insolences du Frère Untel. by the teaching brother Jean-Paul Desbiens. In her defense of Québécois French, Michèle

Lalonde justifies her stance by making a comparison between her twentieth- century compatriots and their sixteenth-century French ancestors. Her text is a transparent allusion to DuBellay’s Deffense et illustration de la langue françQvse. and the two texts serve a very similar purpose. DuBellay sought to defend the stature of the French language against that of Italian, but also against Latin and Greek. Lalonde defends Québécois French against the above-mentioned charges of inferiority (vis à vis so-called "Standard French") and corruption due to the influence of English. Lalonde's adoption of an irregular orthography (not only in the title, but also in the body of her text) establishes an ingenious parallel between the French literature of the sixteenth century and that produced by Québécois authors whose writing reflected the national dialect and not the standard of France. This would be especially true

1 of authors such as Michel Tremblay and Jacques Renaud whose littérature ioualisante' of the late 60 s and early 70 s also featured non-standardlzed spelling. The Défenses of Lalonde and DuBellay figure among the expressions of a new national pride and a sense of national purpose. They do so by celebrating what Is perhaps a nation's most obvious distinctive trait, the national language. In using DuBellay as a precedent for her defense of Québécois

French, Lalonde Is evoking a feeling commonly held by observers of the recent dramatic cultural changes that had taken place In La Belle Province. As Pierre

ValHères described It In his separatist manifesto. Les nègres blancs d'Amérique. Quebec had "leaped from the Middle Ages Into the twentieth century (11).'* In other words, like DuBellay's France, Lalonde's Quebec was experiencing Its Renaissance. The French Renaissance and Quebec’s Quiet Revolution left the people of the two societies with the Impression that they were living In a new world, unlike the one known to their grandparents. There was a break with the medieval sense of eternal continuity. They appreciated that their society was undergoing a profound change and that they were living this time of change.

For sixteenth century France, many factors contributed to this, primary among which were the recent discovery of the Americas and the recent availability of classical knowledge and ancient Greek texts, brought about due to the fall of

Constantinople to the Turks and the resultant emigration of Byzantine scholars to the West.

’ This Is literature written in "joual," taken variously to mean either the dialect spoken by poor working-class Montrealers or those dialects of Quebec most marked by words and grammar unique to the province. The word "joual" is the pronunciation by those who speak this dialect of the word "cheval." Perhaps the best-known example of this littérature ioualisante is TremPlay's Les Belles-sœurs.

* The citation is from Joan Pinkham's translation of this text. White Niooers of America. New York; Monthly Review Press. 1971. 2 In Quebec, this change was brought about by the Quiet Revolution of the early 1960’s. The long-reigning provincial prime minister Maurice Duplessis was dead, and his political party no longer in power in Quebec's Assemblée

Nationale. They were replaced by the Liberals, thus relieving Quebec’s long political stagnation. Legal and social reforms were instituted, most important among which was the assumption by the state of the pre-eminent role previously held by the Church in the fields of education and social services.

The people of Quebec outgrew their long-held rural, agricultural ideal and came to accept their increasingly urban and industrial reality. During this decade, Quebec’s pro-independence party, the Parti Québécois, was born.

In both of these societies. Renaissance France and post-Quiet

Revolution Quebec, political instability becomes a reality. The end of the

1960’s and the first years of the 70’s in Quebec are marked by the activity of the

FLQ (Front de libération du Québec). The FLQ was an extreme left-wing militant separatist group whose aim was to make Quebec an independent socialist republic. At this time, the group resorted to terrorist bombings and in

October 1970 to kidnapping and murder. The Canadian federal government

(led at the time by Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau- a native of Quebec) responded by imposing martial law on the province in the form of the War

Measures Act. This led to wide-scale arbitrary arrests of people suspected of supporting Quebec’s independence (Dickinson and Young, 313). The poet Gaston Miron is one of the more famous of these prisoners. In Renaissance

France, the efforts of the monarchy to consolidate power provoked a corresponding effort on the part of the nobility to resist this political centralization. Coupled with this conflict was the religious divide in the country brought on first through the philosophies of the evangelical humanists and then more concretely and divisively by the Protestant Reformers after Luther’s break

with the Roman Catholic Church. For the greater part of the sixteenth century,

France would be embroiled in religious civil war.

Lalonde's allusion to the Pléiade calls to mind another astonishing

similarity between these two societies separated by the Atlantic Ocean and four

hundred years. Renaissance France and post- Quiet Revolution Quebec^ were

the context for a veritable explosion in literature, marked by experimentation in

language, genre and subject matter. Equally remarkable, and not unrelated as

shall be seen, is a marked increase in the production of literature by women.

The comparison of authors and works that compose this study reveals a

similarity of themes and motifs that is rather surprising. Paradoxically, this

similarity is, upon reflection, hardly surprising at all. Quebec of the late

twentieth century is (in a manner of speaking) a direct descendant of sixteenth-

century France and these two "genetically" related cultures (sharing, among

other things, a common folkloric" and religious heritage) are in the throes of a

profound change in their social and political milieux, the process of nation- building. This study aims to demonstrate that the literary innovation we see in

these two societies is a reflection of and a response to this particular form of

social change that is nation-building.

Before proceeding with a discussion of the literature, it will be useful to

establish what exactly Is meant by terms such as "nation," "nation-building" and

^ Although it is commonly accepted that the Quiet Revolution began with the Liberal victory in 1960, there are differing opinions as to when it ended. Some of the works from Quebec treated in this study are commonly accepted as belonging to this era, for example Jacques Godbout's Salut Galameaul published in 1967, others are clearly too late to be Quiet Revolution era, for example Godbout's Les Têtes à Paoineau. For the sake of simplicity, in this study the term "post- Quiet Revolution" will be used to describe Quebec from after the 1960 elections to the present.

' There are many studies demonstrating the common origins of French- Canadian and Renaissance French folk traditions, notable among these is Antonine Maillet's Rabelais et les traditions populaires en Acadie. 4 "nationalism" and how they may be applied to sixteenth-century France and to

Quebec of the late twentieth century. Firstly, it is important to make the distinction between a nation and a (nation-)state. The term “nation" does not necessarily refer to a sovereign politico-geographical entity that we might also call a state. As an example of the difference between a nation and a (nation-) state, one can point out that the Polish nation continued to exist even though the dismemberment of the kingdom of Poland meant there was no Polish state. Similarly, while there was a Soviet state, there was never a Soviet nation.

Therefore the absence of a Québécois nation-state does not necessarily preclude the existence of a Québécois nation. Likewise the French state could and certainly did pre-date the idea of a French nation. The attributes of a nation are assumed to be some or all of the following: common ethnicity, sovereignty, common language, common territory, common religion, shared culture, shared values, shared history, some history of past sovereignty, and (perhaps most importantly) the belief that the collectivity constitutes a nation.® Some scholars, such as T. K. Oommen will use a much shorter list: common homeland and “a critical level of communication"

(Citizenship. 21). Others will insist on common ethnicity, and sacrifice the territorial aspect speaking, for example, of the Black nation in the U.S. which has no common territoriality, or speak of a Jewish nation existing before or outside of the Jewish state in Israel. The adoption of the term "nation," by such groups as "Queer Nation," further complicates an understanding of this term.

A common definition of nationalism is this one cited by Ramsay Cook in his Canada. Québec and the Uses of Nationalism: ® This list of criteria is a synthesis of several definitions of "nation" given by writers treating nationalism and the national question in some shape or form. These definitions tend to be roughly similar, varying only slightly on which and how many traits are considered essential. See for example that of writer Jacques Renaud in his essay, "Giant-Towns" (239), or Ernest Gellner in Nations and Nationalism (7) or that given in the Petit Robert. 5 a doctrine asserting that humanity is naturally divided into groups with common characteristics and that by virtue of those collective traits they have the right to exercise control - -sovereignty -over the particular place. (Paul Kedourie cited in Cook, 9)

In the same text, Cook uses another definition of nationalism, that is "the collective will of a distinct community to survive and grow according to its own cultural imperatives (86)." For reasons that will become clear, it is this second definition that will be used in this study, as we see that a nationalist group or movement does not necessarily seek political sovereignty.

"Nation-building" is the process of creating a nation out of a human collectivity that for any number of reasons is not considered to be a nation yet.

While nation-building may occur in a pre-existing state,® it is also seen in what are called "aspirant" or "emergent" nations. An aspirant nation is a collectivity bearing many of the traits of a nation, but is thought to be lacking a trait considered essential. Perhaps the two most common nation-building activities are the acheivement of political autonomy, and (perhaps more importantly) convincing the social group in question that they do, in fact, constitute a nation.

In the cases of Renaissance France and post- Quiet Revolution Quebec we are dealing with what might be referred to as "emergent nations." This term better describes the status that is common to both. While Quebec is more typically referred to as an "aspirant" nation, this term is inapplicable to sixteenth century France. The concept of “nation” in its modern sense did not yet exist, so

France could hardly have “aspired” to such a thing, there being no pre-existing model. One might make an argument for "Roman" nationalism and a "Roman" nation particularly during the Republic and the early days of the Empire.

However, once Caracalla granted Roman citizenship to all residents of the “ Richard Handler, in Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec, points out that states would appear to have created nations more frequently than vice-versa (7). 6 Empire, the term "Roman" became too generic to carry this kind of weight.

Michel de Montaigne's eagerness to accept Roman citizenship despite his obvious pride in French culture indicates that by the sixteenth century

"Romanness" did not have a "national" signification. In both late twentieth- century Quebec and sixteenth-century France we can see evidence of deliberate efforts to achieve full national status. (In the case of France, it may be more accurate to call this the deliberate effort to establish within the collectivity what we would today recognize as the attributes of a nation, although they may not have been appreciated as such at the time.)

To begin with, in both societies we witness what may be considered reinforcement of the national state. For France this involved an increasing centralization of power and authority in the person of the monarch. In Quebec it involves not only an increasing involvement of the state in provincial affairs, such as the "nationalization" of the hydroelectric industry, but also a systematic involvement in affairs that in other Canadian provinces are handled by the federal government, such as social security. To this day, Quebec has refused to sign the Canadian constitution, an indication of a belief in a certain autonomy from the rest of Canada. Richard Handler, in his book Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec, describes how Quebec consciously seeks to acquire the trappings of a modern nation-state, such as cultural history museums, cultural regions within the national territory, national minorities, etc

(181). Similarly, in sixteenth-century France we witness deliberate efforts to form a unified collectivity expressed in such laws as the ordinance of Villers-

Cotterets which established French as the sole official language in matters of law, the development of a centralized national government, and loyalty to the king and the royal institution. In her article “Histoires de villes, histoires de provinces et naissance d’une identité française au XVI® siècle,” Myriam Yardeni notes the growing tendency throughout the sixteenth-century for local historians to conflate local history with that of France. In sixteenth-century France and late twentieth-century Quebec we see fascinating parallels in the traits that define a nation as given above. There is quite a cluster of them that come under scrutiny in both societies. Namely, these are the common language, the common religion, and the common historical experience —particularly recent history. In his article, "Quebec: The Homeland," Léon Dion describes the role of language in culture saying: A language is far more than just a combination of words. For those who speak it, it represents both the most public and the most private expression of their personalities. (...) Language expresses not only a person's identity, but also that of the collective to which he or she belongs. In short, a language is inextricably linked with the particularity of a culture. (82)

The dominant language in both post-Quiet Revolution Quebec and sixteenth- century France is French. Although Quebec until 1974 was officially bilingual

(French-English), French speakers have formed the majority population of the province since before the British Conquest. In sixteenth-century France, French was a favored language of the nobility and the language of the king and crown territory of Ile-de-France. It is true that there is a difference in the social classes using French in these two societies. Whereas in Quebec, French is the language of nearly all classes in society, in sixteenth-century France there may have been a great difference between the French of the social elite and the language used by the lower classes. Although it is the dominant language,

French is not the exclusive language of either society. France in the 1500’s had many regional dialects and languages, not the least of which was Occitan, far 8 more widely spoken in the Midi than the French of the court. Latin was a privileged language in the Church and other parts of society, and Italian enjoyed a great deal of prestige as well. The result was that the educated

Renaissance Frenchperson was probably conversant in at least three languages: French of the court, Latin, and the local language or dialect. They were usually familiar with at least one foreign language as well. The milieu of twentieth century Quebec is similarly multilingual. There one encounters

English (in both its British and American versions), French of France (so-called

“standard French"), French of Quebec, and possiblv joual as well. In addition, there are the languages of the various indigenous nations (such as Gree and

Mohawk) as well as those of the immigrant communities (Italian, etc.). As the independence movement in Quebec has grown, these latter communities have taken on increasing political importance.

In both societies we witness the legal reinforcement of French. In 1539

Francis I promulgated the ordinance of Villers-Gotterets making French the only official language in all matters of law. This act was coupled by the activity of the

Pléiade to establish the right of French to primacy as a literary language. In

Quebec we have a series of language laws, beginning with Bill 22 in 1974 making French the sole official language of the province of Quebec and culminating in 1977's controversial Gharter of the French Language (Bill 101) restricting the use of English in the public sphere, and limiting education in

English within the province to those whose parents attended an English- language school in Québec (Dickinison and Young, 310). The implications of these polyglot situations is that not only is the choice of language not necessarily obvious, it is also politically charged. The religious question Is also common to both societies. Religion has been Identified (as mentioned above) as one of the unifying factors that convinces a people that they constitute a nation (or, as In the case of India and

Pakistan, that they don't). Significantly, In both Renaissance France and post-

Quiet Revolution Quebec religion has almost suddenly ceased to play this function. Again, as with language, we are speaking of the same religion, for both societies are/were overwhelmingly Roman Catholic. The history of

France's association with Catholicism Is long, and we will not go Into great detail on It here. It Is Important to recall, however, that It continually played a role In national unity and Identity, reflected In the title granted to the kingdom, la fllle aînée de l'Eglise. The association of the Church with the Frenchness of

France can be seen In the great value given to the legend of the conversion and coronation of Clovis, and Joan of Arc's religious mission to keep the crown of France on a French head. The Protestant Reformation called Into question the religious element of French Identity, and desolldlfled the Identity. Géralde

Nakam In her discussion of Montaigne's Essais presents a very Interesting movement pertinent to this discussion. In a section treating nationalism In sixteenth-century France, she details the political philosophies of the Politiques. who In their defense of national tradition and opposition to "nouvelleté" rallied around Henri de Navarre, a French, If Protestant candidate for the French crown, against a Spanish, yet Catholic claimant (191). Clearly the national and the religious Identities have made a split. These Protestant French were still French, a fact that does not seem to have been widely disputed,^ and so the

Idea of common Frenchness and French unity can no longer rest upon a religious base.

^ By this I mean no one seems to have seriously proposed that in conversion to Protestantism a Frenchman became German or Swiss. 10 By displacing the French-Canadian elite in the governance of Quebec,

one of the results of the British Conquest of Canada was to consolidate the

Roman Catholic Church as Ü3S. French-Canadian institution. This role of the Church was reinforced by the union of Upper and Lower Canada after the

Patriot’s Revolt in 1830 as the English took control of the political and economic institutions of the Canadian confederation. As the last remaining power

structure of French-Canadian society, the Church played an enormously

important role in the preservation of the national culture. Even authors critical of the Church generally acknowledge that without it the French Canadians would

likely have assimilated and disappeared.® The result is that French-Canadian

identity became focused on two factors, the French language and the Catholic

faith. With the Quiet Revolution, people began leaving the Church in large

numbers. What complicates matters is that at this time a new identity was

forming. The people of Quebec were no longer calling themselves Canadiens

or Canadiens-français. They were now Québécois, a name that formerly applied only to the residents of Quebec City. If the Canadien-français had been

francophone and Catholic, what was the Québécois? This person was still francophone, but obviously not all francophones (or even all francophone

Canadians) are Québécois. The absence of the religious factor left a conceptual void.

An additional area of commonality is a history of conflict between these

two societies and the neighboring cultures. The anxiety over foreign influence in Québec is common to many (former) colonies. They are stigmatized as one of history’s “losers,” having been conquered by the British in 1763. As a

numerical minority in Canada as a whole, they are politically dominated by the

“ See for example, “De Sainte-Justine à Montréal: Une Interview avec Roch Carrier, romancier et dramaturge québécois,” Contemporary French Civilization. 2: 269. 11 more numerous anglophone Canadians and also as the only province out of ten and two territories to have a francophone majority. The historically antagonistic relationship with the British and North American anglophones is coupled with an ambiguous relationship to France. After the Treaty of Paris of

1763, the residents of what was formerly New France and Acadia hoped for an eventual French reconquest which never came. The French Canadians of the nineteenth century would condemn France for having abandoned them to their traditional enemies. They would also consider themselves fortunate for having escaped the excesses of the French Revolution, and would think of themselves as more French than the French for having stayed true to the Catholic faith.

This line of argumentation more-or-less ended with the Quiet Revolution, and de Gaulle’s famous (infamous?) “Vive le Québec libre" boosted the pro-French feeling. However, French linguistic and cultural condescension towards its former colonies has led to a certain amount of resentment as well as feelings of inferiority in regard to the former mother country. Sixteenth-century France was in a remarkably similar situation. To be sure, France had not been anyone’s colony since the days of the Roman

Empire. On the other hand, France at this time had within recent memory the experience of the Hundred Years War, which saw large parts of France occupied by a powerful group of foreigners. Indeed, this conflict is sometimes considered responsible for crystallizing the notion of national identity in both

England and France, resulting in their being considered the world’s first

"nations” in the modern sense of the term. This is implied by Beaume in her study of the evolution of the French nation. Naissance de la nation France.

This same conflict is also at the origin of the age-old rivalry between these first nations, and therefore has some small part in the aftermath of the Seven Years’

12 War- the British Conquest of Canada. While fifteenth-century France may have been politically threatened by England, sixteenth-century France felt culturally threatened by Italy. The Italian Renaissance had France in its shadow, leaving many in sixteenth-century France feeling the necessity of defending the French language and culture, exemplified by the activity of the Pléiade. Italy was, and would remain for some time, a rich, dominant, culturally developed and much admired neighbor.

So we see that France of the sixteenth century did fulfill Oommen’s bare minimum of common territory and common language, and possessed sovereignty as well. Still, the French did not yet think of themselves as a nation.

They were still to a great extent divided by class and region and did not necessarily see themselves as sharing a common history and culture. This situation, however, was changing as the century progressed. The religious wars and the poetry inspired by them (such as Ronsard's Discours des misères de ce temps and its sequel, the Continuation du discours) indicate that such an idea had begun to take hold, as the poets express the unnatural ness of the civil war and the unfortunate aspects of “Mother France" being divided and wounded by religious rivalry.

In contrast, the Québécois certainly do think of themselves as a nation

(and therefore of Canada as a multinational state). Evidence for this can be found in the name of their provincial parliament, the Assemblée Nationale, as well as the legal and social developments mentioned earlier. Be that as it may, many Québécois nationalists feel that until they have acheived sovereignty, they cannot be a "normal" nation (Handler, 42). To a certain extent, modern Canada as a unified confederation is founded on the denial of Quebec’s status as a nation. Describing the French Canadians as "a people with no history and

13 no literature (294)," Lord Durham in his infamous Report (1839) argued that since the French-Canadians cannot profit by their continued difference from the Protestant English majority in North America, they should not be given the illusion of being a nation (292). From this logic followed the union of Upper

Canada (majority anglophone) and Lower Canada (majority francophone) in the British North America Act. In his recommendation of this unification, one of

Durham's express goals was the assimilation of the French Canadians (299, 307). The result is that after more than a century of confederation with English

Canada, the human collectivity that resides within Quebec is divided as to whether they belong to a Québécois or a Canadian nation. No estimate of

"national affiliation" can be based on the results of the 1995 referendum on sovereignty. In the context of Quebec, "nationalist" is not necessarily synonymous with "separatist"® and some Québécois may in fact favor separatism, but not at any price.’®

In the process of nation-building, those active in the process showcase those “nation-like” qualities they already possess and seek to establish the remaining qualities. The change implied by the term "nation-building," results in a kind of soul-searching, especially by the educated, literate class of a nation.

National identities are proclaimed to be both natural and (usually) obvious, but in reality are not so simple or straightforward. As examples of this complexity, we can consider the cases presented by John Hutchinson, where we see that nineteenth-century Slovak nationalists had some difficulty convincing the

Slovak people that despite the religious and linguistic differences that existed between villages they indeed constituted one nation (Cultural Nationalism. 24-

® See William Dodge’s preface to Boundaries of Identity: A Quebec Reader, xii.

In the chapter on Louise Labé and Nicole Brossard we will see that this may well be the case for many Québécois feminists. 14 26). In a contrasting example, during the progress of nationalism In Ireland, many Protestant Anglo-Irish began to suspect that the Irish nation might not

Include them (Hutchinson, 216, 218). A sort of Identity crisis may well result from the revelation that Identity, and especially national Identity, Is neither particularly stable, nor can It be taken for granted.

A period of natlon-bullding Is necessarily a struggle over definitions and cultural traits, and for this reason reveals that this Identity Is not as fixed or stable as one might like to pretend. What Is “Frenchness"? What Is “Québécité"? Which traits are good for the nation or Inherent to It? Which should be encouraged and which ones suppressed? Whereas the creation of a national state Is the affair of a political nationalist, the above questions are the domain of the cultural nationalist. It Is this face of natlon-bullding that is of most

Interest to this study.

When speaking of nationalism, there Is a tendency to believe that nationalism Is necessarily a throwback, a conservative movement opposed to change. This In fact Is not so. While national movements usually claim to be

Inspired by the “national genius,” this does not Indicate a slavish devotion to the nation’s tradition and past. As Konstantin Symmons-Symonolewicz points out

In his 1970 work Nationalist Movements: A Comparative View. “Modern nationalism. In contrast to the fanatical defense of the old order. Is often critical of the weaknesses of Its own native heritage and thus tends to be reformist In its goals..."(5). As Hutchinson demonstrates In The Dvnamlcs of Cultural

Nationalism, the business of national reform Is carried out by two nationalist movements occurring In alternating cycles, with the cultural movement preceding the political one (2, 41-42). He Identifies cultural nationalism as "a response to the erosion of traditional identities and status orders by the

15 modernization process as mediated through a reforming state (4)." The steady

evolution of France away from a feudal state and towards a bureaucratic monarchy with its accompanying displacement of the traditional role of the

noblesse d'épée would certainly seem to fit this description. This is likewise true of Quebec after 1960 with the increased involvement of the state in social

services and the displacement of the Church, which was -no t insignificantly - one of the traditional elites in Québécois society. Cultural nationalism has as its goal to provide "'authentic' national models of progress (9)." Importantly,

Hutchinson notes:

Revivalists... admire the human scale of the traditional community and its rootedness in nature, family, locality and religion, but they reject its otherworldliness and its barriers to the equal contribution of all groups (occupational, religious, sexual) to the nation as a corruption of native values. (33-author's emphasis)

This agrees well with Oommen's observation that the rise of the nation coincides with the rise of a sense of individuality, as a nation is perceived to be an assembly of individuals (Oommen, 28). So we see that the cultural nationalist seeks to find in the national culture a means of enabling all members of the nation to participate in the progress of the nation.

Literary experimentation can easily be linked to a desire to express this individuality. It is this inclusive character that sweeps writers into the national debate, leading them to explore their own history, institutions and identity. We will see in the work of Montaigne and Godbout a suggestion that the differences between nations are natural, and that nations should be allowed to develop along their own natural path. Traditions and institutions that stunt this "natural" development are then to be called into question. Cultural nationalism presented in this light not only makes room for a feminist movement, it would

16 seem to invite one. This would be particularly true for a feminism that wears national colors as we will see quite plainly in the works of Marguerite de

Navarre and Louise Labé, and see that many of the women who figure prominently in the works of Anne Hébert and Nicole Brossard also have a strong national affiliation. Identifying these writers as cultural nationalists is not to suggest they perceive national identity as the sole valid identity. A selection of women authors, therefore, permits us to examine how the "additional" identity of being a woman also comes into play in work produced by women at this time. A period of nation-building, where identity exploration is widespread and encouraged, functions as a perfect window of opportunity for women and other suppressed identities to challenge the status quo.

This study will focus on the work of six authors, and in order to emphasize the common effects of nation-building on both literatures these authors will be studied in pairs, one from each period. The first chapter will focus on Michel de Montaigne and Jacques Godbout. Then we will turn to

Marguerite de Navarre and Anne Hébert and finally Louise Labé and Nicole

Brossard. The number of authors studied is determined by the desire to strike a balance between choosing too few representatives, and so making any comparisons appear coincidental, and choosing too many and thereby spreading the analysis too thin to be of any interest. It will be noted that this selection and pairing has been made without respect for chronological order.

Not only will the authors be studied out of order, but those from Quebec are closer together in time than are the authors from the Renaissance. In fact, the

Québécois authors are roughly contemporaneous.” Considering only the context of nation-building, it can be assumed that the process would naturally

" For more about the chronological relationship of Anne Hébert to those being identified as her "contemporaries," see below. 17 progress much faster in Quebec, having the benefit of pre-existing models to follow. As one of the first nation-states, France's arrival at national status would be a slow, evolutionary process. It is this difference between a society with a blueprint and one without this kind of a model that permits the chronological telescoping used here. The gender ratio of two female authors to one male author also would appear to be atypical for sixteenth-century studies. The two- to-one ratio in favor of women is intended to help demonstrate one of my stated observations that at this particular time in France and Quebec the increased productivity by women and their increased visibility is a response to the social change present in a period of nation-building. Hutchinson's discussion of cultural nationalism would seem to predict greater participation of women in a field such as literature, and the increased visibility of women authors in these two national contexts appears to bear this out. In order to get a better feel for the interaction of feminism and nationalism, the corpus of women writers needs to be as broad as possible.

Michel de Montaigne was born in 1533 near Bordeaux. His family had only relatively recently been elevated to the nobility; the title was purchased by

Montaigne’s great-grandfather. In 1554 Montaigne received a seat on a court in Périgueux, a body which was later absorbed into the parlement of Bordeaux, where he served until his retirement in 1571. A Catholic, he was known to both the king of France and the Protestant leader, Henri de Navarre and in his

Essais he speaks of his role as a liaison between Navarre and the French

Crown. In 1581 he was elected mayor of Bordeaux. Montaigne wished to decline, but accepted the position upon the king's order that he accept, for it was considered vital that the religiously divided city have a moderate Catholic

18 as mayor. His re-election to the post in 1583 is evidence of his political and diplomatic skill. His fame today is based on his monumental work, the Essais. It was published in two volumes in 1580, which were subsequently expanded and a third volume added for its re-publication in 1588. Later, a further expanded edition was published posthumously in 1595. Many factors have been cited as inspiring Montaigne to write the Essais. Montaigne himself suggested that it was due to the death of his great friend La Boétie, who died in 1563. Since Montaigne could no longer converse with his friend as he would have wished, he wrote. He may also have been inspired by an awareness of his own mortality. His father, whom he greatly missed, died of an attack of kidney stones. By 1580, Montaigne had already had his first attack of this ailment. In the sixteenth century, kidney stones were an incurable, and therefore terminal, condition. The possibility that he too could die this fairly unpleasant death was one of Montaigne’s concerns. Fortunately, he was spared this and died rather peacefully in his bed in 1592.

David Quint, in his Montaigne and the Qualitv of Mercv. demonstrates that Montaigne’s work shows a concern with the state of the nobility at his time and a desire to reform this, his social class (ix). Although Montaigne repeatedly denies it. it would appear that he hopes the nobility will take the essayist as a model to initiate a self-reform. His strenuous denials of this have much the air of the gentleman who doth protest too much. Montaigne writes that he himself is the matter of his book, and he is critical of the poor subject matter he has chosen. His "living writing" becomes a powerful celebration of natural diversity and the individual, which will form the base of this study of his work.

19 Jacques Godbout was born in 1933 in Montreal. He received his master’s degree in 1954 from the University of Montreal and from 1954-57 taught French in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In 1957 he was hired by the Office nationale du film in Montreal as a writer and producer. He founded the revue

Liberté as well as the Mouvement laïc de langue française. In 1962 he won the

Prix France-Canada for his first novel L’Aquarium. In 1967 he published Salut.

Galarneau! which earned him the Governor-General's prize. In 1973 he was awarded the Prix DuPau of the Académie Française for D'amour P.O. He has also received the Prix Duverny (1973), the Prix Belgique-Canada (1978) and the Prix David (1985). He has published many novels as well as poetry and various scripts and screenplays. The novels upon which we will focus are

Salut. Galarneau!. D’amour P.O.. and Les Têtes à Papineau (1981).

Godbout is frequently described as an écrivain engagé. He has been quite involved in Quebec politics, and in nationalist politics. His political concerns are ever-present in his writing and his writing self-consciously presents itself as a political act. The crisis of the national identity is often conflated with the personal identity crises of his protagonists. As an example.

Les Têtes à Papineau was in part a response to the failure of the 1980 referendum on independence. In critical studies his protagonists are often interpreted as allegories for the Québécois nation. This is true especially for

Galarneau and the bicephalous Papineau. Most significantly, his protagonists are often (aspiring?) writers. Here we will explore Godbout's use of the writing protagonist as allegory for the nation and particularly how the act of writing as vécriture is linked to self-identification.

Marguerite de Navarre was born in 1492, the year of Columbus' arrival in the Americas. She was the older sister to Francis I, and she exerted a

20 considerable influence in political affairs, exemplified by her role as negotiator for Francis I's liberty from Charles V who held him captive in Madrid. Her first published work was the Miroir de l’âme pécheresse in 1533. This poem was quickly condemned by the Sorbonne, but the intervention of the king on his sister’s behalf forced them to lift the condemnation. In 1547 she published a collection of her poems. Les Marguerites de la Marguerite des princesses. where the Miroir finds a place at the head of the collection. The Heptaméron. a collection of tales in imitation of Boccaccio’s Decameron and perhaps her most famous work, was not published until after her death in 1549.

She was an ardent supporter of the evangelical movement in France, and her writing reflects her evangelical Christianity and tendency towards mysticism. Although she remained a Catholic all her life, she became the protector of evangelicals and eventually of Protestants from persecution. Her court at Navarre became a refuge for many like Clément Marot and Lefèvre d’Etaples, particularly after the 1534 “affaire des placards,” when the king began to crack down on would-be reformers. In her writing she places a great deal of value on orality and the truth of personal observation. Politics are by no means absent from her work, and she criticizes institutions of the Church, particularly certain religious orders. Her work also indicates that she agreed with Louise Labé’s view of the equality of women in matters of scholarship and writing. In the Heptaméron. for example, she goes out of her way to demonstrate the intellectual equality of her male and female characters. Of interest to this study are the roles of sin, testimony and redemption in her work and how they function in the question of identity.

Anne Hébert was born in 1916 in the village of Sainte-Catherine-de-

Fossambault, and since 1954 has lived most of her life in Paris. She comes

21 from a literary family. Her father was a known literary critic and she is the

cousin of the poet Saint-Denys Garneau. She has been the recipient of numerous literary awards including the Prix David for her 1942 collection of

poetry Les Songes en équilibre, and the Prix France-Canada as well as the

Prix Duverny for her first novel Les Chambres de bois in 1958. In 1959 she

received the Prix de Littérature de la Province de Québec and in 1960 was

received into the Royal Society of Canada. Her 1970 novel Kamouraska.

perhaps the most famous of her works, received the Prix des Librairies de

France, and she received the Prix Fémina in 1982 for Les fous de bassan. She began her literary career primarily as a poet, and her first publications were in

periodicals in 1939. Among her collections of poetry are the above-mentioned

Les Songes en équilibre, and also Le Tombeau des rois. Eventually she also began to write short stories, of which “Le Torrent" is probably the best-known

example. It is her career as a novelist which is of interest to this study.

Although her career as a writer in general began well before the Quiet

Revolution, her work as a novelist is contemporary with the work of the other

two Québécois authors of this study. Her first novel. Les Chambres de bois. was written in 1958. She would not publish her second until 1970,

Kamouraska. From 1970 on, her literary production is largely if not exclusively

in novel form. This study will focus on three of them: Kamouraska. Les Enfants

du sabbat n 9751. and Les Fous de bassan.

In these novels she focuses on a transgressive or potentially transgressive female protagonist, usually in the setting of a historical or pseudo-

historical novel. Her writing explores and experiments with the transgressive potential of the historical novel, or seeks to subvert this form. These novels all take place in the past, from a century ago (Kamouraska) to the more recent past

22 (Les Fous de bassan). In these three novels she violates chronological order,

interweaving the narrative present with memories of the characters’ past. Time

and narrative are fluid. Historical authority is challenged by the resurrection of

suppressed memory and history, and a refusal to differentiate clearly between

objective reality and dream. By subverting the dominant order’s claim to a monopoly on historical truth (“History is written by the victors”), the marginalized female protagonist seeks to (re-) establish her own identity. Although it never forms the central focus of the text, the conflict between English and French Canadians is never absent from these texts. One positive aspect she exploits in

using the form of the historical novel is that it denies English the monopoly of the historical voice. Personal history and national history are closely interwoven in the novels of Anne Hébert. As in the work of Marguerite de

Navarre, truth in the Hébertian novel is a personal testimony, as is underlined in

Kamouraska by the difference between the truth of the protagonist’s memory and the “truth” proclaimed by the court of law. Testimony and the role of guilt will be the focus of our interest in these works.

Louise Labé was born in Lyon which at the time was the intellectual center of France. This was due to its “internationalized” milieu as a banking center, and the fact that it was nearly as Italian as it was French. It was for its time highly modern and relatively wealthy. It was not the political center of the kingdom, but it was in many ways the cultural one, enjoying the benefits of its cosmopolitanism and its distance from the conservatism of the Sorbonne in

Paris. Labé’s father, a member of Lyon’s wealthy merchant class, appears to have seen to her education, something relatively rare at the time. She published only a single volume of work, so what we know of her as a writer is based on a very small corpus indeed. She is considered to be part of the so-

23 called Ecole de Lyon. This was not a literary école in the formal sense, but rather an informal association of writers in Lyon, of which the focal point (and certainly its most famous member) was the poet Maurice Scève. The majority of

Labé’s poems consists of sonnets based on the Petrarchan model. In these sonnets the female speaker claims to be burning with passion for an unattainable man, not her husband. If this outpouring of passion and sexual desire was not shocking enough at a time when women were not supposed to feel such things, let alone speak of them, her collection opens with a sort of feminist manifesto. In this preface, she calls men to task for having kept women from learning and most importantly from writing, and she calls upon the women of her class to take on these activities as their right. Given this information, it comes as no surprise that she was a controversial figure in her own lifetime. Of particular interest to this study is her description of how she came to writing, her coupling of sexual passion and desire with equal textual passion and desire.

Nicole Brossard was born in Montreal in 1943. Many comparisons can be drawn between twentieth century Montreal and Louise Labé’s Lyon. Like sixteenth century Lyon, Montreal is a modern, cosmopolitan city, and an important crossroads for Canada’s dominant cultures, English and French.

While it is not the political center of the province, it is arguably Quebec’s cultural center. Brossard received her licence from the University of Montreal in 1968, but she had been active as a writer before then. Her first collection of poetry.

Mordre en sa chair, was published in 1966. This was to be followed by many others, a sampling of which are Suite logique (1970), French Kiss (1974) and

Amantes (1980). In 1984 she republished many of her earlier works in Double impression: Poèmes et textes 1967-1984. She has also written many novels, one of the more recent being Le désert mauve (1987). She was a cofounder

24 and codirector of the feminist revue La Barre du jour and the codirector of its resurrection as La Nouvelle barre du four. She was cofounder of the feminist

[ournai Les Têtes de pioche and in 1982 founded her own publishing house, L:inté9nalg..éd.itrlçg- While feminism has always played an important role in her work, her earlier writings are very much involved in the nationalist movement in Quebec.

Her work often draws comparisons between the oppression of women in patriarchal society with the oppression of francophones in a society dominated by anglophones. Gradually she turned the focus of her work from the national struggle to women’s struggle although she never entirely abandons the national question. With her increasing attention to women's issues, she also focuses more and more on lesbian issues with much of her work as explorations of lesbian desire, sexuality and identity. Amantes and the poem Sous la langue are examples of this. Similarly to Labé, her sexual exploration is a textual one. Her work deliberately blurs the distinction between poetry and prose and she explores and experiments with the French language itself, in particular the grammatical expression of gender. This attention to gender has posed many a problem for those who translate her work into English; Barbara

Godard turned to the clever but somewhat awkward Lovhers. in order to translate the title of Brossard's Amantes. Identity plays a very important role in her work. It's tempting to see her shifts in focus as explorations of three aspects of her own identity: Québécois, woman, lesbian. Her interplay of national and sexual identity, sexual and textual production will form the focus of this analysis of her work.

This study will present the six authors as demonstrating three different approaches to the problem of national identity. The first approach is the

25 connection between national upheaval and the writer "qui n'en est pas" in an exploration of marginal identities in Montaigne and Godbout. Secondly we look at the role of sin and sacrifice in the examination of national identity, as treated by Hébert and Marguerite. Lastly, the chapter on Labé and Brossard examines the interplay of identity and desire. By treating Montaigne and Godbout first, and thereby treating the men separately from the women, we are able to appreciate the complex interplay between national identity and gender identity in addition to the primary focus of their chapters. It is also to be hoped that this will dispel any idea that women's writing is being treated as monolithic or that women are "single-issue" writers. The focus in gender identity will be on women's identity as women with little mention of men's identity as men. This is due in large part to the fact that these women authors address women's identity in a more direct manner. In presenting these ideas, the argument of each chapter is twofold. The presence of national issues and nationalist themes is analyzed in the work of each author. Secondly, the chapters demonstrate and analyze the comparability of the two authors, and hence of the two literatures, on a theme that is allied to nationalism and the national idea. It is important to mention here that this present study does not suggest that each or indeed any of these six authors are nationalists in the contemporary sense of the term.

Rather, their works demonstrate that each of them is aware they belong to a

French or Québécois nation and we will see in their writings the effects of their cultural context of nation-building.

Montaigne made an interesting observation of how writers become prolific at times of trouble, comparing his own time to the last days of the Roman Empire (III: 9, 201). Daniel Russell has observed in Marguerite's Heotameron the literary effects of this instability in a preference for characters of borderline

26 identities or transitional characters (204, 210). These traits will be observed in the works of Hébert, Godbout, and Montaigne as well. The characters favored

by Labé and Brossard will prove to be frankly iconoclastic. If, as Russell

proposes, transitional periods favor transitional characters in literature, this may

help to explain why a period of nation-building (transitional by definition) favors or encourages women's writing. To see why this may be so, we will need to turn to a notion proposed by Nicole Brossard, and discussed by her in Les terribles vivantes. This is the notion of the spiral describing women's reality as overlapping men's reality. Starting from a point on the margin of men's reality

(figured as a circle) the female experience moves in a spiral pattern through this circle and then out into the territory that is unbounded by this circle. This description greatly simplifies an extremely rich concept, but it makes clear that

Brossard sees women's experience (or at least the experience of the woman writer) as transitional or "borderline."

This image of the spiral carries us to another common trait between these works, namely, the sense of movement one finds in them. Brossard makes much of the notion of spirals and curves, the curve being one of her favored images for a woman or a woman's body. The spiral is striking in that it is essentially a singular unchanging movement in a perpetually expanding path. In other words, it is both progressive and repetitive. Robert Cottrell identifies in Marguerite's work the motion of the pendulum, a forward motion that is also forever a repetition (Grammar. 180), a motion we can see in

Hébert's work as well. These images of forward movement coupled with repetition or revisitation are also to be found in the works of Montaigne and

Godbout, and follow the notions expressed by Hutchinson of the logic of cultural nationalism, reaching into the past to prepare the future.

27 Feminist criticism and women’s studies have done much work on identity politics in the work of the female authors examined in this study. They have explored to a great extent the relationship between society and text particularly in the discussion of the roles played by women. Important examples of this kind of work are Katarina Wilson's Women Writers of the Renaissance and

Reformation and Rewriting the Renaissance edited by Margaret Ferguson. For twentieth-century Quebec there are many important works, for example Patricia

Smart's Writing in the Father's House. P.G. Lewis' Traditionalism. Nationalism and Feminism: Women Writers of Quebec and the recent study by Bénédicte Mauguière, Traversée des idéologies et exploration des identités dans les

écritures de femmes au Québec (1970-1980). Of striking interest to this study of literature and nation-building are those observations that confirm suspicions that the success of women's writing in this context is no coincidence. Nicole Brossard observes that the accomplishments of feminism in Quebec are in part due to the coincidence of the development of feminism in conjunction with the movement of national liberation and modernization ("December 6, 1989 Among the Centuries," 115). As though to address this conjunction, in an article entitled, "The Gender of Sovereignty," we read:

At this time, when we are striving to pinpoint what brings us together as well as what distinguishes us, our identity as feminists and Québécoises is indivisible. Without a common history and a common language, how could we communicate? How could we, as women, say who we are or share our experiences without the Ariadne's thread of culture tying us one to the other? (de Sève, 110)

Although Micheline de Sève is referring to Quebec, it would appear clear that the women of Renaissance France must also be tied by this "Ariadne's thread." In fact, it invites the question as to whether or not this same thread is necessary for communication between men as well, and if in fact the national identity, the 28 cultural nationalist project, is a vital intersection between the identities and experiences of men and women.

By culminating with the chapter on desire, we are able to follow an interesting current that flows through these chapters exploring national identity.

All of these authors give a strong voice to sexuality and desire in their writing.

The role of desire becomes a universal thread and woven into nationalist . themes of family and genealogy brings us to the idea expressed in the title of this study, that of "conceiving the nation." A cultural nationalist believes the nation to be an "organic" being, a "living personality" endowed with a "creative life-principal" (Hutchinson, 13-14). The nation as an organic entity becomes subject to natural laws -evolution and the biological processes of birth, growth, and death -a n idea we will see expressed in Montaigne's Essais HI: 23. 515).

Sexual imagery is not uncommon in nationalist contexts. We have, for example, the symbolic mariage of the nation to its home soil. Carla Freccero in an article on Marguerite de Navarre evokes the image of the king as wedded to the nation ("Practicing Queer Philology," 112).

In Quebec studies, texts treating nationalism and national identity are really fairly numerous. In fact, the issue of French Canada as a nation is a concern that predates the Canadian confederation, as seen in Lord Durham's

Report on the Affairs of British North America.'^ For more contemporary examples, we can consider the above mentioned work by Richard Handler

(Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec). Ramsay Cook's Québec.

Canada, and the Use of Nationalism and Richard Chadbourne’s article “Three

Expressions of Nationalism in Modern Québec Literature," among many others.

Due to the recent increase in nationalist activity in Quebec, most contemporary

Although, as we have seen, Durham denies this national status, and recommends the extinction of the French Canadian culture. 29 studies of nationalism and the related areas of self-determination, separatism, etc. make at least some passing mention of Quebec. There are noticeably fewer for Renaissance France. This is due in part to some of the amibiguities already referred to regarding the status of France as a nation in the sixteenth century. Traditionally in studies of nationalism, the modern nation is considered to be a phenomenon that did not and could not have occurred before the

French Revolution of 1789. Nations and nationalism were thought of as phenomena largely belonging to the nineteenth century and associated with the rise of the bourgeoisie and the development of capitalism. Therefore sixteenth century nationalism would have been thought impossible. Slowly this barrier is being pushed back as a small collection of works pointing to pre-

1789 nationalisms appears. We have, for example, Denise Godwin’s article,

"Le nationalisme français dans la nouvelle de 1657 à 1700," and have already mentioned Yardeni’s "Histoires de villes, histoires de provinces, et naissance d'une identité française au XVI® siècle.” To this should be added Beaume’s very interesting study. Naissance de la nation France, discussing the growing evolution of a French national identity during the Hundred Years’ War. As has been seen, of particular interest to this study are works treating the cultural manifestations of nationalism, and not just in France or Quebec.

There are many parallels one could make between the Irish and the French-

Canadian nationalist movements, no doubt in part due to the fact that they are both Catholic, European (or Western) nations colonized by the same Protestant

European power. John Hutchinson's above-mentioned study of the Gaelic revival in Ireland has presented a very helpful discussion of cultural nationalism. Although there are significant differences in the experiences of

France, Quebec and modern Greece, Gregory Jusdanis' Belated Modernitv and

30 Aesthetic Culture: Inventing National Literature is also interesting for its examination of the development of literature in a nationalist context.

Turning from the cultural context to the writings themselves, it may be surprising to discover that parallels between sixteenth-century France and twentieth-century Quebec have been implied, if not stated explicitly, for quite some time. The widespread application of Bakhtinian analysis, particularly the ideas presented in Mikhail Bakhtin's Rabelais and His World, to Québécois literature points to the presence of the carnavalesque aesthetic in both societies. One may cite as examples Maroussia Ahmed’s “The Relevance of the Carnavalesque in the Quebec Novel,” and André Belleau’s

“Carnavalisation et roman québécois: mise au point sur l’usage d’un concept de Bakhtine.” Indeed, François Rabelais is certainly notable by his absence from the list of authors that is the focus of this study. There already exists a good deal of work linking twentieth-century Québécois writing to Rabelais, in particular Québécois author Roch Carrier (also not included in this study and for similar reasons).’® This is hardly to suggest that the last word has been said on the subject, but including them here would needlessly duplicate the work of other scholars and equally needlessly lengthen this present study.

The proposed approach of dividing the issue of writing and national

Identity into three problems is therefore not to suggest that these are the only three possible options for a writer in the context of nation-building. Nor is it suggested that the pairs used to examine each approach use that approach exclusively or even that the other pairs do not. It is hoped that in organizing this study around three precise problems or techniques it will better permit the exploration of those resonances that link the texts of the two domains. In analyzing similar approaches to a similar question in two literatures widely Consider for example John Lennox's "Carnavalesque and Parody in 'Le jardin des délices." 31 separated by time and place, this study aims to demonstrate a continuity between them that may provide a different perspective for both francophone and Renaissance studies.

32 CHAPTER 2

JACQUES GODBOUT AND MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE: SPOTLIGHT ON THE GROTESQUE

Je sais bien que de deux choses l’une: ou tu vis, ou tu écris. Moi je veux vécrire: (Salut Galarneau!.157 - author’s emphasis)'

These lines were written by Jacques Godbout in the conclusion to his 1967 novel, Salut Galarneau!: but François Galarneau’s aspiration to vécriture echoes the sentiment of his sixteenth-century forebear, Michel de Montaigne, as carried out in his monumental work, the Essais. These literary monuments are built through the interaction of two closely interrelated techniques that drive their evolution, and we can refer to the techniques in question by the terms used by Galarneau to describe his writing: ethnography and vécriture. Through this examination we will see that more important than either of the literary approaches or techniques is the identity they explore and celebrate. As a forum discussing the social, cultural and literary context of the person that is their subject, they frame this identity like a portrait. As Montaigne himself says in his preface to the Essais. “Ainsi, lecteur, je suis moy-mesmes la matière de mon livre: (“Au Lecteur," 4)” An identical declaration can be made concerning the subject of Galarneau’s cahiers. In treating these ideas, in addition to the Essais and Salut Galarneau!. I will examine two other works by Jacques Godbout,

’ The word “vécrire” is coined by Godbout in this passage. 33 D’Amour. P.Q. (1972) and Les Têtes à Papineau (1981). As has been noted by Yvon Bellemare and Jacques Pelletier, in many ways these novels by Godbout are revisitations of the same problem, and as such they bear a certain similarity to Montaigne’s continually re-read and revised Essais. Like Salut Galarneau! all three of these novels share traits of both the journal and the (fictional) autobiography while not truly being either. They all demonstrate a complex interrelationship between the text and the life of the writer, and actively problematize the notion of the writer as writer. No less than Montaigne’s Essais and Galarneau’s cahiers, these texts are also driven by the twin engines of ethnography and vécriture.

By “ethnography,” I mean commentary on and study of their own cultures and the cultures that affect them, either due to geographical proximity, historical and/ or cultural similarity or through personal interest. Montaigne turns this ethnographic eye towards the cultures of Antiquity as well as sixteenth-century

France, its neighbors and the newly encountered nations of the Americas. It is an approach that permits Montaigne and Galarneau to explore philosophy, custom, and the movement of history. Unlike ethnography from a more traditional viewpoint, their primary interest is not in exotic or distant cultures, but rather their own. Foreign or historical example is cited primarily as a means of highlighting, clarifying or critiquing contemporary local phenomena.

Vécriture deals with the relationship between a writer’s life and his writing and is the activity permitting a writer to bridge the gap between living and writing. (Both Montaigne and Galarneau state that they must isolate themselves in order to write, but also crave human contact.) The consubstantiality between the author and the work is a highly developed theme in Montaigne’s Essais, explored in great detail in Richard Regosin’s The Matter

34 of My Book: Montaigne's Essais as the Book of the Self. In it, he allies

Montaigne’s presence in his Essais to God’s creative act and to Christ as the

Word incarnate (68, 150-51). The presence of the author in his act of creation is a notion also explored in Godbout’s work, and is problematized by the ambiguous relationship between the writer-narrator and his identity with himself as a writer. Montaigne and Galarneau both recoil from the idea of themselves as (professional) writers, even though they are both writing and fully intend to publish their work. Under the heading of vécriture I wish to treat the theme of writing as it appears in the text and especially the extremely important theme of the lives of the narrators as art. The role of these “ethnographic” studies may seem to be beside the point in works whose stated function is primarily self-exploration. Yet the Godboutian narrators and Montaigne are all aware of the Important role that social and national context play in one’s identity. As Montaigne puts it in the opening to his essay “Du repentir,” “Les autres forment l’homme (III: 2, 21).” There is a curious interaction between ethnographe and “ethnographié” in these works, and this is in part due to a certain unity between the writer and the nation he represents. There is a distinct feeling that the state of the nation -th e cultural context- is intimately linked to the narrator’s identity in a way that makes it inseparable from the personal record that these works claim to be. While

Montaigne presents himself as a typical French nobleman and not as a sort of microcosm of France, Godbout’s characters are often unmistakeably allegorized versions of Quebec or Quebec in microcosm. The identification of the narrator(s) of Les Têtes à Papineau with Quebec is profound, and will be discussed in detail later in this chapter. For now we can observe that the date of publication of this novel about the choice whether to assimilate or remain

35 distinct is 1981, the year after Quebec’s first referendum on sovereignty-

association and also point out that the title characters have the same last name as Louis-Joseph Papineau, leader of the 1837 Patriot’s Rebellion. The writer-

narrators of D’Amour. P.O. are clearly designed to portray or personify the interaction between intellectual and popular culture in Quebec, a point that is

emphasized by Mireille’s outburst during the radio interview at the end of the

novel.

Mon Cher Thomas D’Amour, la première chose que tu vas te mettre dans le ciboulot avant d’entreprendre un autre livre, c’est que les mots ne t’appartiennent pas; le langage est une richesse naturelle nationale, comme l’eau; quand tu viens me dire que c’est TOI L’ECRIVAIN, tu me fais mal aux seins, toi mon garçon, t’es l’aiguille du gramophone, t’es pas le disque, tu n’as pas la propriété des mots, si tu leurs touches, c’est parce que la commune veut bien que tu nous fasses de la musique, mais faut pas nous faire chier. Toutes les secrétaires du monde ont droit d’intervention dans les lettres que leur dictent les patrons, tu comprends? c’est pas chinois ça! (156)

The role of Thomas and Mireille as representatives for the nation is made

particularly clear as Mireille symbolically divides all of Québécois society between “patrons" and “secrétaires." Montaigne is less emphatic about presenting himself as representative of France, but he does go out of his way to present himself as typical, at least in the demographic sense. David Quint

refers to his work as “a self-portrait of the essayist-as-everyman fQualitv. x).’’ Of average means (for a nobleman), Montaigne makes no great effort to increase his possessions, authority, or influence at court. Even his name is average, a subject which he discusses in his essay on glory (11:16, 435). Galarneau likewise perceives himself as demographically typical.

Ils ont consulté les statistiques et ils ont trouvé leur citoyen moyen, celui à propos duquel ils 36 recommandaient que l’on fasse des tests: François Galarneau, un homme d’aujourd’hui qui ne se sauverait pas dans les Appalaches; (Galarneau. 76).

Galarneau’s plan to wall himself up inside his own house is far too obvious an allusion to Quebec’s flirtations with isolationism, particularly during the

Duplessis era. Like Galarneau’s attempt at isolation and Les Têtes’ struggle with assimilation, an important parallel is drawn between Montaigne and the

nation he lives in. As Robert Cottrell remarks in his study of Montaigne, Sexualitv/ Textualitv. Montaigne perceives himself and his nation as an aging body in decline (61-2). Mon monde est failly, ma forme est vuidée; je suis tout du passé, et suis tenu de l’authorizer et d’y conformer mon issue. (Ill: 10, 285)

Montaigne complains throughout the Essais about the degradation of his times.

Most often it is about the decay of custom, the nobility ignoring their responsibilities, or the devaluing of cultural symbols, such as the baiser exchanged at greeting. Highlighted by him as a particularly French cultural practice, Montaigne remarks that since they are given out so freely they are no longer a sign of favor, and one is also faced with the disagreeable necessity of kissing unattractive people (III: 5, 121). He also comments ironically on the degradation of the knightly Order of Saint-Michel. Recounting that in his youth he hoped to earn an appointment to this order, he tells the reader that rather than raising him up to the Order’s former high standards. Fortune did him the favor of lowering those standards to meet him, and indeed well below (11:12,

359). The Godboutian narrators have a mixed perspective on their own times.

Les Têtes à Papineau is by far the most pessimistic, marked by repeated references to annihilated cultures, ending with the assimilation/transformation 37 of francophone (but bilingual) Charles and François Papineau into exclusively

anglophone Charles F. Papineau. D'Amour. P.Q. is often highly critical of

Québécois society, but ends on what might be considered an optimistic note.

The novel that resulted from the collaboration of Thomas and Mireille Is a

success, and Mireille closes the novel with “Tu viens, D’Amour (157)?”

indicating that despite her differences with Thomas, she does not seek a break­

up. Galarneau’s perspective on his own times is ambiguous.

Est-ce qu’un jour, quelqu’un va me dire; Galarneau, c’était comment dans ton temps? Dans mon temps! II pleut plus fort encore, j ’entends I’eau des gouttières qui s’accumule dans le baril, ça doit être ce temps qui me rend triste. Dans mon temps! !! restait encore un cheval debout, il s’appelait Martyr, il ne tirait plus rien, mais personne n’avait le courage de l’achever, il mourait de vieillesse à quinze ans, j’en avais vingt-cinq. Dans mon temps, dans mon Amérique à moi, pour être heureux, il fallait être riche, très riche, ou instruit, très instruit, ou crever ou crever des bulles, des rêves, des si. On pouvait écrire des livres aussi. (Galarneau. 44)

Interestingly enough, Montaigne also remarks that writing was a popular option

for those living at his time.

L’escrivaillerie semble estre quelque simptome d’un siecle desbordé. Quand escrivismes- nous tant que depuis nous sommes en trouble? Quand les Romains tant que lors de leur ruyne? (111:9, 201)

Les Têtes remark with some amusement upon a similar profusion of artistic communication in their own time.

La moitié du Québec, de toute manière, une guitare à la main, chantait déjà pour l’autre moitié. Les nègres avaient pour eux la boxe et le baseball, les Fontaine la lutte, pourquoi ne pas devenir chansonniers? (Les Têtes. 103)' Les Fontaine are a family of dwarves. The Fontaine children were the first friends of Les Têtes. 38 Although Montaigne attributes this activity to the general spread of vice during these times (writing belonging to the vice of “oisiveté” and uselessness), it

seems reasonable that this writing responds to a psychological need to

preserve one’s name and identity, a notion which will be explored in more

detail later in this chapter.

Montaigne and Galarneau also reveal a certain anxiety about the

relationship of the writer to his work. Montaigne comments that since his Essais have been read by the public, he feels almost compelled not only to have the

Essais conform to himself, but also to make himself conform to his image as

presented in the Essais. In Salut. Galarneau! we hear Mari se asking François to see his cahiers.

-Est-ce que je peux lire ce que tu as déjà écrit? Pour voir seulement. "Q u’est-ce que ça te donnerait? -Ç a me changerait d’idées sur toi peut-être. -Je suis toujours le même Galarneau. (81)

While his inquiry into her motives for seeing his notebooks is perhaps philosophically sound, his hesitation in letting her see his writing betrays a concern that he may not “live up to” the image of himself painted in the cahiers.

Either that or he is afraid that being “read” is a far more intimate form of being known than that he had previously experienced with this woman.

It is clear that both Montaigne and Galarneau (and probably Godbout, although not all of his narrators are as explicit on the subject) assign a positive value to writing. Montaigne asks why everyone can’t produce self-portraits (II;

17, 473) and Galarneau is even more emphatic:

...chaque être humain devrait être forcé de remplir des cahiers: au bout de l’instruction obligatoire, il devrait y avoir l’écriture obligatoire, il y aurait moins

39 de méchancetés, vu qu’on aurait tous le nez dans des cahiers. fGalarneau.73)

Yet while writing is definitely positive, it is by no means clear that they assign a

similar value to being a writer, and certainly do not consider themselves to be

writers. Jacques Pelletier notes that Thomas D’Amour’s movement to an

“écriture vivante, populaire" in D'Amour. P.Q. is precisely what undermines

D’Amour’s status as a writer (Roman national. 41). On the subject of

professional writers, Godbout’s Galarneau writes: Je ne suis pas un écrivain professionnel, moi, ça me fait mal quand je cherche une phrase, je ne suis pas Biaise Pascal, moi, je n’ai jamais eu de nuit de feu, sauf celle où des petits sacrements en scooter ont tenté de faire brûler mon stand, je ne suis pas La Bruyère, moi, ni d’un autre fromage... (Galarneau. 130)

As François Galarneau dismisses La Bruyère as some sort of cheese, we hear an amusing echo of Montaigne’s similar contempt for professional writers of his day. Likewise, as Montaigne is insistent that his readers not mistake him for a professional writer, or push upon him proper writer projects (a history of France, his memoirs, etc), Galarneau is equally suspicious of those who wish to see him become a writer. Reacting to the suggestions from Marise that he write a book, he writes, “les femmes veulent toujours être la George Sand de Musset, la

Simone de Beauvoir d’un Jean-Paul Sartre (Galarneau. 29).” It is surely no accident that these two women are important writers in their own right. One can almost hear Galarneau wishing to respond, if you want to know a writer, become one yourself. An even greater disdain for writers is expressed by

Mireille in the above-cited radio interview at the end of D’Amour. P.Q. This is the culmination of a highly developed theme against writers, one that was very strongly expressed in statements like, “Pour qui qu’il écrit des affaires de

40 même? Du jus de mots... de la bave d’écrivain (D’Amour. 13)1” Montaigne

goes into great detail about how he is anything but a writer in “De la ressemblance des enfants aux peres” (II: 37, 662).

Mireille obviously shares Montaigne’s impatience with professional writers, as she declares in D’Amour. P.O.:

...je ne sais pas pourquoi Thomas D’Amour et ceux de sa caste me donnent envie de crucifier l’imparfait du subjonctif. Dès qu’ils ouvrent la bouche, comme une fenêtre trop grande, je voudrais leur fourrer au fond de la gorge un mot juteux, un mot mouche justement, un mot de rue. un mot bon, pas un bon mot, un mot au fenouil, un mot scotch, un mot poivré comme j’aime les Bloody Mary, un char de mots dans la gorge douze par bancs, puants, parfaits. (67)

We read here a virtual assault on the French trop soigné of the intellectual

class. The violence of her reaction to D’Amour’s language recalls that of the

Rabelaisian giant, Pantagruel, when faced with the absurdly latinized French of

the Limousin scholar. In both cases, it is a revolt/ reaction against intellectual segregation created by a dialect wilfully different from that spoken by the

people. Mireille’s imagery is bodily, physical, yet with a certain “luxury” to it as

she speaks of seasonings and alcohol. She is not a partisan of a language

stripped to its bare minimum, but rather one where the word is real, hearty, rich, in the gastronomic sense. It carries within it an echo of Montaigne’s assessment of the various dialects from his region, as he praises a particular dialect of Gascon for having a strong masculine quality he thinks that French

lacks (II: 17, 453) and especially his comment that French could benefit by developing the potential found in military and hunting vocabulary (III: 5, 111).

The paradox of the writer “qui n’en est pas un” seems merely to demonstrate Montaigne’s observation about the nature of humankind: “Certes,

41 c’est un subject merveilleusement vain, divers et ondoyant, que l’homme (1:1,

10)." This word “undulating” (“ondoyant”) particularly catches one’s attention as it appears an unusual choice to apply to a human being. Some humans may

be highly flexible, but the word “undulating” calls to mind sinuous, serpentine

creatures like snakes and eels, or mythical animals like the kraken and the

mysterious sea serpent. It could also apply to the human hybrids evoked by

Montaigne in two of his essays: the mermaid mentioned in “De l’amitié" (I: 28,

232) and the “homme perdu” with a philosopher’s tail (“la queue d’un philosophe”) of “Du repentir” (III: 2, 36-7). In short, Montaigne’s wording suggests a human grotesque more than it does an actual human. During her interview in the television production Les terribles vivantes

(1986), Québécois author Jovette Marchessault discusses her early career as a visual artist. This was before she had achieved reknown of any kind, and as a young woman with no financial means worth mentioning she was faced with the great expense of paints and other art supplies. In order to meet this expense,

Marchessault tells us:

...(J)’avais trouvé un emploi de nuit dans une tour de la ville de Montréal, à la place Bonaventure. J’étais femme de ménage. Je commençais très tard le soir et on passait la nuit à faire du ménage. Et un soir j’arrive dans une pièce -il était très très tard -je rentre dans une pièce et je vois tout de suite un [ ® ], une huile très belle— alors, bon, je continue et là il y avait un Chagall et puis au fond de la pièce il y avait -il y avait un Marchessault... [...] C’était toute l’abérration du monde pour moi. (Jovette Marchessault, in Les terribles vivantes)

In her shock at seeing her own work in such a context Marchessault suddenly

^ Here Marchessault mentions a name that is almost certainly that of the artist who painted this work. She herself seems to be unsure exactly who it is as she says it is “(something) ou (something else which sounds similar),” and I regret that I am unable to clearly understand or transcribe either name. 42 feels a sort of consubstantlailty with her painting, which she describes as a

hemorrhagic feeling. It was as if, in her words “tout mon sang sortait de moi et

faisait les couleurs de ce grand dessin (Les terribles vivantes).” The tableau in

question is a work called “Celle qui parle le langage des oiseaux," a rich array

of color, primarily blues and purples with occasional oranges and greens. It

portrays a grouping of birds which meld together to form a grotesque figure, a feathered, multicolored, humanoid face. The shock experienced by

Marchessault (a shock that, as evidenced by her expression, she still feels as

she repeats the story several years later) is that of the cleaning lady become artist (a colleague of Chagall no less!), the marginal become focal, the decorative grotesque that discovers it is able to take center stage."

Early in the Essais. Montaigne describes his writings as “crotesques.”

When he does so, he is comparing them to the small twisted hybrid figures found in the margins of portraits.

Considérant la conduite de la besogne d’un peintre que j ’ay, il m'a pris envie de I"ensuivre. Il choisit le plus bel endroit et milieu de chaque paroy, pour y loger un tableau élabouré de toute sa suffisance; et, le vuide tout au tour, il le remplit de crotesques, qui sont peintures fantasques, n'ayant grace qu'en la variété et estrangeté. Que sont-ce icy aussi, à la vérité, que crotesques et corps monstrueux, rappiecez de divers membres, sans certaine figure, n'ayants ordre, suite ny proportion que fortuite? (I: 28, 232)

He intends by this to indicate that his writings are mere marginalia to the work by Etienne de la Boétie that he wishes to feature in the first edition of the

* The parallel one can draw between Marchessault in this story, and the cleaning lady perfoming the monologue in Antonlne Malllet’s La Saoouine is striking.

43 Essais/ He also continues a theme that is found throughout this monumental work, that of "la bassesse du sujet (II: 17. 472),” -th a t is to say, Montaigne himself -and the poor quaility of his writing skills. Fausta Garavini refers to the

Essais as Montaigne’s effort to “domesticate” (domestiquer) the monstrous products of his mind (33,36). In short, compared to that of La Boétie,

Montaigne's writings are inferior, twisted, malformed, suitable for decorating the margins, but not as a feature.

It is not difficult to see how Montaigne’s writings could resemble such grotesque marginalia. With his tendency to write digressions that go on for paragraphs or to write essays that appear to digress entirely from their proposed subject (if one takes the title given any particular essay to be its subject- for example “Des coches”) his Essais easily call to mind those grotesque images found in art of human or animal bodies joined to the sinuous tail of a serpent. This idea is suggested by Gisèle Mathieu-Castellani as she describes the monstrous quality of the essay, D’un enfant monstrueux. composed of disparate elements grafted onto each other (228). In a sense,

Montaigne’s "monstrous” writing would appear to anticipate Michel Foucault’s characterization of discourse, in L’Ordre du discours, as a monster reined in by carefully maintained procedures (10-11 ). However, the grotesques found in painting are distinctly marginal, and in no way rival the visual primacy of the focal or central work of art. This can hardly be said to be the case for the

Essais, which by volume alone would overwhelm La Boétie s 29 sonnets, or even the originally proposed single essay by him, “De la servitude volontaire. ”

By the 1595 edition of the Essais. Montaigne would seem to have abandoned ® Montaigne originally had planned to feature an essay written by La Boétie In his youth, “De la servitude volontaire." This essay, however, had appeared after La Boétie's death In a Protestant pamphlet under the title of Le Contr' Un. and so Montaigne renounced his plan to publish it again after seeing it put to this purpose which he states La Boétie would never have supported (248). In Its place he proposes to print the previously unpublished sonnets. 44 even the pretense of creating a frame to another’s work. The sonnets have

been removed and replaced with the single sentence, “Ces vers se voient

ailleurs (250).” The marginal grotesques known as the Essais have clearly

taken center stage. “(L)’essayiste tient le cadre pour le tableau lui-même (Mathieu-Castellani, 222).”

Yet if Montaigne’s claim that his Essais are mere embellishment to the

sonnets by La Boétie is disingenuous, there is another sense in which the

image of the Essais as marginal grotesques is indeed profound. Pursuing Montaigne’s claims to consubstantiality with his work, we can conclude that he

is himself such a grotesque, an argument easily supported by the many self-

disparaging remarks found in the Essais. We can consider for example the

long passage in “De la praesumption” where Montaigne enumerates everything

that is wrong with his writing (11:17, 451). John O’Neill, in his work Essaving

Montaigne, alludes to these remarks under a chapter entitled “Portrait of the

Essayist without Qualities." Indeed, his self-deprecating remarks leave one with

a mental image of Michel de Montaigne that is almost comical. He attacks his

physical appearance and his (absence of) other talents in a later essay, saying

he only has the makings of a “bon clerc,” and a short clerk at that. En mon

climat de Gascongne, on tient pour drôlerie de me veoir imprimé (III: 2, 27).” To

make himself perfectly clear, in his essay “Des boyteux, ” Montaigne writes:

Jusques à cette heure, tous ces miracles et evenemens estranges se cachent devant moy. Je n’ay veu monstre et miracle au monde plus exprès que moy-mesme. On s’apprivoise à toute estrangeté par l’usage et le temps; mais plus je me hante et me connois, plus ma difformité m’estonne, moins je m’entens en moy. (Ill: 11, 308)

Yet it is not just Montaigne that is grotesque. The France that formed the context to his life is, in its own turn, a marginal “crotesque.” Renaissance 45 Europe looked to antiquity, and particularly Imperial Rome as Its model. It would not be outlandish to propose that many saw the various national cultures

as marginal grotesques to the focal point that Latin culture served or had

served. The lingering subordination of the national cultures to the Latin Is

betrayed by Montaigne’s reference to Rome as “seule ville commune et

universelle" and “la ville métropolitaine de toutes les nations Chrestlennes (III:

9, 268).” This Is further Implied by the relative status of the vulgar languages compared to that of Latin, a marginal status which Renaissance Europe was

beginning to question, as revealed not only by the Protestant Reformation, but also by Francis I’s ordinance of Vlllers-Cotterets.

We can make similar observations regarding Quebec's position In the context of North America. This francophone culture of Catholic tradition appears as similarly grotesque In the margins of the traditionally Protestant and anglophone culture that dominates this continent, something that Is not lost on Québécois author Jacques Godbout. Zlla Bernd qualifies all American (In Its transcontinental sense) literatures as hybrids, the result of grafting American traditions and realities onto a European literary heritage (“La quête d’identité,”

21 ). Bernd also has an Interesting perspective on the hybrldlty of the French- Canadlans.

Deux mots sont nécessaires: «canadien» et «français» (du moins avant l'adoption du vocable «québécois»). L'hybrldisme est à l'orlglne même de leur double nom: le premier les rattache à l'Amérique, le second aux ancêtres gaulois. (24)

Galarneau In his cahiers suggests that It Is somehow grotesque for anyone to live In Canada.

Cochon de pays. Tu gèles ou tu crèves, jamais de milieu, tempérez vos jugements! J’emmerde Jacques Cartier! Je rêve de voir Johnson ou Lesage 46 empalés, c’est tout ce qu’il méritent, je veux dire, c’est une baptême de folie de rester ici. (24)

Ail of Godbout’s narrators are grotesques. We have the misfit Galarneau, a hotdog vendor who thinks of himself as a ethnographer and has himself walled-

up in his own home. Mireille (the opinionated secretary of D’Amour. P.Q.) is,

like Galarneau, a cultural grotesque in the margins of literary society and academia. The grotesque comes into its own in Les Têtes à Paoineau. In the dedication of Les Têtes à Papineau. Jacques Godbout salutes his dedicatees with, “vivent les monstres! et tous ceux qui ont la tête dure." (Les Têtes, 9) This quickly introduces the reader to the central topos of this novel, monsters and monstrousness. The hero(es) of the novel. Les Têtes, are conjoined tw in s-

Charles and François Papineau -tw o fully functioning heads with distinct personalities sharing a single body. Their monstrousness is further underlined by the title to the English translation of this novel, Paoineau the bicephalous monster. This translation, unfortunately, has the effect of resolving the primary ambiguity of Les Têtes, the question of whether Les Têtes are singular

(Charles- François Papineau) or plural (Charles and François Papineau).® Les

Têtes are frequently compared to a frog, as we see here as they recount their meeting with actress Irma Sweet, who photographs them with a Polaroid camera as they take a swim.

«Oh!» fit-elle jetant un coup d’œil au résultat, «on dirait un animal préhistorique! Un... un serpent de mer. Venez voir Harry!» cria-t-elle à son producteur. Celui pencha sur la photo et conclut: «It looks like a frog!» «Vous avez raison!» lança Irma Sweet. «Oh la vilaine grenouille!» Puis elle nous regarda en face * In the novel, they are referred to as both “les Têtes" and (more infrequently) “Charles-François." At the end of the novel, when the two heads have been surgically joined to make one. the result calls himself Charles F. Papineau. In this discussion, when I am speaking of Charles and François jointly, as a unit. I shall refer to them as “Les Têtes." and I shall use Charles F. to designate the monocephalous person they become.

47 pour voir si la photo lui avait joué un tour et nous la tendit sans signature. La starlette française avait l’œil! Nos deux têtes sur la pellicule ressortaient comme les deux protubérances oculaires dudit batracien. Nos bras et nos jambes dans la vapeur d’eau complétaient l’illusion. (Les Têtes. 124)

It is in this following image that Les Têtes become a symbol for the French-

Canadian people, also traditionally referred to as frogs.^

Le cri des grenouilles. Cela nous convenait. Dans l’océan anglophone tout ce qui ne saxonne est un batracien. Enfin. Querelles de vieux pays qui ont fait long chemin. (123)

The implication, of course, is that a French-speaking people in North America,

“l’océan anglophone ” is as grotesque as are Les Têtes in the world of the monocephalous. There can be no doubt that Montaigne had in mind exactly such monstrosities as the froglike bicephalous Papineau when he described his Essais as “crotesques,’’ a matter which he clarifies with a citation from

Horace describing a mermaid, “Desinit in piscem mulier formosa superne (I: 28, 232).” Additionally, his essay “D’un enfant monstrueux” was written about a monocephalic child with two bodies, whom he saw on display for money. It may appear disconcerting (or even grotesque) to see one of the canonical authors of the sixteenth century placed in such close comparison with the somewhat comical working-class narrators of Godbout’s novels. In fact, the similarities between the Essais and Salut Galarneau! in particular are striking enough to permit the interpretation of the latter as a rewrite of Montaigne’s work, set in twentieth-century Québec. Of course, the similarities one could highlight do not erase some fundamental differences between the two works. First and

'^Use of the term “frogs" to refer to the French predates the colonisation of North America, and the frog has since been adopted by the French Canadians themselves as a symbol of cultural distinctiveness and pride, as can be seen on t-shirts and sweatshirts which proclaim “Grenouille- et fière de l’être.” I happen to own one. 48 foremost, Salut Galarneau! is a work of fiction, and the Essais are not. No less important is the fact that Salut Galarneau! is a novel, which the title page makes clear, centering in lower-case type the word “roman" under the author's name and the title. The Essais are not the slightest bit novel-like, without even a pretense of having a plot, as we usually understand novels to have.

Furthermore, while Montaigne’s Essais are not, properly speaking, an autobiography, they are intimately concerned with the life of their author. No critic (to my knowledge) has proposed an autobiographical or semi- autobiographical reading for Salut Galarneau! and I am not proposing one here. The similarities between Montaigne’s Essais and Godbout’s Salut

Galarneau! are to be found in their textual presentation, their stated purpose, and their subject matter. There is a certain similarity between the two narrators,

Montaigne and Galarneau. For our purposes it would be good to remember that Montaigne the narrator of the Essais, is -as Montaigne himself realized - not completely identical to the historical Montaigne a fact noted by Regosin

(Matter. 8). This “fictional” aspect of the narrator of the Essais, narrows the gap with the entirely fictitious Galarneau.

As noted earlier, Montaigne presents himself as belonging to a sort of middle-class nobility, “content de sa fortune et nay de moyenne fortune (III; 13,

369).”® François Galarneau likewise is not of great means, but he does have his own business, selling hot dogs and french fries out of an old bus converted into a roadside stand, and he seems reasonably content with his economic lot.

From a sociological standpoint there is a great deal of difference between a nobleman and a snack-bar owner. However, George Hoffmann’s fascinating ® This description is not technically of Montaigne himself. It occurs in a passage where he is describing the sort of office he would have liked to have if he had been engaged to serve a higher ranking seigneur. Since these are among the qualifications he lists as being desirable for a person holding the office described, it is reasonable to assume they apply to the author. There is nothing in the Essais to contradict such a conclusion, and much to support it. 49 study, Montaigne’s Career, presents Montaigne as very much a working writer,

in the fullest sense of the word “working." The picture Hoffmann paints,

especially in his first chaper “Working at Home,” shows a Montaigne whose

writing took place amid the everyday business of running his estate. This is not

unlike Galarneau who wrote at the snack-bar, between dealing with customers

and preparing food. There is also an interesting similarity between the physical

surroundings in which Montaigne and Galarneau write. Describing his library Montaigne says:

Chez moy, je me destourne un peu plus souvent à ma librairie, d’où tout d’une main je commande à mon mesnage. Je suis sur l’entrée et vois soubs moy mon jardin, ma basse court, ma court, et dans la pluspart des membres de ma maison. (Ill: 3, 51)

Galarneau speaks of his bus/ snack-bar in this way:

J aime mieux mon château: Au roi du hot-dog. C’est moi le prince et le ministre, et si je ne veux pas travailler, je n’ai qu’à fermer les volets. (42)

Notice how in both descriptions there is an emphasis on the control exercized

by these men in the surroundings in which they choose to write. While

Montaigne is literally the lord of Montaigne, Galarneau also feels himself to be master of his small domain, and we can note that he refers to himself as “prince" and "roi" and not by some more democratic term of authority like “président.”

Their writing locations are not only retreats where they can go to write, but also privileged locations of interaction with the world. We note that Montaigne can keep an eye on his manor from this tower as he emphasizes all that he can see.

As Hoffmann points out, this tower library was the ideal location for Montaigne to place himself in order to supervise the goings-on at his estate (14).

Galarneau likewise is in a place of activity, saying of his snack-bar, “c’est peut-

50 être le carrefour idéal pour faire un baptême de coupe dans la populace! (61)”

Even after leaving the snack-bar he does not write in isolation. Galarneau

writes while supervising the construction of the wall around his house and while

writing in his home after he has himself walled in, the television replaces these

hired hands and the snack-bar clientèle. This last substitute is ultimately less

satisfying, and he goes over the wall to renew the human contact. Even these

physical locations appear to problematize the notion of the narrators as mere

marginal decorations. Although earlier critics discussing Montaigne’s tower

describe it as marginal to the daily life of his estate, emphasizing his view of the

exterior countryside, Hoffmann points out that it was indeed in the center of

activity, and that Montaigne’s workers were aware of being watched from this

center (15). Similarly, Galarneau’s snack-bar, the immobile bus (certainly a

grotesque among automobiles) is found along the margins of the highway, but in fact motorists come to him, he does not need to go to them, transforming his marginal location into, as he describes it, a “carrefour”.

The Essais and Galarneau’s cahiers were written at turning points in the

lives of their authors. Montaigne began his career as an essayist at what he

thought would be the end of his public career with his retirement from the

Parlement of Bordeaux. Galarneau began writing in his cahiers at a time of

crisis in his personal relationships. Separated but not divorced from his

manipulative wife, he finds himself watching his girlfriend seduced away from

him by his older brother, whom he idealized. They are also at transitional periods in a biological sense. Galarneau is clearly no longer an adolescent, but is only now coming to grips with adult realities and adult responsibilities. As Montaigne begins his Essais, he is entering old age.® Neither Montaigne nor

® This is Montaigne's assessment of his age group. He began writing the Essais when he was approximately forty years old, which in the sixteenth century marked the final stage of life. 51 Galarneau have set out to write a novel. Their writings are based on their readings and on their personal experience. They may even share a certain

“commercial” intent. Hoffman theorizes that Montaigne may have written the

Essais in order to advance his political career (147), and Galarneau states bluntly that publication of his cahiers may serve as good publicity for his snack­ bar (28). François Galarneau, while having little use for formal education (an opinion with which Montaigne appears to be sympathetic) is portrayed as an avid reader, although he does not fill his cahiers with citations in the manner of

Montaigne. The Essais and the cahiers are both commentaries on the social context of the author, based on close observation, each portrayed in a lively and living manner as the narrators comment on these observations. Both works reveal only a rough sense of organization. Montaigne has divided his writing more or less thematically, while Galarneau’s is loosely organized around his life (whose chronological order he does not always respect) as he passes through this time of change. Montaigne's Essais grew, published in three main editions (the last one posthumous), each longer than the one before as he revisited his work and commented on it. While Galarneau’s cahiers do not reveal this kind of literal rereading and enhancement, there is an aspect of his work that evokes it. Instead of chapter numbers, each division of the work is marked with one of the letters A-U R-O-l D-U H-O-T D-O-G. This phrase, referential to the writer’s livlihood and place of writing, and used in repetition suggests a revisitation of the work.

The writer’s aim, in both works, appears to be the creation of a living portrait. This is precisely how Montaigne describes his Essais, claiming them as a literary portrayal of himself, and even to the point of claiming consubstantiality with the Essais. What they produce in order to create this

52 living monument or memorial of words is something that is neither an autobiography nor a journal, but has aspects of both, and many traits that belong to neither. Yvon Bellemare emphasizes the journal-like qualities of

Godbout’s œuvre (Romancier. 192) while Jacques Pelletier remarks upon its journalism-like qualities (Le roman national. 232). David Bond describes the novel as a conversation Galarneau is having with himself, and compares it to the letters that François leaves for himself while he is walled-up within his house (“Nature of Reality," 209). This bears striking similarity to the frequently made observation that Montaigne’s Essais are a substitution for conversation with LaBoétie. Montaigne and Galarneau record their contemporary world in almost excruciating detail, Montaigne taking the trouble to write an essay on the subject of thumbs, for example. Written during a time of profound social as well as personal change, the composition of the Essais and the cahiers may occasionally resemble a coping mechanism, allowing Montaigne to complain about France’s civil wars and his declining health and Galarneau to regret the passing of his simpler childhood. However, they result in powerful monuments of personal identity and independence.

François Galarneau demonstrates a passion for ethnography, as he

“ethnographe” (he uses “éthnographier" as a verb) from his hot dog stand. His first observations are of Americans who attempt to speak to him in French (13) and he also dreams of beating the Americans and the Soviets to the punch and becoming the first lunar ethnographer (63). The base from which he performs his study is, of course, his roadside snack-bar. Au roi du hot dog. As an example of the sort of topics he covers, we can read here as he does an analysis of the effects of climate on french fry consumption.

On ne mange pas des patates dans n’importe quel climat, peu importe le temps. Il y a des soleils qui en 53 donne envie, des vents doux qui font venir au- dedans des joues un goût, un besoin de salé, des avant-pluie qui vous picotent les gencives jusqu’à ce que vous ayez mordu dans une longue tranche, un long bâtonnet de patate blanche, molle en son centre, dorée juste à point en surface, une peau de graisse encore bouillante couleur vahinée tout autour (56).

This is not of earth-shattering import, obviously, but it is an indication of the wide varieties of topics treated by our authors. French fry consumption is no more frivolous a topic of discussion than are thumbs (see Montaigne’s “Des pouces") and indeed less so given its relevance to Galarneau’s livlihood. He also sees himself using his clientèle as a population sample for even more profound questions.

“ Deux patates avec Ketsupl Dites-moi: pensez-vous que Dieu est mort? Sans vinaigre? -Etes-vous heureux? Je veux dire; qu’est-ce que c’est que le bonheur pour vous? Sincèrement... Qu’est-ce qu’ils me répondraient, mes clients? Que le bonheur c’est quand on n’a pas le temps d’y penser,... (61).

Here we see the real point of Galarneau’s ethnography. It is a launchpad for his own observations. The responses of his clients are not as important as his own questions, questions which permit him to philosophize about the answers.

Ethnography also appears in Les Têtes à Paoineau. where we see in particular the father’s interest in minority cultures, particularly endangered cultures.

II notait dans son agenda, à la page de la mappemonde, les noms des tribus balayées. L’agence France-Presse tous les matins au journal télexait sa nécrologie. Pataxo. Rayés. Tapaiuana. une langue originale, trois cents membres d’une culture trop humaine. Disparus, dans la semaine. (61-author’s emphasis) 54 Here again, the interest is primarily self-referential. A.A.’s (the father's nickname from Alain- Auguste) interest in these extinct peoples is a feeling of solidarity based on the (at least perceived) menace to French-Canadian culture. The idea of approaching extinction, on a far more personal level, is also present in the Essais. In his preface “Au lecteur,” Montaigne states specifically that the purpose of the Essais is to serve as a remembrance to his friends and family after he is gone (1:3). Montaigne, Godbout and Les Têtes are monument builders, notwithstanding Montaigne’s insistence that his work is to be of temporary duration. Their work puts a human face on a national history. One can compare these texts to the great temples, pyramids, and obélisques constructed by the Egyptian pharaohs. These had the primary purpose of immortalizing the pharaoh and had the secondary result of preserving Egyptian h istory. Godbout’s narrators are similarly creating a monument. Galarneau’s cahiers are a monument to his life, his vécriture. They are a monument to an original, much like the wall constructed around his house. While Galarneau eventually rejects his isolation, we note that he merely climbs over the wall with a ladder. There is no indication that he intends to take down the wall. Likewise, the journal kept by Charles and François Papineau is intended by them as a record of and monument to the memory of the bicephalous French Canadian(s) on the eve of his/ their integration or assimilation into monocephalous society.

However, in a striking contrast to the pharaonic pyramids, the Essais and the cahiers are not static monuments. Montaigne’s work, constantly revised by him, is like the portrait of Dorian Gray, but aging and evolving with, and not instead of, its subject. Godbout’s novels likewise show themselves to be works “in motion," a quality highlighted by the journal-like form. In L’Espace littéraire.

55 Maurice Blanchot ailles the journal to the active present, as the writer seeks to find himself by anchoring his writing In the activities of everyday (29).

The “lifelike” quality of Montaigne’s Essais has often been remarked upon. Montaigne himself Implied that there was a similarity to reading his work and reading a living being. This Is particularly true given the way he wrote them, going back to previously written Essais to express his Ideas on his own writings, coloring them according to his experience. This vécriture Is revealed not only In the themes and matter of the works, but also In the style of writing.

Montaigne makes a point of saying that there Is no difference between his speaking style and his writing style. We have already seen how the Irregular qualities of Montaigne’s writing mimics the freely confessed monstrosity of his own self.

Icy, nous allons conformément et tout d’un trein, mon livre et moy. Ailleurs, on peut recommander et accuser l’ouvrage à part de l’ouvrier; Icy, non; qui touche l’un, touche l’autre. (Ill: 2, 22)

Montaigne says, “Je ne peints pas l’estre. Je peints le passage: non un passage d’aage en autre, ou, comme dict le peuple, de sept en sept ans, mais de jour en jour, de minute en minute (III: 2, 22).” This concern on Montaigne’s part no doubt affected his choice to write In French rather than In Latin, as discussed above, since French was seen as In perpetual change versus Latin which was carved In marble, so to speak. This Is suggested by Regosin as he writes, “The medium he chooses, like the man he portrays. Is meant to express becoming (213).” There can be little doubt that Godbout’s choice to write In colloquial Québécois French Is similarly motivated. His work shows an oven/vhelming concern with being a record of the here-and-now, a record of that which Is, and Is In the process of going, rather than that which Is permanent or

56 should become so. This concern with the ephemeral is also reflected in

Godbout’s frequent allusions to extinct or endangered minority cultures. It is part of what makes the text most closely resemble its narrator’s life.

Godbout would appear to have carried his ideal of vécriture into his other novels as well. The most recent of the novels in this study, Les Têtes à

Papineau, is driven by the journal kept by the bicephalous Papineau during the time period preceding the experimental surgery to unite Papineau s two heads into one. Here is their description of the work they are writing (and that we are reading):

Done cet ouvrage ne se prétend pas une biographie officielle. Il s’agit tout simplement du iournal de notre évolution, jusqu’au scalpel. Rien de plus. Et c’est pourquoi nous l’assumerons, ad finem. au nom des deux têtes. C’est un récit bi-graphique. Nous ne craignons pas même le pathétique! Car si tout se déroule sans problème le dernier chapitre de ce livre sera, forcément, écrit par ce qui sortira de la salle d’opération... Nous ne savons même pas, à cette heure, de quelle main nous écrirons lorsque nous serons affublés de l’hémisphère droit de l’un et du gauche de l’autre! (Les Têtes. 28-9, author’s emphasis)

As Montaigne makes an effort to see to it that his work reflects the way he speaks, the journal kept by Les Têtes accomplishes a similar reflection of their singular duality in a very interesting way. In discussing their physical situation, they say, "Cela nous tient ensemble. Ensemble (Les Têtes. 15).’’ It is this use of repetition that reminds the reader of the duality of Charles-François Papineau.

In keeping with François e love of word-play, this can also be used to create highly effective puns.

Tous les dix jours nous étions sollicités pour une entrevue ou un documentaire à la radio, dans les

57 journaux ou à la télévision. Freak show. Fric chaud. (Les Têtes. 106)

Admittedly it is not as immediately apparent how D’Amour. P.O. is also vécriture. On the surface we have a tale of the collaborative creation of a novel

by Thomas D’Amour, a writer of the academic elite (an “Auteur." the term used

to mock him), and Mireille, a secretary of the popular classes originally hired to

type the Author’s flawed (according to Mireille) manuscript. This act of writing

becomes swiftly fused and confused with the very lives of the collaborators as

the heroes of their novel share their names. It becomes impossible to

distinguish between the actions of the “real" Thomas and Mireille and their “fictional" counterparts. In a profound sense, Thomas and Mireille vécrivent. Analysis of D’Amour. P.O. reveals vécriture on a much more intriguing level. It

is difficult, if not impossible, to find a single or dominant narrative voice in this novel. It is tempting to assign this role to either Thomas or Mireille, but neither

is correct. Furthermore, it is equally impossible to settle upon a single

protagonist for this novel. Again, one is sorely tempted to choose either

Thomas or Mireille for this role. It would appear that Godbout has created a

narrative voice with a split personality. The exploration of identity comes from the dialog between the different voices within the narrator-writer.

THOMAS: Je cherche l’homme universel, voilà. MIREILLE: Ecœur pas le peuple, baquet! T’as attrapé un coup d’Europe à l’université? C’est un maudit torticolis ça. Mais vas-tu te promener toute ta crisse de vie le corps dans un sens la tête dans l’autre? THOMAS: Torticolis...? MIREILLE: Vati falloir te mettre le nez dans sloche pour que tu vois DOUKE tu viens? (D’Amour. 95- author’s emphasis)

Here is the conflict in a national writer having received a so-called liberal education, a conflict about what makes great literature. In a search for great 58 truths and “l’homme universel” the writer knows that this “universal experience” is not authentic. It is certainly not her/ his experience, if indeed it is the lived experience of anyone at all. Regosin notes a similar evolution in the Essais. saying of Montaigne, “The more personal his stance, the more appropriately universal his remarks (128).”

In approaching this impulse to construct a literary monument, it is not irrelevant to remember Lord Durham’s infamous dismissal of the French

Canadians as a people without history and without literature. In Montaigne’s day the work of the Pléiade indicates that there was a concern to remedy a similar perception of French culture as being without history and without literature, as is indicated by Montaigne’s own perception that the French language is ephemeral.

J’écris mon livre à peu d’hommes et à peu d’années. Si ç’eust esté une matière de durée, il l’eust fallu commettre à un langage plus ferme. Selon la variation continuelle qui a suivy le nostre jusques à cette heure, qui peut esperer que sa forme présente soit en usage, d’icy à cinquante ans? Il escoule tous les jours de nos mains et depuis que je vis s’est altéré de moitié. Nous disons qu’il est à cette heure parfaict. Autant en diet du sien chaque siecle. (Ill: 9, 248)

The irony, of course, is that it is precisely works like the Essais that helped stabilize and fix the forms of the French language. In this way, Montaigne’s

Essais are more than just a personal monument. They are a monument to and in French as a medium of culture. Still, this monument cannot be constructed without challenging the order of things that declares these people and these cultures to be unworthy of monuments.

It is in this construction of monuments to the grotesque that Montaigne and the Godboutian narrators perform some of their most subversive acts. It is a

59 question of turning the tables, of inverting the perspective on what is grotesque and what is portrait, what is margin and what is center. This subversion of perspective begins in Les Têtes à Papineau as we see the reactions of those who think of themselves as normal as they face the grotesque. As may be expected, some of these are rather comic, as is this reaction to the birth of Les

Têtes:

L’abbé arriva précipitamment, arraché à son sommeil, la soutane au vent, prêt à administrer les derniers sacrements. Mais quand il vit cet enfant qui gigotait devant lui comme un morceau de cauchemar, il ne put y croire. Mystère? Miracle? Supercherie? Pendant de longues minutes l'élite candienne-française -médecin et curé -nous contempla dans un silence incrédule. (Les Têtes. 42)

While we are amused with the mental picture of these two highly educated men dumbstruck before a newborn, this moment is heavy with symbolism. Of course, the image of these wise men in silent awe before (a) baby boy(s) makes an obvious allusion to the Nativity of Christ. Montaigne also notes the degree to which the birth of a monster may be an E/epiphany. In his essay “D’un enfant monstrueux, ” he makes the observation that that which are monsters to us, are not so to God, concluding with the comment:

Nous appelions contre nature ce qui advient contre la coustume; rien n’est que selon elle, quel qu’il soit. Que cette raison universelle et naturelle chasse de nous l’erreur et l’estonnement que la nouvelleté nous apporte. (Il: 30, 561)

In short, it serves to reinforce one of Montaigne’s favorite refrains, we don’t (and can’t) know everything. In the fictional Quebec hospital, the doctor and the priest, representing between them science and religion- the sum of what humankind pretends to know about the universe -are silent before the

60 grotesque. This (these) Infant(s) is (are) outside what they had defined as the

realm of possibility- marginal in an extreme sense. Yet in this case, in the beau

milieu of the scene all eyes are on Les Têtes. They are the focus, not the decor, with the elite looking in from the outside.

The reaction from the scientific world, however, is the most telling and

threatening.

Savez-vous la place que vos deux têtes vous permettent de revendiquer? Pour la science et l’administration. Messieurs Papineau, vous n’êtes que des moitiés d’homme... (Les Têtes. 21)

If science considers Les Têtes as “halves of a man,” the Church takes the opposite viewpoint, for each head is baptized separately, implying recognition

of their individual wholeness.^" Les Têtes come under the care of Dr.

Northridge, and it is while they are under his care that they write the text that

forms. Les Têtes à Papineau. Dr. Northridge reveals that he considers the

bicephalous condition of Charles and François to be a disease, a problem to be

fixed. “II se fiche de savoir où sont ses racines. Il cherche des cas exquis. Des

malformations rares. Il veut transformer le monde. Le monde (Les Têtes. 19).”

The doctor’s “solution” is a somewhat barbarie process in which the left-hand

half of the right-hand head is removed along with the right side of the left head.

The two remaining halves will be joined to form a single head. He proposes to

assimilate Les Têtes into the monocephalous world. Dr. Northridge is not only

an agent of assimilation, but he is also assimilated himself. His mother was a

French-Canadian nun who left the convent and became pregnant precisely in

order to help reproduce her own kind; “Elle n’acceptait pas la disparition de sa

race et l’assimilation de ses concitoyens au grand Tout confédéral fies Têtes.

’° That the Church in this matter should be portrayed more positively than science is indeed surprising in a largely anti-clerical body of work. 61 18)." Of course, it didn’t work. Northridge was adopted by English-Canadian

parents, and raised as an anglophone. The sister of Charles and François has

no illusions about what Dr. Northridge’s proposed intervention actually means. -Bon. Si vous tenez tant à le savoir, je suis du côté de maman. Je vous aime tous les deux. Je ne connais que vous. L’intervention chirurgicale me ferait perdre mes frères. Je serais pour le non. Vous n'avez pas le droit de m'arracher une partie de ma vie. Car c’est cela que vous allez entreprendre. Tuer mes souvenirs, puisque nous ne pourrons plus en reparler jamais. Je trouve l’idée inacceptable. Mais c'est votre vie. (147)

Dr. Northridge has not lied to Les Têtes, and they are aware that the person who leaves the operating room will not only not be Charles and François neither will he be Charles François." This assimilation is essentially a destructive act. Dr. Northridge has helped the "grand Tout confédéral" absorb another single-headed citizen, but Les Têtes are irretreivably gone. A similar caution against assimilation can be found in the Essais. Montaigne may regret the violation of France’s traditions, but his social conservatism does not extend to support of assimilationist measures. We have already seen in his essay on the monstrous child that he believes variety as it occurs in nature to be good (or at least acceptable) because it is natural. He feels similarly about human conventions that occur "naturally" within given societies, speaking of the different drinking practices between the French and the Portuguese (III: 13,

" Yvon Bellemare in Jaooues Godbout. romancier states, to the contrary, that the surgery has excised François, leaving only Charles. (“Charles. I’anglophile. a survécu à ropération(73).”) I strongly believe this to t»e in error. Charles may have been an analoohile. but he was not an anglophone. Although bilingual, the native language of both heads was French, a language Charles F. is unable to speak. That the Amalgam is going to be different from either head is implied by statements like the above by Les Têtes' sister, and also in their description of who is to write the last chapter of their journal "ce oui sortira de la salle d’opération (28- author’s emphasis).” not “celui qui" which would seem to be called for if they expected it to be either of the original heads. Finally, if Charles F. is indeed identical with Charles, he would be able to remember (at least roughly) the contents of the journal, and would not require the translation asked for in the letter that closes the novel in order to write the journal’s conclusion. 62 373), and the differences in sleeping habits between the French and Germans

(III: 13, 372). He also remarks upon the great difference between his own preferences and those of a young beggar he once hired as a valet. The young man left his service to return to living on the streets and eating out of the garbage. He naturally expresses some surprise at this, but we note that even though this is a cultural and not biological variation, his tone conveys the same admiration at human variation that he noted in his observation of the monstrous child (III: 13, 375).

Dr. Northridge’s operation to "correct" Les Têtes has an unfortunate side effect. It was a shock for the entire surgical team when it became clear that once beheaded «Les Têtes» were replaced by a unilingual individual. So be it. Both heads wanted so much to be normalized. Well there is no one left to be blamed for what happened, is there? (Les Têtes. 155-56- author's emphasis: text in English in original)

Charles F. Papineau (the result of the union of Charles and François) is exclusively anglophone. Without the ability to speak or even understand

French, he is unable to fulfill the contract made with the publishing company to continue the journal begun by Les Têtes before the operation. Charles F. cannot read the journal and lacks the memory of Les Têtes. Their “normalization” has led to their abrupt end. Dr. Northridge must carry no small blame for this. Although Charles F. states that the surgical team was shocked at his inability to speak French, this is difficult to believe. The blame is laid to the fact that the ability to speak French for each head was unexpectedly stored in the two hemispheres that were surgically removed. Yet the journal has led the reader to believe that Charles and François were under a rigourous series of tests to analyze exactly how their brains worked in order to determine the 63 feasibility of the operation. One is left wondering if this linguistic matter went

unnoticed because the assimilated Dr. Northridge simply didn't care. This is, of

course, conjecture. Still, A.A., the father of Les Têtes, doesn’t mince words in giving his opinion of the plan to “monocephalize" Charles and François.

“HamalghamI lança «A.A.» avec un faux véritable accent allemand. Ein Kultur,

ein nation, ein head, Ein Führer! Ya?! (Les Têtes. 69)” A.A.’s use of the

expression “ein head” (instead of “ein tête” or “ein kopf’) is an eerie foreshadowing of the operation’s unilingual result and the effect is to liken Dr.

Northridge’s assimilationist operation to Nazi ethnic cleansing. Montaigne would appear to share this opinion as he writes, “car c’est tousjours un’aigreur tyrannique de ne pouvoir souffrir une forme diverse à la sienne (111:8, 180).” If

Les Têtes are a monster, it is the actions of the monocephalic doctor that are monstrous.

This anti-assimilationist ideology is part of a broad pattern of affirming the

“crotesque” not as a marginal curiosity but rather as a positive point of focus, a work of art in its own right. On a simple level we can see this in the Essais as

Montaigne suggests that the monstrous child is not a problem to be corrected, but rather a positive omen for France.'^

Ce double corps et ces membres divers, se rapportant à une seule teste, pourroient bien fournir de favorable prognostique au Roy de maintenir sous l’union de ses loix ces pars et pieces diverses de nostre estât; (II: 30, 560)

In doing so, Montaigne would be following sixteenth century practice regarding unusual births as suggested by Géralde Nakam in her work on Montaigne (although he would seem to be unique in considering the monstrous birth as a

It has been suggested that the word “monster” is derived from the word “monstro,” due to a belief that the birth of such children was an omen of some sort, which served “to show” Providence’s intentions (Fiedler. Freaks. 20). 64 positive, and not negative omen- Nakam only cites negative examples) (276)."

Notice that here too Montaigne reveals his opposition to forced assimilation,

even (apparently) of the Protestants. In other examples the “crotesque”

becomes an object of admiration and value, as are the deformed horses of

Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar (I: 48, 360). In his description of the

“crotesques” to which he compares his essays, he identifies as their “grace” the very quality that makes them grotesque, “leur variété et estrangeté (I; 28, 232).”

Mathieu- Castellani proposes the monstrous child as an allegory of the Essais. representing, “la diversité de l'œuvre et son unité (239).” Montaigne also cites for us the following:

Egregium sanctumque virum si cerno, bimembri Hoc monstrum puero, et miranti jam sub aratro Piscibus inventis, et fœtæ compare mulæ. (Si je vois un homme d’élite, un homme d ’honneur, c’est pour moi un phénomène tel qu’un enfant à deux corps, des poissons trouvés sous la charrue qui s’étonne, une mule qui a mis bas.'" [Ill: 9, 263])

Although the original intent of this citation from Juvenal was doubtless to indicate the rarity of men of honor, the juxtaposition of these men to twin-bodied children not only indicates the infrequency of the former but also, perhaps inadvertently, the value of the latter.

This rarity of honorable men falls into a highly developed theme in

Montaigne’s Essais and Godbout’s novels of the undermining of authority, especially historical authority. This begins early in Montaigne’s work with the first essay “Par divers moyens on arrive à pareille fin.” The conflicting examples which produce identical results signals the reader that History, especially as a

" Nakam also notes that Montaigne quickly rejects this superstitious interpretation of what he makes an effort to describe as a natural event (286).

" Translations from Latin into French are from the edition of the Essais prepared by André Lhéritier.) 65 teacher, may not be all that it is cracked up to be. Robert Cottrell sums up

Montaigne’s attitude about historical accuracy saying:

Given his skeptical cast of mind and his acute sense of man's inability to arrive at anything but a relative, provisional truth, Montaigne simply could not muster much enthusiasm for the pursuit of an elusive (and illusory) historical truth. (51)

Indeed part two of Cottrell's Sexuality/ Textualitv. on discourse in the Essais.

comments greatly on how Montaigne undermines the notion of historia magistra vitae. Montaigne's hesitancy to rely on human authority is best demonstrated

by him as he discusses the Roman judiciary practice of prefacing their remarks

with “II me semble,” (III: 11, 309). This aspect of Montaigne's work on human

changeability and fallibility is much discussed and I will not spend a great deal

of time on it here. However, I would like to point out an example that indicates

how widespread this undermining of authority goes. Although it is an activity he clearly approves of, even philosophy comes under scrutiny in the Essais.

Montaigne rejects the conventional wisdom that one is not obliged to keep

one's word if it is given under duress.’® He states “II y a des regies en philosophie et fausses et molles (III: 1, 18).'”® Not even philosophy can

override personal experience, which in Montaigne's case has demonstrated that it is better to keep one's word, regardless of the circumstance.

Authority in all of its forms comes under assault in Godbout's novels.

Religion, and the Catholic Church in particular, comes under such frequent assault that it would be tiresome to mention all of the examples here. It is somewhat amusing that this is perhaps the only authority not openly critiqued in The specific example he uses is that of a man captured by bandits who secures his release by promising to pay them upon his release. Because the promise was only given to get out of danger, this man is not believed to be bound to keep his word.

’* In the Essais his word “molle" belongs to a whole category of words with similar negative connotations as discussed by Cottrell (Sexuality/1extualitv. 7) 66 the Essais. This is almost certainly due to a desire to avoid supporting the cause of the Huguenots and also to avoid seeing his Essais censured or worse

(in “De l’affection des peres aux enfans” Montaigne provides several examples of writers from Antiquity who died along with their works upon seeing them

condemned to the flames [11:8, 101].) In short, it is almost certainly the different political climates that influence these two authors regarding this subject. It is

unlikely that Montaigne believed the Church to be more perfect or perfectible than any other human institution. However, especially considering Montaigne’s

political career and possible political aspirations," it would be foolish of him to attack the Church at a time of religious civil war. This is far from the case for

Godbout's Quebec, where the Church’s influence on politics had diminished greatly and among intellectuals of Godbout’s generation was widely perceived

as an obstacle to the social and political development of the province. In Godbout’s work these attacks range from Galarneau who pretends that the sausages he grills are burning priests (42), to Mireille and Mariette of D’Amour.

P.O. who mock the catechism by using its words and forms to make sexual jokes.’® In Les Têtes à Papineau, we see that the Church has simply been

replaced by another set of rites. “Maman ne va pas à la messe, mais elle est

restée attachée à certains rites. La soirée des prix hollywoodiens remplace la

Fête-Dieu (66).’’ The challenge to Church authority may also be seen in the frequency of the sacre in these novels. The sacre is a typically French-

Canadian form of swearing, using ecclesiastical vocabulary as profanity.

See Hoffman’s concluding chapter to Montaigne’s Career for a discussion of these possible aspirations.

For an example, see p.43. 67 Tabarnak!" (from “tabernacle") Is an example. Galarneau closes his cahiers with another, “Stie (158)" from “hostle.''^°

Naturally Galarneau (and Godbout) do not limit their challenge to religious authority. The education system meets with Galarneau's disapproval, as he feels It did him very little good.

L’Instruction obligatoire, c'est une Idée de bourgeois, une Idée de gens riches qui s’emmerdafént à se poser tout seuls des questions, sans toujours trouver la réponse. (25)

At another point he will excuse his brother’s peculiar behavior In a bar saying,

“Excusez-le, mesdamolselles, c’est pas la boisson, c’est l’Instruction (36).”

These critiques, essentially accusing the system of filling student’s heads with

Information that Is more cumbersome than useful recalls Montaigne’s distinction In “De l’Institution des enfants” between a head that Is “bien falote” and one “bien pleine (I; 24, 189)."

The undermining of authority should not be understood as the embracing of anarchy. These structures of authority -history, education, the Church, and the Influence of outside privileged cultures- effectively stunt the growth of the emergent nation. To repeat the Image of the biological cycle, the old must give way In order to make room for the new. In Godbout’s novels there Is a growing revelation that these authority figures hold themselves In place through the use of myth. In D’Amour. P.O. the fictional Thomas and Mireille have formed the revolutionary “cellule d’amour* ” of the Front de Liberation du Kébek. After

Issuing several communiqués, the army has been sent after them. While

’® “Stie” carries roughly the same weight as an English word of identical length sharing many of the same letters.

^ It may be more correct to write this “cellule D’Amour." In the novel this expression only occurs in blocks of text that are written in all capitals, and so the name of this cell “d'amour” or “D'Amour” is left deliberately ambiguous. 68 discussing how to react to the fact that it is in this manner that “le gouvernement

nous envoie ses messagers” Thomas and Mireille register their surprise.

-T u penses qu’on était tellement forts qu'ils avaient besoin de soldats? -O u bien ils étaient faibles, et on le savait pas. -Cedric dort? -Oui. -Le Kébek, lui? (D’Amour, 141)^

This episode is clearly an allusion to the events of October 1970 and Ottawa’s

imposition of the War Measures Act on the province of Québec.^ The meaning is clear. If it takes an army to put down the two-member “cellule d’amour” then

perhaps “the government” is not as powerful as one has been led to believe.

(Which government, of course, must be left in question. The army sent after the

“cellule d’amour” is multinational.) Government power is therefore a myth, and

an awake Kébek/ Quebec might notice this. History has its own myths, and these can be revealed as such in turn, a task shared by Montaigne and

Godbout’s narrators, as evidenced by their undermining of historical authority. Commenting on one of the founding myths of the Canadian confederation. Lord

Durham’s report, the Québécois writer Hubert Aquin wrote:

Lord Durham disait vrai, en ce sens, quand il a écrit que le Canada français était un peuple sans histoire! L’histoire étant évidemment dévolue au peuple canadien-français, il ne nous resterait qu’à la prendre comme on prend un train. Si nous acceptons de jouer un rôle, si noble soit-il, c’est forcément à l’intérieur d’une histoire faite par d’autres. On ne peut à la fois être une fonction et l’organisme qui la régit, une entité culturelle

^ Cédric is the couple’s newborn son.

“ This act was the result of two political kidnappings carried out by the Marxist revolutionary organization, the Front de Libération du Québec (FLO). Under the War Measures Act, Prime Minister Trudeau sent in the army, suspended civil liberties and carried out widespread imprisonment without formal charges against anyone who supported Quebec independence (regardless of whether or not they actually supported the FLQ) (Dickenson and Young, 313). 69 “enrôlée” et une totalité historique. J’emploie ici le mot histoire dans son sens hégélien qui est aussi celui du Star de Montréal (“History in the making"). Pour ce qui est de la science historique, c’est autre chose. Nous en avons une; elle n’intéresse que nous. (“La Fatigue culturelle du Canada français,” 92- note22)

The solution, then, is to stop playing a role in a history made by others, and replace that historical myth with a new one. Myth making is a powerful creative force at work in both the Essais and Godbout’s novels. In a particularly striking passage in another of Godbout’s novels. Le Couteau sur la table (1965), the narrator watches a schoolchild do just that.

Nous entreprenions le processus le plus simple: détruire un mythe, le remplacer par un autre. C ’étaient les conditions mêmes de la création. Gauthier, dans son grand cahier d’écolier, rayé de traits bleus, écrivait suivant la calligraphie imposée par un transparent aux enfants brouillons Le fleuve Saint-Laurent est le plus beau fleuve du monde Le fleuve Saint-Laurent est le plus beau fleuve du monde Le fleuve Saint-Laurent est le plus beau fleuve du monde ligne après ligne phrase après phrase cette même affirmation le fleuve Saint-Laurent est le plus comme pour créer un envoûtement du monde cette formule le fleuve Saint-Laurent magique est le plus beau fleuve répétée inlassablement du monde le fleuve des pages et des pages jusqu’aux Laurentides des nuits d’application d’affirmations heureuses. Mythe après mythe. (119)

As we have noticed with the “monuments in motion” of Montaigne and Godbout, this myth is likewise is motion. Like the Saint Lawrence itself, the écolier’s myth, “le fleuve Saint-Laurent est le plus beau fleuve du monde” flows into the narrative maintaining a constant, but moving presence, “répétée

70 inlassablement.” Galarneau’s cahiers has many similar myths, myth-making being a tradition he has inherited from his father and grandfather. Claiming that the Sun is the father of all life, his father named it/ him also Galarneau, making it/him one of the family (58-9). Young Galarneau is awakened by his grandfather one night, who has taken it into his head to initiate the boy into manhood. After the “initiation," grandfather Aldéric explains;

Ecoute-moi: nous venons de traverser un grand péril, nous avons ensemble, tous les deux, comme des hommes, nagé à bout de force, nous aurions pu nous noyer, mais nous sommes sortis vainqueurs de l'entreprise, nous avons vaincu le dragon. (...) “ Tu voulais m’initier? “ Tu ne te souviendras pas de cette baignade? “ Je ne suis pas prêt de l’oublier. -Alors bois un coup, i’avais raison... (136-137, author’s emphasis)

In D’Amour. P.O. we have the myth created by Thomas D’Amour about the

Punis, a group of fallen angels, who fell to Earth from the Toupie du Temps. A little more than halfway through the novel we find (perhaps to our surprise)

Thomas admitting to Mireille:

“ C’est possible que je sois un peu perdu, mais tu vois, la Toupie du Temps, j’y crois. MIREILLE: Moi aussi. THOMAS: La chute des anges, ça n’était peut-être pas des québécois, mais j’y crois. MIREILLE: Moi aussi. (88-9)

On a more comic note. Les Têtes record in their journal an incident in which a shipment of plastic statuettes made in their image goes astray, winding up in the hands of a small Korean sect. As a result, these images of Les Têtes have found their way into temples and among this people they are accorded the rank of deity (21).

71 It is clear that the establishment of national myths is one of the fundamental steps in the process of nation-building. Perhaps the most important immediate function for these myths is that it provides a context in which the nation makes sense. The myth provides a justification for their existence and can give a sense of purpose. Montaigne’s glorification of his friendship with La Boétie functions in almost precisely the same way, providing most importantly an excuse to create what will ultimately be (despite his protests) a monument to himself, the Essais. Additionally, whether he is aware of it or not, Montaigne is also creating a myth about the mores of his ancestors, which he prefers to those of his day as he denounces “les nouvelletez de ce temps.” His many contradictory citations demonstrate that Antiquity, while fascinating, is ultimately not a reliable source, and by citing examples of the foibles and mistakes made by the Ancients, reveals them to be as prone to error as men of his own day. What does appear to remain consistently valuable is the custom and tradition of his own country (as he portrays it) and hence his distress at seeing these customs violated by the Reformers and opportunistic noblemen. According to Quint, the establishment of this new myth about the

“quality of mercy” in French traditions is one of Montaigne's central concerns in writing the essays (xi).

The contestation of authority is also evident in the matter of language, a point of contention between those who speak it and the intellectual elite. It is a cultural sore spot for Quebec, caught between the rock of English-Canadian assimilationist pressure to eliminate their language and the hard place of

Parisian linguistic and cultural condescension. The secretary Mireille does not mince words, however, when it comes to the matter of Quebec’s supposed linguistic inferiority.

72 “ Eh bien l’Auteur, ma théorie, moi, ma théorie intelligente et littéraire pour tes tabarnaques d’intellectuels, c’est que ça sert à rien de soigner mon langage, vu qu’il n’est pas malade... (D’Amour. 151)

For ail her vulgarity and certainly more limited formal education, Mireille has a better command of the language than does her Auteur. Her language of choice is Québécois French “joualisé", but the corrections she makes to D'Amour’s novel indicates that her use of this sort of langage is not due to an inability to use or unfamiliarity with so-called “standard” French. As evidence, consider:

...où le temps vient s’arrêté. -Arrêté? dit Mireille; accent taigu? Cela aurait tété mieux d’écrire: arrêter, E-R, mon beau Caruso de papier. (15) or later:

-Mariette! CAU-CHE-MAR... avec un d ou un t? MARIETTE: ...ien. MIREILLE: Thomas D’Amour écrit ça avec un d, sacrament, j’aime pas ça effacer en trois copies! (25)

Of course it should be noted that what might be called “irregularities" in the spelling of her own paroles are not representative of her writing skills, but rather are due to Godbout’s effort to reflect her spoken French, as it is/ was popularly spoken in Quebec at the time he wrote this.“ Galarneau treats the French of France as something of a folkloric curiosity, an amusing reversal of what might be considered traditional or typical French-Francophone relations. He discusses these European "cousins” in his cahiers as he contemplates hiring a few of them in his (eventually abandoned) plan to develop Au roi du hot dog into a chain of snack-bars.

“ Mireille’s language is intended to reflect that of working-class Montrealers of the time of the publication of the work. As any representation of familiar or informal language forms, it is dated. For more on this, see the article by Carrol F. Coates, “Le jouai comme revendication québécoise: D’Amour. P.O. de Jacques Godbout." 73 Je pourrais même engager des Français comme cuisiniers, ils ont bonne réputation je pense. Jacques dit que les Français ne sont pas tellement vivables, parce qu’ils sont cartésiens. Ça n’est pas moi qui dis ça, c’est lui. Moi, je ne sais pas, j ’en connais seulement deux Français de France, qui ont acheté des maisons ici, dans l’île, et quand ils viennent chercher au stand un “cornet” de frites, je leur vends un casseau de patates comme à tout le monde. C’est des drôles de gens, ils sont toujours pressés, faut que ça saute, ils sont faciles à insulter: il suffit de les regarder— du monde nerveux; ça doit être à cause de la guerre, nous autres on n’a pas connu ça, ce devait être terrible, les bombardements, l’Occupation, les tortures, la Gestapo. Ils sont difficiles, c’est vrai, mais ils parlent bien, ils ont un accent qui shine comme des salières de nickel. Ça se mettrait sur la table à Noël, un accent comme ça, entre deux chandeliers. Je pourrais avoir quatre ou cinq Français sur mes quinze locataires (119, author’s emphasis).

We can read a lot into this clearly tongue-in-cheek description of the French.

The “cousinage” between the French and the French Canadians, so frequently spoken of, is put into question here as Galarneau makes it clear that the French are foreigners in Quebec. We can see the differences produced in a culture by geography and history. When Galarneau speaks of the touchy attitude of the

French, he traces this to their experience under the German Occupation of

World War II. He leaves the French-Canadian experience of the British

Conquest and Occupation unspoken. The supposedly corrupt quality of

Québécois French is dispelled when he compares “cornet de frites” to “casseau de patates, ” a different -yet equally French -expression. When it comes to the linguistic differences between the French and the Québécois, he quickly turns their accent into an artifact, comparing it to nickel salt shakers. By referring to it as an item to set on the table at Christmas, the French of France is reduced to a

74 decorative curiosity, pretty but not practical. The linguistic aesthetics of

Godbout’s narrators seem to place a heavy emphasis on the practical. In

D’Amour. P.O.. we can hear Mireille insisting to Thomas:

D’abord, arrête de me dire VOUS quand ça fait ton affaire, l’Auteur. A partir d’astheure tu me dis tu: on n’a pas le temps de se vouvoyer au Kébek! (94)

Again, we have a linguistic deviation from the model of France, an abandonment of the formal “vous.” In other passages Mireille uses “vous” in its plural sense herself, indicating that her preference for “tu” is not based on the

English model of a single second-person pronoun.^“

Montaigne and Godbout have not only taken the trouble to produce writing that evokes speech or thought more so than traditional forms of written communication, but we can see/ hear their narrators actively concerned with linguistic aspects of their communication. They use language, and are acutely aware of language, not just its variety of meanings, but also matters of dialect and register.

-Non... je veux dire que le problème de la littérature québécoise est d'abord politique. La libération du verbe... -D u sujet, de l'attribut, du complément, de l'adjectif, de l'adverbe, de l'artic... -Passe par l'affirmation du français en Amérique. Il ne peut y avoir de littérature bilingue (D'Amour, 153).

One is forced to conclude that either Godbout does not agree with Thomas' assertion of the impossiblity of bilingual literature (which is doubtful), or that he wishes to explore the extent to which one may use English in a text and still have a work “d'expression française. " We have in D'Amour. P.O. the following rather extensive apparently bilingual passage. Yet I wish to emphasize the The interested reader may also note that another item of “non-standard” French in this speech, “astheure,” is frequently to be found in the pages of Montaigne's Essais (his preferred spelling is “asture.”) 75 word “apparently” because, as Carrol Coates points out. these are phrases that can found in commercial or public postings, and therefore form the everyday linguistic reality of the French-speaking people of Québec (Coates, “Joual," 75).

l’ascenseur-élévator, down en bas. close doors fermez portes, no smoking please défense de fumer, second floor deuxième étage, films developed in 5 hours VOS films prêts en 5 heures. Glassy’s Snack­ bar restaurant chez Classy's, chez Pit’s place, sandwich au jambon ham sandwich .45, sandwich au saumon salmon sandwich .65 sandwich aux œufs eggs sandwich .40 cents c’est ça que je veux merci thank you come back au revoir, sacrament mon coke! T’as pas de patates? (59)

One can see that the “English” is somewhat flawed. Coates’ article provides a good analysis of the linguistic “flaws" in this passage, but to highlight one example we can note that the translation provided for “sandwich aux oeufs” is

“eggs sandwich,” a plural in a context where no native speaker of English would use a plural but which reflects the plural preferred by the French (Coates,

75-6). We could also point out that “Pit” of “chez Pit’s place” is far more likely to be a francophone Pierre than an anglophone Peter. Although this particular passage is divided nearly equally between the two languages, even this brief passage cannot be considered an example of “bilingual” literature. It is true that it is more (but not exclusively) accessible to bilingual readers than to francophones who understand no English, but significantly it is not accessible to an anglophone who reads no French. The “action" of this scene takes place entirely in French. (“C’est ça que je veux m erci... sacrament mon coke! T’as pas de patates?”) Recalling the earlier citation, we can also note that while

Mireille mocks Thomas’ high-sounding notion of the “libération du verbe, ” she does not similarly ridicule his denial of a bilingual literature, merely asking how

76 he supports this contention (153). On the literary level It would appear that

Quebec Is already an autonomous nation. While the government In Ottawa

makes deliberate efforts to create/ encourage a unitary Canadian national

Identity, Ideally a bilingual one, In literary matters this effort must be considered a failure. Volker Strunk, In an article published as recently as 1983 on the

problem of Canadian national literature, states unequivocally that “Canadian

poetry Is In the English language (72).” While there are those who disagree

with him, he Is not alone In this opinion.

Godbout particularly enjoys playing with flawed translations between

Canada’s two official languages, as In this example from Salut Galarneau! The

matchbooks purchased by Galarneau for distribution at his hotdog stand bear

the message: “Thank you merci. Come again au revoir. Close cover before

striking, baisser la tête avant de frapper (23, author’s emphasis).” On one level

we have a mockery of the unbalanced nature of Canadian bilingualism. Note

that the English Instructions or comments preceed, and that only the English receives the capital letter. John Dickenson and Brian Young, In their A Short

HIstorv of Quebec, are rather blunt In their evaluation of Canadian bilingualism,

stating, “official bilingualism Is largely a myth (312).” The “peculiar” translation

Into French of the English expression “close cover before striking” In one sense

highlights the Imperfect command of French exhibited by Canadian

anglophones. On another level. It presents a harsh Image of the cultural

domination of English Canada over French Canada. “Baisser la tête avant de frapper,” then becomes not so much an error In translation, but rather a graphic

depiction of French Canada’s cultural and linguistic submission.

77 Montaigne Is not above bilingual word-play,“ as in for example when he is discussing the necessity of accepting the pain that comes with living or give up living, he provides this citation from Cicero “Aut bibat, aut abeat," and then notes that it sounds better in Gascon than in the original Latin, for Gascon readily mutates B into V (II; 12, 236). This naturally would transform “bibat” into

“vivat,” a command to live. This particular pun would doubtless have been pleasing to François Rabelais, an author that Montaigne says he admires (or at least believes that he is worth reading) (II: 10, 114).

It would be inaccurate therefore to see the use of English and anglicisms in Godbout’s text as evidence of bilingualism or as a statement about the supposed “corruption” of Québécois French. The French of François Galarneau and of Mireille is no more “corrupted" by English than Montaigne’s text is “corrupted” by Latin and Italian, or for that matter by Gascon (“Au rebours, c’est aux paroles à servir et à suyvre, et que le Gascon y arrive si le François n’y peut aller (I: 24, 219)1”). Instead of corruption, we see a language decorated/ embellished with foreign, but assimilated elements.®

...(T)oute culture est un mélange d’éléments hétérogènes. On rappelera le cas de la culture grecque formée d’éléments grecs, mais aussi d’éléments crétois, égyptiens, asiatiques... Il est bien vrai que la règle ici est de l’hétérogénéité. Mais attention: cette hétérogénéité n’est pas vécue en tant qu’hétérogénéité... Il s’agit d’une hétérogénéité vécue intérieurement comme homogénéité. L’analyse peut bien reveler de l’hétérogène, mais les ______éléments, quelque hétérogènes qu’ils soient, sont Indeed it is the contention of one critic, Floyd Gray, that bilingualism (French-Latin) is an essential element of the Essavs. as discussed in his Montaigne bilingue: Le latin des Essais.

“ It would appear that the question of corruption vs embellishment resides almost entirely in the perceived power relationship between the borrowing culture and the culture from which it borrows. In contemporary France, there is a concern that their language is “corrupted" by the presence of English borrowings (especially American English), yet no one considers French to be “corrupted” on account of words borrowed from Arabic like “toubib." “kif-kif." and “bled." not to mention much older Arabic borrowings such as “alcool." “algèbre.” and “coton." 78 vécus par la conscience de la communauté comme siens, au même titre que les éléments les plus typiquement autochtones. (Aimé Césaire cited in Aquin, “Culture et colonisation,” Blocs erratiques. 85)

The anglicisms used by Mireille and the other Godboutian narrators can be seen as grotesque embellishments to their (French) words, and not the result of a poor or degraded command of French. For a particularly clear example of this, we have Mireille reproaching Thomas with the comment, “Ton affaire est bourrée de marde comme une dinde de la Thanksdonnégivingmerci.” This last construction, “Thanksdonnégivingmerci." is clearly wordplay for the joy of wordplay. Unlike the above citation of the public notices and restaurant menu where we have linguistic doubling- one phrase followed immediately by its translation— here we have interlocking bilingualism, where the two are not equivalent. While “Thanksdonné" may be considered understandable

“franglais” signifying the November holiday, “givingmerci” not only cannot be understood as its “translation” (into Frenglish?), it practically defies interpretation. Furthermore, Thanksgiving in French Canada is (of course) “la fête de l'Action de grâce” not “Merci donné.” The use of English as embellishment is an inversion of the traditional portrayal of French-English interaction in North America. Likewise, Montaigne’s use of Latin and Italian citations in his own work serve as decorative grotesques enhancing the Essais as self- portrait. This is an idea Montaigne himself advanced on how a student should assimilate ideas from authority in his “De l’institution des enfans.”

Les abeilles pillotent deçà delà les fleurs, mais elles en font après le miel, qui est tout leur; ce n’est plus thin ny marjolaine: ainsi les pieces empruntées d’autruy, il les transformera et confondera, pour en faire un ouvrage tout sien, à scavoir son jugement. (191)

79 This is one of many passages to be found in the Essais in praise of hybridity and serves as a illustration of Césaire s above-mentioned discussion of heterogeneity lived as homogeneity.

Godbout provides in addition a counter-example of this creative adoption/ assimilation of foreign elements in the character of Hénault the pharmacist.

C’est même Marise qui est allée chez Henault's Drugstore (il aurait pu appeler ça la Pharmacie Hénault, le sacrement, mais il est tellement content, Hénault de savoir parler anglais que si sa femme lui dit; je t’aime plutôt que I love vou. il ne peut plus bander. Colonisé Hénault: une couille peinte en Union jack, l'autre aux armoiries du pape!) (Galarneau.59- author’s emphasis).

Hénault is victimized by the difference in status between English and French in

Canada. He has not embellished his French with anglicisms, but rather has abandoned his French to English. Galarneau is obviously mocking Hénault, in almost the same way Montaigne makes fun of the state of medecine in his day when he says that people wouldn’t take medecine they understood, preferring exotic ingredients and Latin phrases (II: 37, 646). This is not the case for

François Galarneau (whose French reveals such embellishments as the word

“craoudé”) or for the secretary Mireille, who has an interesting perspective on this notion of the “language problem," as can be seen in this exchange with

Thomas during their radio interview:

-J e n’y crois pas, dit Mireille, dans la rue où j ’habite il n'y a pas de problème de langage. Mais au département où je travaille là il y en a un char épis une barge! Pas vrai, Thomas? “ Mireille a raison: les problèmes de langage sont des problèmes d’universitaires qui naissent du puritanisme en quelque sorte (D’Amour. 154).

80 The literary aesthetics proposed by Mireille and her roommate Mariette would seem to challenge precisely this puritanism. Mariette suggests that writing is (or should be) a sexual act.

MARIETTE: Tu veux-tu ma théorie? (...) J’ai l'impression que ceux qui écrivent couchent avec la langue. Voilà. C'est bien dit non? MIREILLE: Et si c'est leur langue maternelle, ils consomment l'inceste, c'est ça? MARIETTE: Que ça soit un roman, un poème, ce que tu voudras, c'est chaque fois un acte d'amour, et les bébés livres ressemblent à la qualité de cette amour. MIREILLE: Yen a qui sentent l'éprouvette en tabarouette! (...) MARIETTE: ...Il y en a qui ne font pas l'amour, ce sont des écrivains qui gâtent le fonne. La littérature leur reste dans les mains. (33-34)

The literary study performed by Mirielle in conjunction with her roommate,

Mariette, centers around an exploration of the sexuality of the author, alluded to in the above citation, and which one can see more clearly as the novel progresses. Sex, sexuality and sexual relations play an extremely important role in Godbout's work. On the one hand, one can see this as a sort of revolt against the former Church-controlled literary establishment that would have discouraged and avoided any overt sexual reference, and so such sexual reference is very overt in Godbout's novels. Secondly, much like the carnavalesque usage of sexuality noted in the work of Rabelais by Russian scholar Mikhail Bakhtine, the focus placed upon the sex lives of his characters serves to balance the intellectual and political aspects of his work, keeping it grounded in human bodily reality and preventing it from escaping into over- intellectualized theory. It ties the intellectual activity of writing to the living bodily activity of intercourse. We can see in D'Amour. P.O. that these two aspects of his work are personified in the characters of Thomas, representing intellect and

81 theory, and Mireille who represents bodily reality. Mireille and Mariette study

literature by sleeping with the writer.

MIREILLE: Tu vas me lancer l'Histoire de la littérature dans la face! Je sens ça venir. MARIETTE: Eh bien houil Nous avons fait une pacte, faut s’y tenir. A nous deuses, à ce jour, nous avons étudié un dramaturge, trois poètes et un critique (...). MIREILLE: Et un romancier. MARIETTE: Maudit je l'avais oublié! Faut dire que son livre, c'était pas vargeux... sa verge? MIREILLE: C'est pas parce que je couche avec un écrivain que je lui fais passer un examen oral chaque fois. Il faisait des fautes de français, au début; ensuite j'ai corrigé, raturé, une étreinte, une passion, c'était bien. C'était bien correct. MARIETTE: On devrait se faire un tableau, comme dans un manuel, tu vois, avec la date de naissance de l'auteur, puis celle où il a commis le péché d'impureté en notre compagnie. MIREILLE: Quelles sont les principales occaisions qui conduisent à l'impurété? MARIETTE: Les mauvais compagnons, les mauvais livres, les mauvaises danses, les mauvaises fréquentations, les mauvais programmes du théâtre et de la radio, les boissons enivrantes et les vêtements immodestes. (43)

In addition to showing another lapse into the catechism, we see here a clever

link made between bad literature and improper behavior. We see also how a

linguistic error is linked to a moral failing, as the two roommates segué from the

errors made in French to the “sin of impurity." A link is forged between linguistic

impurity and sexual impurity, an idea which is by no means original to the twentieth century.^ The link between sexuality and writing is, in fact, the most

highly developed image of D'Amour. P.O. One may even presume that it forms the driving motif behind the novel, its inspiration and cause, as suggested by its

^ Alain de Lille's De pianctu equated Orpheus’ sodomy with failing to distinguish between the grammatical genders and other grammatical “impurities” (Cottrell, “Allegories of Desire in Lemaire's Concorde des deux langages." 273). 82 title. Pursuing this discussion of their plan to experience literature through the

sexual experience of writers, the roommates note a problem.

MARIETTE: Evidemment, les auteurs féminins et les pédés posent un problème sérieux. MIREILLE: On fera ça en une séance, un gros pot party! Tu vois le genre? (44)

By suggesting that a sexual liaison is the best approach to an author (and

perhaps setting up a dreadful pun based on the word “genre”), the approach to

literature used by Mireille and Mariette imply that the ideal reader for any heterosexual male author is a heterosexual female reader. These conditions

are indicated when they remark that gay male authors and (heterosexual)

women authors would pose a problem.® Rather comically, and in a move that

forms no doubt an original critical approach, they suggest that “un gros pot

party” would get around these difficulties. Galarneau would seem to agree as he discusses the ideal reader for his cahiers.

Je vais me fabriquer une lectrice idéale, une fille comme dans la publicité, avec des yeux marron et des seins gros comme son nez; elle sera mon confessional, mon psychanalyste, ma silencieuse, ma dévoreuse, je lui apprendrai la saleté. Elle boira mes mots comme si c’était du Pepsi glacé, elle sourira, deviendra généreuse comme un enfant de

Cathleen Bauschatz has identified in the Essais a similar movement to define a female as the ideal reader for this (presumably heterosexual) male, although notably not on the basis of sexual compatibility. Her article allies Montaigne’s move away from male presumed readers (principally the absent La Boétie) towards female readers as he embraces his project of writing on a very personal subject. She writes:

“ That it Is the heterosexuality of these women authors that is the potential problem is implied by a lesbian interlude that takes place between these two roommates. 83 All the essays or portions of essays containing dedications to women were written between 1578 and 1580. (...) The topics of education and of the relationship between parents and children predominate during this period, as is appropriate to the process of reflection on the self and its development. All these are subjects which are applicable to the lives of women as the earlier military tactics and scenarios were not (89).

Bauschatz’s article focuses on those essays specifically dedicated to women,

but she directs her observations to the work as a whole. Noting that Montaigne

identifies the Essais as an activity “domestique et privée" (and therefore of the

traditionally feminine realm) Bauschatz says;

Montaigne’s ‘Au Lecteur" could well be entitled “A la Lectrice" without changing its intention ("à mes parens et amis") or message about the privacy of the reading experience and the intimate project of the book. (99)

These notions of “privacy" and “intimacy" take on a particularly interesting

coloration in the essay “Sur des vers de Virgile" where Montaigne brings to the

foreground the sexual implications of his work, targeting specifically the women readers.

Je m’ennuie que mes Essais servent les dames de meuble commun seulement, et de meuble de sale. Ce chapitre me fera du cabinet. J’ayme leur commerce un peu privé. (111:5,75)

This statement certainly highlights the potential sexual interaction between

Montaigne and his (ideally female) readers. The adulterous (in earnest or in jest) potential of this encounter is suggested by Montaigne’s often repeated

equivalency between himself and his book. Montaigne emphasizes this

understanding with his statement “Ce chapitre ms. fera du cabinet." Cottrell, in

his article “Gender Imprinting in Montaigne’s Essais." also notes the importance

84 of seduction in the exchange between the essays and their reader(s), although he casts Montaigne’s work in the feminine role (95). Montaigne clearly anticipates finding the interaction between writer and reader enjoyable. In the essay “Que nostre désir s'accroît par la malaisance," Montaigne suggests that the difficulty or even the forbidden quality of certain activities makes them more desirable. He gives as one of his examples Lycurgus ordering Lacedemonian spouses to approach their intimacies in the same manner they would an adulterous affair (II; 15, 414). Does Montaigne heighten his pleasure in producing the text by reminding us that he shouldn’t be speaking publicly of himself in this manner? He certainly does make his text more difficult to write by repeatedly defending himself against potential charges of immodesty and boastfulness. As in the traditional view of the sexual act, these sexual texts are assigned a clearly reproductive goal.

-II n’y a pas de recette. Il faut aimer les livres si on veut en accoucher, dit enfin D’Amour. -Mariette soutient qu’il faut baiser la langue. (D’Amour. 92)

Montaigne and Godbout both compare writing to reproduction. Montaigne wonders if he wouldn’t rather conceive a child by intercourse with the Muses than with his wife (II: 8, 102). An interesting parallel can be found in D’Amour. P.O. After they have begun their sexual relationship and literary collaboration,

Mireille asks Thomas if she is his muse (103).

While the revalorization of the monstrous is perhaps the major development in the treatment of the grotesque in these works, this subversion does not limit itself to transferring a positive value to the grotesque. These works perform a gradual transfer of grotesqueness, or potential grotesqueness onto “the normal. ” As Gisèle Mathieu-Castellani observes about Montaigne’s

85 work in Montaigne: L’écriture de l’essai, “rien n’est monstre, tout est monstre, l’homme est la mesure de toute chose (monstrueuse) (235).” Montaigne has striking techniques to drive home this idea of universal grotesqueness that go beyond his assertion that humankind is “vain, diverse and undulating.” In his discussion of the supposed superiority that humans have over animals, he goes into some detail about senses and abilities that some species have that humans don’t seem to demonstrate. He postulates that humans may be lacking some essential sense, that we don’t know how to miss, rather like the man born blind (11:12. 376). In discussing social reluctance to discuss matters of sex he says, “Quel monstrueux animal qui se fait horreur à soy mesme. à qui ses plaisirs poisent; qui se tient à malheur! (Ill: 5, 118)” All of these potential monstrosities merely illustrate Montaigne’s point about human variety. “Leur plus universelle qualité, c’est la diversité (II: 37. 665).” To transfer the focus from the center to margins, to consider the grotesque as a work of art in and of itself can be unsettling, as the example of

Jovette Marchessault demonstrated. Yet it is a project deliberately proposed by or forced on our narrators. Montaigne included. He alternately assumes and denies the role of model, positing himself both as central portrait and as marginal grotesque. As Montaigne’s Essais progress, he appears to call his own grotesqueness into question. After criticizing himself for his ridiculous shortness in “De la praesumption” Montaigne enumerates a list of physical qualities that he states are of no value in a short man. height being the pre­ eminent physical quality of masculine beauty (II: 17. 456). Assuming these other traits (a medium nose, small ears and mouth, thick and even chestnut- colored beard, etc) are ones that Montaigne himself possessed, he appears to be arguing that monstrousness is in the eye of the beholder. He may be a fine-

86 looking fellow, from a shorter point of view. He will also posit a (theoretical)

grotesqueness for neighboring cultures and those of Antiquity by writing about

some of their more unusual practices. I have already cited some of the eating

and sleeping habits the French found peculiar or unacceptable. In his essay on

“Des coustumes anciennes” he lists many practices and habits that are not

found in France of his day, some of which may strike the modern reader as

comic. We are reminded of Montaigne’s dictum, “chacun appelle barbarie ce

qui n’est pas de son usage (1:31, 260)." This message, that grotesque is in the

eye of the beholder, is an important theme in Les Têtes à Papineau. In the

same sentence which describes the French-Canadian people as a frog in a sea

of anglophones, the frog-like (and therefore monstrous) quality is deflected onto

English-speaking North America by Godbout’s turn of phrase “tout ce qui ne

saxonne est un batracien.” This word “saxonne,” (from saxonner?) has a harsh

croak-like quality to it, something which is lacking to more obvious choices like

“parler anglais” or even “angliciser.”® Of course, even (or especially?) the well-

intentioned can be found guilty of grotesqueness. Their mother’s attempt to

encourage in her son(s) a positive self-image meets with a mixed reaction. «Un homme averti en vaut deux», disait-elle souvent pour nous encourager. Nous étions très avertis. Elle avait trouvé l’expression dans les culottes roses du dictionnaire. «Bis repetita placent», les choses répétées plaisent; «deux têtes valent mieux qu’une»; elle nous fouettait à coup de dictons. Il fallait n’avoir qu’une tête sur les épaules pour parler ainsi. CLes Têtes. 109)

® This choice of wording in the journal kept by Les Têtes also serves to ally them with other endangered cultures, those of Europe's so-called “Celtic fringe." Whereas speakers of Germanic and Romance languages refer to the (cultural) descendants of the Anglo-Saxons by their Angle forebear, their Celtic neighbors have always referred to them as “Saxons" (consider for example Scots Gaelic “Sassenach,” Welsh “Saesne," and the Irish Gaelic word for “England," “Sasana”). Indeed, François's “côté gaulois" (and therefore “celtique.") is mentioned early in the text and is specifically linked to his pleasure in word-play (Les Têtes. 17). 87 Since Les Têtes eventually agree to Dr. Northridge’s surgical Intervention, It appears that her efforts were not successful.

Les aimables, les simples d’esprit, les humbles de cœur, ceux qui sont de trop, qui ne peuvent faire de mal à un papillon, les dinosaures, les brontosaures, les hominiens, les Kalapos, les Arméniens, les Acadiens, les têtes à Papineau de tous les hémisphères, ou l’une d’entre elles, sont condamnés à disparaître. L’évolution, c'est la raison du plus fort. Comment une grenouille pourrait-elle nager dans une mer d ’unicéphales? (Les Têtes. 150-1 )

Because they could not answer this question, Les Têtes agreed to assimilate.

The answer that leads to the survival of our other narrators Is, as suggested above, to project grotesqueness onto everyone. In a sea of grotesques. It Is the “normal” who cannot swim, and who become monstrous by not being a hybrid.

Galarneau walled within his home Is able to change his mind about the outside world. In part due to television commercials advertising cleaning products. This obsession with purity leads him to cry out, “Ces gens ont ardent besoin que je salisse/ leurs antisepsies (Galarneau. 147)1” Montaigne has an amused, condescending reaction to the young courtiers he has observed.

Ce que je dis de ceux là me ramentolt, en chose semblable, ce que j’ay par fols aperçeu en aucuns ne noz jeunes courtisans. Ils ne tiennent qu’aux hommes de leur sorte, nous regardent comme gens de l’autre monde, avec desdain ou pitié. Ostez leur les entretiens et mystères de la court. Ils sont hors de leur gibier, aussi neufs pour nous et malhabiles comme nous sommes à eux. On dict vray qu’un honneste homme, c’est un homme mesié. (Ill; 9, 253)

As we read about these young noblemen staring at Montaigne we recall the astonished gaze the doctor and priest turned towards the newborn Têtes. However In this passage Introduced In the second edition of the Essais, an

88 older Montaigne presumably more comfortable with himself as the object of public gaze (since he survived being read in the Essais’ first edition), boldly returns this gaze upon the disdainful courtiers. Under Montaigne’s experienced eye, we recognized the mixed man as the “honneste homme," and that which is not hybrid, appears strangely inbred. We could also look at the peculiar story of

Spurina, which inspired the thirty-third essay of Book II. Spurina, an exquisitely beautiful young man, was so disturbed at the reaction produced by his beauty that he disfigured himself (II: 33, 591). This would appear similar to Les Têtes who also voluntarily did away with their uniqueness. Yet, where Les Têtes were grotesque on account of their non-idealized physical appearance, the reverse is true for Spurina. Grotesque on account of his beauty, he defaces himself in order to stop being grotesque. The unfortunate Spurina enters a vicious circle, for in order to avoid being grotesquely distinct, he becomes distinctly grotesque. Our narrators’ comfort with their role as simultaneously “crotesque” and portrait seems to be linked to their ability and willingness to read themselves as they are written. Cottrell remarks upon Montaigne’s reaction faced with his own portrait, both painted and textual. Rereading what he had written before (...) Montaigne is in fact communicating with a stranger, a man curiously like himself and yet just as curiously unlike himself. He marvels at the changes that have occured both within himself and around him. (Sexuality/ Textuality. 104)

This phenomenon is demonstrated even more dramatically in Les Têtes à

Papineau. Charles F. Papineau is facing the thoughts and lives of nearly complete stranger(s) as he contemplates reading the journal of Charles and François, particularly since he is not able to read this journal in the original, and

89 requires a translation. Montaigne, moreover, could have expected, to a certain

degree this estrangement. In considering the lessons one may learn from

historical events, he writes, “II n’est aucune qualité si universelle en cette Image

des choses que la diversité et variété. (111:13, 352)” The strangeness of the

younger Montaigne for the older Montaigne Is merely the personal application

of the diversity of context brought on by the passage of time.

If Les Têtes are eventually unable to read their own portrait, this Is not the case for Godbout’s other narrators. Galarneau’s decision to climb over the wall and end his physical Isolation coincides with a decision to allow his cahiers to be read (158). Mireille of D’Amour. P.O. Is very at ease with herself. Following her sexual approach to reading, she clearly has no problem with being “read.” and her comparison of masturbation to a manuscript (55) would Indicate a familiarity with reading her own self. This Is not the case, at least Initially, for Thomas. As we have seen, throughout the opening of the novel, one of the struggles between Thomas and Mireille has been the way Thomas has avoided writing himself honestly Into his work, preferring to hide behind an unidentifiable universal. She accuses him outright of dishonesty. MIREILLE: Non. Je veux dire: votre biographie. Vous fabriquez à mesure, c’est faux nez. THOMAS: Vous voulez que je recommence? MIREILLE: Mais cette fols, soyez honnête (80).

In proofreading his text, Mireille remarks an oddity In Thomas’ original text which may Indicate the source of his hesitation to write himself In an honest manner.

-C ’est une baptême de manie son soleil, y en a partout, hellle Mariette? C’est quoi comme symbole, le soleil? MARIETTE: ...veuxdire? MIREILLE: Ben oui, c’est-tl un symbole phallique?

90 MARIETTE: ...trop rond! MIREILLE: Soleil, chaleur, la mère? MARIETTE: ...père MIREILLE: Ben dans ce cas-là, mon Auteur voit son père partout. fP’Amour. 29- author’s emphasis)

As Cottrell has observed in the Essais. Montaigne also experienced a certain

discomfort, feeling himself to be under the gaze of his father fSexualitv/

Textuality. 137). If Mariette’s interpretation of solar symbolism is accurate, the

end of Montaigne's Essais may indicate a sort of reconciliation to the paternal gaze. He closes with an invocation to Apollo, god of light, but through

conflation also associated with the sun.

It is significant that the Essais close with a poem, a song by Horace that is in fact a prayer to Apollo, god of light, health, poetry, beauty, music, beseeching him to bestow his gifts upon the aging. (Cottrell, 111)

In a final parallel with the Essais. Galarneau’s cahiers also end with an

invocation to the sun, significantly asking him to warm the aging work-horse.

Martyr. The horse's role in the novel appears to be either as a symbol for

Quebec, or perhaps as a symbol for Galarneau himself: ...tu peux continuer ton tour de terre, cela va beaucoup mieux, merci (réchauffe Martyr en passant il doit être transi) je te verrai demain, j'emprunte l’échelle de Dugas, je fais un saut à l'hôtel Canada. et je m'en vais porter mon livre en ville pour que Jacques, Arthur, Marise, Aldéric, maman, Louise et tous les Gagnon de la terre le lisent... A demain vieille boule, salut Galarneau! (158)

Galarneau closes his portrait announcing his plan to make this same portrait public, freely meeting the gaze of his solar parent and the reading gaze of the world. These two prayers indicate that the formerly decorative grotesque is asserting itself in the center. Montaigne and Galarneau, and by extension the

91 nations they represent, not only passively accept, but actively ask for their place In the sun.

92 CHAPTER 3

MARGUERITE DE NAVARRE, ANNE HEBERT AND THE HERITAGE OF EVE

The notion of the heritage of Eve found In the title to this chapter may be

surprising. However, in discussing the work of sixteenth-century French author

Marguerite de Navarre and twentieth century Québécois author Anne Hébert,

the image of Eve serves as a useful point of focus for the themes common to

their work as they struggle with the crisis of identity associated with the

phenomenon of nation-building. Marguerite’ and Hébert seek to establish an

identity through an exploration of the theme of family, and the twin themes of trial and confession, sin and guilt. The heritage of Genesis' first woman is

evoked as we see these themes united in the figure of Eve as wife, mother, and

history's first recorded sinner. In the Bible, the creation of the world begins with a scene of chaos: formlessness, darkness, wind stirring up the turbulent waters.

In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless wasteland, and darkness covered the abyss, while a mighty wind swept over the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light," (...)=

’ This name is used in keeping with the practice of using first names to refer to royalty.

* Genesis 1:1-3. This and all other citations from Scripture are taken from the New American Bible (New York: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1983). 93 God’s act of creation, as depicted here, consists of bringing order out of chaos, dispelling the darkness through the creation of light, and on the third day summoning the dry land from underneath the waters/ Marguerite de Navarre,

In her Heotameron. opens with a remarkably similar scene. Chaos Is brought to the region of Cauterets with the arrival of torrential rains and flooding. The ordered world of the noble French visitors to the baths Is turned upside down as they are scattered In various directions In their attempt to return from whence they came. The waters sweep over the earth. In apparent defiance of God’s command that they be gathered Into a basin, taking out bridges and depriving the nobility of their accustomed retinue of servants. To add to this chaotic vision. Marguerite depicts them as set upon by brigands and bears, and the apparition of the wife of the chief bandoulller. noted In the text for her unnatural cruelty. Of course, the Biblical Image recalled In the text Itself Is not that of the waters present at the Creation, but rather those of the Flood, as Marguerite writes, “...II semblolt que Dieu eut oblyé la promesse qu’il avolt falote à Noé de ne détruire plus le monde par eaue (1);’”* Nevertheless, the Image of re­ creation Is the same, for the survivors of the floods and chaos, much like Noah before them, set out to re-order the world.

The disorder and chaos of Marguerite’s prologue to the Heptameron mirrors the disorder and Instability that began to break down the medieval

Image of stability that had previously reigned In the minds of Europeans.

France was progressing on a path from a feudal state towards absolute monarchy. The relationship between the monarch and the nobility was In change. Indeed the very function of the nobility was In a state of change as the

^ Genesis 1 ;9

' Ail citations from the Heotameron are from Michel François’s edition, of the Qassiaues Gamier series published by Bordas. 1991. 94 power and prestige of the noblesse d'épée began to give way before the increasing importance of the noblesse de robe. The once-unified face of

Western European Christendom was beginning to show the volatile aspects of

religious dissent and division brought about by the evangelical humanists and

the religious reformers. Throughout all of this questioning, doubt, change and division, something new was about to be born, for in the sixteenth century we

see the progression of a sort of proto-nationalism, which has its roots in the

Hundred Years War. With its beginnings in the encouragement of the cults of the patron saints of king and country, we now see nationalist activity spreading into the secular domain with the passage of the proclamation of Villers-

Cotterets, making French the sole acceptable language in matters of law, and in the activity in favor of French language by the Pléiade.

In Marguerite’s work, we see a response to disorder. Like the Creator

calling light out of the darkness, Marguerite seeks to impose order in her

disordered world by recalling the truth, and serving as its witness. This is a truth

which is profoundly Christian, for one cannot read her work without being intensely aware of her religious concerns. Yet the religious aspect of her work

does not prevent her from discussing other themes and problems central to the

reestablishment of a stable order. Her work reveals her to be profoundly

monarchist, and this is hardly a surprise since the monarchy was more or less

the family business for the sister of Francis I and the Queen of Navarre. She

also demonstrates a concern for the establishment of a stable and just relationship between the sexes. The fact that male honor and female honor appear to operate at cross purposes is obviously disturbing for her. Her work proposes guidelines for the reestablishment of social order and/or lay the grounds for a new nation of France. And so, in her Prologue, the rains are

95 brought to an end, the devisants are assembled in the ordered environment of a

monastery, in the pleasurable environment of a garden where day after day

they will explore what is true. This is a meeting of equals, a strangely artificial

notion in a hierarchical society, like the one outside of the walls of the

monastery. Yet Hircan states plainly, “au jeu nous sommes tous esgaulx (5).”

As equals, the five ladies and five gentlemen can mirror the cooperation of the

three equal persons in one creative and creating God. For Marguerite’s

devisants, each day brings the work of the new batch of tales, they return to the monastery discussing how well the day was spent over dinner, evening comes,

and morning follows; ten more tales are added to the Heptameron.

Anne Hébert, daughter and cousin to poets and an established poet

herself, began her work as a novelist during the 1960’s. Quebec after the Quiet Revolution, like sixteenth-century France, was also characterized by a certain

amount of disorder, as the old institutions gave way before the province’s

sudden rush into the modern age. The novels of Anne Hébert also reflect this attempt to call order out of chaos that we see in the Heptameron. The allusion to the Biblical account of creation is not as strong as it is in the Heptameron. although Peter Noble in his study of Les Fous de Bassan. detects a parallel between the six books that constitute this novel and the six days of creation

(with God resting on the seventh) in Genesis (9). Nevertheless as we look at

Kamouraska we see that as her husband’s illness is prolonged, Mme. Rolland’s reality has become more and more disordered with her increasing paranoia. In her revisitation of her past, which constitutes the bulk of the novel, we can see her attempting to Impose order on her chaotic involvement with the murder of her first husband as she attempts once and for all either to come to terms with her guilt or to establish a solid innocence. The opening of Les Enfants du

96 sabbat does not immediately strike one as chaotic, taking place within the carefully ordered world of the convent, but we soon see that the regulations imposed upon the Dames du Précieux-Sang are a hypocrisy masking spiritual and psychological disorder. The case of Griffin Creek is similar, for underneath the seemingly unified and carefully ordered face of this isolated English village in Quebec is a seething cauldron of repressed emotions. As is the case in

Genesis, there is a common first step. Against Elisabeth Rolland’s protest, we hear Aurélie Caron say, “On ne peut pas toujours vivre dans la noirceur. Il faut ce qu'il faut. Les grandes scènes de votre vie s'en viennent Madame. C'est en pleine clarté qu'il faut les revivre (Kamouraska. 1Q3L" And there was light.

For Marguerite, the truth is predetermined. Knowing the answer before she asks the question, her efforts to find order in a chaotic world are fixed from the very beginning on the Christian promise of salvation. The return to order is ultimately and inevitably a return to God. We do not see this same certainty in

Anne Hébert's work. Even after hauling her past out of darkness and into the light in Kamouraska. Elisabeth Rolland's re-creation remains unfinished, as she is unwilling to embrace her guilt and is claustrophobic in her innocence. In Les

Fous de Bassan. the abrupt exposure to the light of the angers, lusts, and jealousies of Griffin Creek is explosive, and leads to the destruction of that hope of re-creation and renewal found in the persons of Nora and Olivia. Only in Les

Enfants du sabbat do we find a reestablishment of order similar to that found in the work of the queen of Navarre. Even so, in this novel we see the (re-) creation of two diametrically opposed orders, as Julie de la Trinité sets off to re­ create the world of the witch, and the convent of the Dames du Précieux-Sang is left to reestablish itself, having come face-to-face with its own sin.

97 Lacking Marguerite’s absolute faith in Christian salvation, Anne Hébert’s

literary world seems to relate to that of Marguerite’s like a photographic

negative. This is particularly true in the case of Les Enfants du sabbat, whose

heroine is literally in the service of Satan. This is perhaps a reflection of a primary difference between sixteenth-century France and twentieth-century

Quebec. Both societies were at one time very nearly uniformly Roman Catholic.

Whereas in Renaissance France, there was a transition from one form of

Christianity to another. In Quebec the hegemony of the Roman Catholic Church

was shattered by the events of the Quiet Revolution, and while the state has filled In the void in the realm of public services, in the spiritual realm the Church

has not been clearly replaced by anything at all. Still one can be struck by the fact that both works have a strong spiritual presence to them, and as both authors make their literary search for a stable identity, several striking Images are evoked and are treated in remarkably similar ways. Both Marguerite and Hébert make extensive use of imagery taken from the judicial tradition, particularly the themes of trial, witness and testimony. As is not unexpected for authors from a Catholic tradition, the ecclesiastical variant of this trope, that of the confessional, is also exploited. In addition, as mentioned earlier, family roles are also explored as models for identity.

Marguerite’s national concerns, particularly her monarchism, can be seen surprisingly perhaps in her religious dramas and poems. In the opening speech of Marguerite’s Comédie de la Nativité Joseph says, "Obéir fault aux

Princes de bon cœur,/ Voyant en eux de nostre DIEU l’image;’’® Christ’s

® Ali citations from Les Marguerites de la marguerite des princesses are from the edition published jointly by S.R. Publishers, Johnson Reprint Corp., and Mouton and Co., of the Classiques de la Renaissance en France series edited by M. A. Screech. For the sake of clarity, in my citations I distinguish between “]” and “i,” and “u" and “v;” long-form “s" is written as short form; and I have written out the word “e f as well as any abbreviated words. I have otherwise kept the text as it appears in this above-cited edition. 98 kingship and the importance of this attribute of the Deity are clearly tied to her own preoccupation with the family business. The triad of Louise de Savoie, her daughter Marguerite and Francis I were often portrayed as a royal “Holy

Family,” and references to Christ’s kingship are likely to be allusions to

Marguerite’s brother. Robert Cottrell, in his study of La Coche.° points out that this work by Marguerite was at least in part “une apologie de la monarchie absolue et du droit divin royal (“Figures emblématiques,” 313).” Her poetry is certainly not without overt praise of her royal brother, as we can see in this description of Francis I from the Chansons spirituelles:

Par luy (Francis) estes (vous=Dieu) congnu en France Mieux que n’estiez le temps passé, Il est ennemy d’ignorance. Son sçavoir tout autre a passé. (470- my parentheses)

It is on such a basis that we can see that Marguerite clearly has Francis in mind as the model of a Christian monarch. Consider for example her Comédie de l’adoration des trois rovs. which seems to function not only as a lesson in the ways in which a believer gains access to Divine Intelligence and hence faith in

Christ, but also appears to be a lesson of the proper formation of kings. This would seem to be made explicit in Joseph’s greeting to the kings upon their arrival at the stable in Bethlehem, “Bien soyez vous venus, sages seigneurs,/

Des autres Roys l’exemple et enseigneurs: (257)” One might well be justified in seeing in her depiction of Balthasar an image of her brother, Francis I. This king, addressed by Philosophie as “O sage Roy,” is introduced in his opening speech as follows:

J’ay fait grand cas des biens de ceste terre, J’ay désiré honneur et gloire acquerre, Et de me voir seigneur grand et puissant; ______Pour acquérir des biens, j’ay fait de la guerre; ' This work by the queen of Navarre is not specifically analyzed in this study. 99 Làs, je voy bien que trop foiement je erre; Car tous ces biens n’est rien que vent passant. Philosophie amye, mon cœur sent Ta bonne odeur, et te prend pour s’amye; A t’obeïr pour jamais se consent; Ne sois donc pas de l’apprendre endormye. (214-15)

There do seem to be many traits about Balthasar that reflect what we know of

the historical Francis I. Corresponding to Balthasar’s military activities, we can

note Francis’ involvement in multiple wars in Italy and in Spain. We also see

that Balthasar, like Francis, favors book-learning. Philosophie responds to Balthasar’s request for learning with “Or tiens et voy le thresor que je porte,/

Livres icy pour voir, de toute sorte (215)." If indeed Balthasar is a thinly

disguised Francis, then Marguerite pays him the ultimate compliment, as it is he who first lays eyes on the newborn Christ (254). As Balthasar, Gaspard and

Melchior serve as examples of good kings, Herodes functions as an example of

a bad one, whose reign is marked bv la guerre, crudelité. and ambition (243). After their meeting with Herodes, we read the following exchange between

Balthasar and Melchior:

BALTHASAR. Lon donne à Herodes le bruyt En ce païs, d’estre cruel. Croyez qu’un Prince qui est tel. N’est de l’esprit de Dieu instruit.

MELCHIOR. Lon congnoit l’arbre par le fruit. Làs, que le peuple est malheureux Qui vit soubs un Roy vicieux! En fin l’un et l’autre est destruit. (253)

In her portrayal of French society Marguerite’s work definitely betrays a

pattern of members of the second estate substituting themselves for those of the first. This is one of the points brought up by Christian Desplats as he writes: 100 Improductif par vocation, le gentilhomme selon Marguerite se distingue sur un point au moins de ses prédécesseurs et de ses successeurs; il ne méprise pas le savoir. On retrouve là cette prédisposition du second ordre à se substituer au premier: le noble prie mieux que le clerc et il en sait plus que lui. (“Ordres et «estats»,”219)

Desplats points out that Marguerite did not inspire this effort of the nobility to reinvent itself at the expense of the clergy. She is. in her writing, merely reflecting a change that had already developed in her society. It is, nevertheless, an important development from the nationalist point of view.

Without usurping the privileges and dignities of the clergy, the king -a s a member of the nobility and therefore of the second estate- must always be subject to the first estate in the figure of the Pope. This is a galling situation to a nationalist for the Pope was, after all. a foreign monarch in addition to the head of the Church. Francis I’s wars in Italy must have given him, as well as Marguerite, a certain perspective of the Pope as merely another Italian monarch. This substitution of the nobility for the clergy is a logical companion of Francis I's ordonnance replacing the language of the Church in government affairs with that of the nation. Karine Berriot suggests that Marguerite’s choice to set her Heptameron in the village of Cauterets (spelled by Marguerite as

“Cauderès") is perhaps a patriotic nod to the ordonnance de Viilers- Cotterêts promulgated by her brother. Francis I fLa Belle rebelle. 157). One can also detect Marguerite's nationalism in her treatment of the various surrounding nations and their mores, particularly of the Italians and the

Germans. She clearly enjoys playing with national stereotypes, always to the benefit of French reputation. Consider this excerpt from the adventures of

Bonnivet with the dame milanoise of the fourteenth tale. After her seduction through deception by the Frenchman, what is the lesson this woman learned? 101 ...et qu’elle congnoissoit bien le contraire du faux bruict que l'on donnoit aux Françoys; car ilz estoient plus saiges, perseverans et secretz que les Italiens. (113)

In discussing Marguerite’s use of national stereotypes, Daniel Russell points out that

...proverbial typecasting associated certain nationalities with certain characteristics, such as cleverness, a propensity to drink, or deceitfulness; the motivation of nouvelle 16 in the Heptameron. for example, turns partially on the assumption that Italians are more cowardly than the French. (205)

She also does not hesitate to compare the king of France favorably with the monarchs of other, less favored nations. As one instance of this we can consider the king of England as he defends the cause of the murderous Sainct-

Aignan and his wife in the first nouvelle.

...(L)e roy d’Angleterre feit requeste au Roy de luy vouloir donner sa grace et le remectre en ses biens et honneurs. Mais le Roy, ayant entendu le vilain et énorme cas, envoya le procès au roy d’Angleterre, le priant de regarder si c’estoit cas qui meritast grace, luy disant que le duc d’Allençon avoit seul ce privileige de donner grace en sa duché. Mais, pour toutes ses excuses, n’appaisa poinct le roy d’Angleterre, lequel le prochassa si très instammant, que, à la fin, le procureur l’eust à sa requeste . ..(16)

The English monarch is easily duped by the feigned innocence of Sainct-

Aignan and his wife, but the king of France sees the evidence and is not taken in.

One nouvelle in particular would seem to give us an interesting look at

Marguerite de Navarre’s nationalism. In her article “Practicing Queer Philology with Marguerite de Navarre; Nationalism and the Castigation of Desire,” Carla

Freccero analyzes the forty-second tale as intended to serve the same function

102 for the French nation as did the legend of the rape of Lucretia for the Roman

Republic. Freccero even goes so far as to characterize this tale as “Lucretia meets Marianne (110).” The legend of Lucretia appears to have been of interest for Marguerite as her twelfth nouvelle, the tale of the murder of the Duke of Florence, is remarkably similar to that of the rape of Lucretia with an important difference. The rape of the Florentine woman never takes place, for the brother does not deliver his sister to his master as promised. The rape is preempted by the Duke’s murder, and as a result, this new Lucretia does not commit suicide. The twelfth tale is a tale of Florence. In the forty-second, the tale of the pursuit of the virtuous Françoise by a prince of France, Marguerite has a different fable for the French nation, fitting her pattern of contrasting

France’s wise and benevolent monarchy with the poor judgment of the rulers of

England (as in the first nouvelle ), and with the Italian propensity for producing tyrants.

On the surface there is a marked similarity between these two tales. We have a lusty young nobleman who seeks physical fulfillment of his attraction to a young woman, Françoise, at the cost of her honor. The prince cannot even pretend to consider marrying the woman, for her social class makes such an alliance inconceivable. Like his Florentine counterpart, the Prince seeks help in his project from Françoise’s relatives, the very people who should be helping her guard that which is a sixteenth-century woman's most precious attribute.

Astonishingly enough, they encourage the young woman to give herself to the prince. Despite these similarities, in stark contrast to the example of the Florentine tale, the violence is missing. To be sure, the young prince’s courtier (described as “ung gentil homme de sa chambre”) does threaten the young

103 woman, but Françoise sees easily that this threat does not come from the prince himself.

Importantly, it is the two main characters who are innocent (more or less) of any guilty dealings in this affair. The dirty underhanded work is all done by the gentil homme and the sommelier. Françoise’s brother-in-law. This makes for an important difference between this French seduction and the Florentine one. In the twelfth tale, both the Duke and the nobleman seeking to protect his sister are guilty of sinister plots. The Duke proposes that the nobleman hand over his sister. His is an underhanded plot to begin with, for from the beginning it is a question not so much of obtaining her consent, as tricking her into rape through the intervention of her own brother. Although the story-teller suggests that the assassination of the Duke saved the country from a tyrant, we know from the reactions of the other devisants that they do not completely approve of this deed.

Ceste histoire fut bien écoutée de toute la compaignye, mais elle luy engendra diverses oppinions; car les ungs soustenoient que le gentil homme avoit faict son debvoir de saulver sa vie et l’honneur de sa seur, ensemble d’avoir délivré sa patrie d’un tel tirant; les autres disoient que non, mais que c’estoit trop grande ingratitude de mectre à mort celluy qui luy avoit faict tant de bien et d’honneur. Les dames disoient qu’il estoit bon frere et vertueux citoyen; les hommes au contraire, qu’il estoit traistre et meschant serviteur; et faisoit fort bon oyr les raisons alléguées des deux costez. (95)

In contrast, the French story does not generate this kind of controversy. There is no question that both Françoise and her prince have behaved well, an important detail considering the probable identity of the prince in question.

Intriguingly, Françoise is the only character in this story to have a name. It is true that this is not terribly unusual in the Heptameron. and frequently when 104 characters do have names, we are informed that “the names have been changed to protect the Innocent.” However, this does not appear to be the issue in Heptameron 42. Parlamente’s comments about various figures in the tale lead one to believe that her audience could be expected to recognize the players. We are, after all, talking about a prince of France, and his mother is identified as “une des plus saiges femmes du monde (291).” In short, they are most probably Francis I and Louise de Savoie.^

The give and take between the prince and Françoise resembles in many ways an ideal relationship between a monarch and the nation he governs. In his treatment of Françoise we see that the prince is by no means a tyrant. In keeping with the familial imagery common to Marguerite's work and indeed to many nationalist works, the monarch falls in love with this representation of the nation. They are shown as coming from the same household, hence the same family. We note that Françoise states this most graphically, that she was

“nourrye en vostre maison (290, my emphasis).”

Freccero, citing Patricia Cholakian’s Rape and Writing, points out that this is the tale of the making of a king (112). Freccero goes on to say, speaking of the identity of Françoise:

If this is an encrypting of the hero's name, François (and for the purposes of my argument it will suit me well to go along with the belief that this is a story about Marguerite's brother, the king), it is also a narrative about, at its simplest figurai level, an accession to royal heroic virtue that passes through the (middle-class) body, person, of a woman. For what the story is designed in part to demonstrate is how the prince develops from a boy into a (worthy) king. From penis to phallus. From François, through Françoise, to France. (112)

^ This Identification of the prince and his mother is made by M. François in the footnotes to his edition of the Heotameron (481. note 603). 105 Françoise Is a remarkable ,yet logical, choice for this representation of the

French nation. She Is In many ways the mirror Image of the prince who pursues her, or a negative In the photographic sense. Her femaleness responds to his maleness. Her common social status contrasts with his royalty. She speaks with a wisdom and experience that the prince does not have, which Is no wonder, for most nations are older and more experienced than the princes that govern them. Her actions show that the prince may desire his nation as a man desires a woman, but must respect this nation as an equal partner, according to the lot of each. Assuming, as Freccero has done and many others before her, that the prince Is Indeed François, they are the yin and yang of the French nation, François and Françoise, French feminine and masculine, Frankish (for the nobility traced Its descent from the Franks) and Gaulish (the presumed forebears of French commoners), maître and servlteuse. and --due to the prince's effort to seduce her and his claims to honesty- serviteur and maîtresse.

Nationalism In Hébert’s work often shows up In the somewhat sinister quality of the Anglophone characters In her novels. In the novel Les Fous de

Bassan. It Is the entire village that has this disquieting trait. Although some critics Insist that the conflict between French and English Canadian Is absent In this novel (Ewing, “The English World," 105), there are details that make this a difficult Idea to accept. One of these Is the way In which the residents of the old town of Griffin Creek refer to the residents of the new town. Twice they are referred to as “papists," once In the Rev. Jones’ narrative (13), and once In the diary of Nora Atkins (128). To Ignore the offensive quality of this label Is. at best, a questionable decision. While It Is possible that the Roman Catholic neighbors are Irish and not French-Canadlan, the absence of Irish names In the

106 vicinity makes this unlikely.® It is also true that "papist" is a religious, and not

ethnic slur. However, this is not the only reference to the conflict between

English and French in Canada. The necessity of calling in an English-

Canadian policeman from Montreal to investigate the disappearance of the

Atkins cousins is a tacit recognition of a tension between these English and the

surrounding French population.

Nicolas Jones’ narrative is very telling in its establishment of the

character of the English village of Griffin Greek. This is particularly true when

we begin to look at the emphasis on genealogy found in the novel. In presenting the foundation of Griffin Greek, Jones tells us;

Jetés sur la route, depuis la Nouvelle-Angleterre, hommes, femmes et enfants, fidèles à un roi fou, refusant l’indépendance américaine, ont reçu du gouvernement canadien concession de la terre et droit de chasse et de pêche. Les Jones, les Brown, les Atkins, les Macdonald. On peut lire leurs noms sur les pierres tombales du petit cimetière dominant la mer. (14)

To a certain extent, this short passage contains the entire fate of Griffin Greek, a

people marked by refusal, madness, and death. Madness, la folie, is as

important to this work by Anne Hébert as it is to Marguerite de Navarre’s Heptameron. In Marguerite’s work, it is fairly well-established that "folie"

indicates a separation from God. The same would seem to apply to Les Fous

de Bassan. where the Deity appears to have abandoned these self-styled elect.

More ambiguous are the Anglophones Piggy, and George Nelson. Piggy, the English war-bride of Sr. Julie’s brother Joseph in Les Enfants du

sabbat, on the one hand is the innocent victim of the wrath of the French-

Ganadian witch. On the other hand, she is a symbolic rival to the heroine of this

® The only family names given for people in neighboring areas to Griffin Creek are Allen and White. The detective McKenna, potentially of Irish extraction, is from Montreal. 107 novel. In the rites of the witch’s sabbath as depicted in this novel, a pig is ritually sacrificed in the place of the witch.® The name of Joseph’s new wife

indicates a like tie to this sacrificial animal. Her role as rival, as usurper, is

underlined by Julie as she renounces her effort to have a child by her brother; Le temps de ma conversion est terminé. Mon frère est marié. Que sa cochonnette d’Anglaise s’occupe de le protéger de la guerre, si elle en est capable! (135)

Note that here the war-bride’s association to the sacrificial animal is underlined

by referring to her as “cochonnette.” The rivalry is further underlined when Sr.

Julie implicitly compares her (late) sister-in-law to her mother:

Je réussirai là où pauvre Piggy a échoué. Prisonnière dans un couvent, j’enfanterai par magie. (...)Je triompherai là où Philomène a échoué. Je coucherai avec mon fils. (174)

References to Anglophones of ill-omen are also present in Kamouraska. Queen Victoria is mentioned in a negative light, both as the executioner of the

Patriotes (42) and as a jealous rival of Elisabeth Rolland (34). George Nelson,

Elisabeth’s American-born lover, is particularly marked as sinister due to his

foreign background. In one passage, this trait is allied negatively with his

Protestant origin (despite his childhood conversion to Catholicism) and suggests a threat to French- Canadian Elisabeth.

Celui qui dit “le" table au lieu de “la” table, se trahit. Celui que dit “la Bible” au lieu des “saints Evangiles”, se trahit. Celui qui dit “Elisabeth” , au lieu de “Mme. Tassy”, se compromet et compromet cette femme avec lui. (128)

Close attention to the Anglophone presence in Kamouraska and in Les Enfants

du sabbat, reveals that even well-intentioned Anglais, like Piggy and George,

' The connections between pig and witch are discussed in more detail later in this chapter. 108 herald no good. For this reason when one comes to Griffin Creek, an entire

village of Anglophones, one begins to suspect that something truly sinister Is In store.

This sentiment Is echoed by the oppressive portrayal of the English-

Imposed law used to nationalist effect by Anne Hébert In Kamouraska as Elisabeth Is confronted with the force of law. We read, “L’acte d'accusation est

écrit en anglais. Par les maîtres de ce pays (32)," and again later, "Elisabeth

d’AulnIères veuve Tassy, vous entendez? C’est en langue étrangère qu’on

vous accuse et qu’on vous charge (44)7’ In this way she establishes the law as

foreign/ alien. Queen Victoria as the Incarnation of the Law Is depicted as

distant. Inaccessible, and bloodstained.

With entend (sic) in so doing feloniously, wiifuHy and of her malice aforethought to poison kill and murder the said Antoine Tassy, against the peace of our said Lady the Queen, her crown and dignity. The Queen! Toujours the Queen! C’est à mourir de rire. Qu’est ce que cela peut bien lui faire à VIctorla-au-dela-des-mers qu’on commette l’adultère et le meurtre sur les quelques arpents de neige, cédés à l’Angleterre par la France? (...) ...Elisabeth d’AulnIères, veuve Tassy, souvenez- vous de Saint-Denis et de Saint Eustache! Que la reine pende tous les patriotes si tel est son bon plaisir. (44, author’s Italics)'°

Marguerite de Navarre also portrays the Law as a hostile, alien entity In

her “Le Triomphe de l’Agneau” where she describes the Law as holding sway from an Inaccessible mountain. This mountain, located “Pres des deserts ou gist la terre morte” Is described as “Hideux, pierreux et presque Inaccessible

(383-84).’’ There Law, with Its “rigoureuse face” maintains a throne surrounded by flames (384). This figure Is dressed In a “vestement de sang Saint-Denis and Saint-Eustache are the sites of two of the major battles of the Patriots Rebellions (1837-38).

109 tout coloré” upon the hem of which Is written a condemnation of those who fall to uphold the Law to the very letter. We can see an Interesting contrast In that

Marguerite’s Law, representing the strict religious conformity associated with the Old Testament, is separated by fire and desert, whereas the Canadiens In

Hébert’s work are distanced from their equally unforgiving secular monarch by snow and sea.

Hébert’s work cannot be described as overtly nationalist. The only blatantly political nationalist expressions In these novels are to be found In

Kamouraska. In addition to the above-mentioned references to Queen Victoria and the Patriotes, Elisabeth as narrator refers to the English as “les maîtres de ce pays (32)’’ and also to “la loi anglaise de ce pays conquis (195).” This work

Is also the most tempting to read as a sort of allegory for the Québécois nation."

One of the striking similarities is that Elisabeth Is portrayed as a woman trying to establish and reclaim her own history, a national obsession for Quebec since

Lord Durham’s Infamous Report. There are also Intriguing parallels between

Elisabeth’s men, and those who govern/would govern Québec. Antoine Tassy, with his taste for habitant, hence French, culture and customs Is analogous to the French royal government, and the régime seigneurial It established. This comparison Is enhanced by the fact that Antoine Is Indeed a hereditary seigneur, and like the French colonial government Is conquered/ killed by a foreigner. Jérôme Rolland represents the British/ Canadian government.

Unlike Antoine, he Is not noble but bourgeois, and In this sense represents what came to be the dominant class In Quebec. Although Jérôme Is Indeed French and Roman Catholic, his profession as notaire In the city of Quebec " There is nothing about Les Enfants du sabbat that would encourage such a reading, and critical opinion appears to agree that despite the surface similarities between Anglophone Griffin Creek in Francophone Quebec and Francophone Quebec in mostly Anglophone North America, Les Fous de Bassan should also not be read this way. For more on this, see Ronald Ewing’s “Griffin Creek: The English World of Anne Hébert." 110 indicates a certain collaboration with the British justice system. In this second

marriage Elisabeth comes to resemble more and more the dominating English culture to the point where she resembles the English queen. Like the marriage between French Canada and English Canada, the Rolland marriage is based more on convenience than love, and the tension between the parties is evident.

Elisabeth is forced to conform to an imposed image of a model wife, much like the assimilation of the French-Canadian nation into the English proposed by

Lord Durham in his report. Elisabeth’s short and violent affair with American- born George Nelson would then seem to resemble the Patriot’s Rebellion,

Lower Canada’s failed attempt to liberate itself and establish an American-style republic. That Hébert’s national allegory is more descriptive and less prescriptive than what we have seen in Marguerite’s work may have to do with the uncertainty about Quebec’s future with Canada. If this reading of Kamouraska as a national allegory is valid, it is certainly interesting that

Canada/ Jérôme Rolland is presented as sick and dying.

The instability present in the historical contexts of these two authors has a definite mark on their work. Daniel Russell, in his article “Some Ways of Structuring Character in the Heptameron.’’ explains:

Stable periods produce stable conceptions of the self, and these conceptions may appear to be universally valid models for self-structuring in the period that produced them, and sometimes, at least for a society’s more conservative members, even long after that society has changed quite radically. But the sixteenth century was a period of transition in many respects and did not, therefore, develop so firmly fixed a conception of the self as either the Middle Ages that preceded it or the classical period that followed. This situation, I believe, permitted the kind of social mobility one can see in the Renaissance, but it also had the effect of producing

111 characters in narrative fiction that emerge in surprisingly various and different ways. (204)

What he says of the sixteenth century can be held as equally valid for post-

Quiet Revolution Quebec. The absence of a stable model for self, or the

apparent instability of any model can lead to a crisis of identity. In coming to terms with their societies in transition, we see that Marguerite and Hébert will turn their attention to characters, particularly women, who are also transitional.

Russell notes this development in the Heptameron.

Changes can occur, for example, with a change of age, and it is no coincidence, I think, that Marguerite is particularly interested in women who are entre deux ages, for these are the women who are most often faced with change and confront it in different ways. (210-11, author's emphasis)

In speaking of Heptameron 30, the tale of the incestuous mother, observing that

Hircan characterizes the protagonist as “la jeune dame vefve.” Russel notes;

A palpable tension between nature and culture is invoked by the epithets “jeune” and “vefve,” positioned on either side of the noun like two persuasive companions tugging in opposite directions; “jeune" pulls her in the direction of nature while “vefve” asserts the claims of culture (211).

Hébert likewise seems to have an interest in women at a transitional stage. Her Elisabeth struggles with the competing claims of her identity as d’Aulnières, as Tassy and as Rolland. The novel has her perpetually at the threshhold of widowhood. As Elisabeth Rolland she is not quite wife, for her husband is now too sickly to oblige her to fulfill her conjugal duty, nor is she quite widow, for Jérôme Rolland is still alive. Likewise, Sr. Julie de la Trinité is introduced in the novel as a novice, not quite a nun. nor exactly a layperson.

This tension is not resolved until the end of the novel when she escapes the

112 convent. Nora and Olivia Atkins in Les Fous de Bassan are also entre deux

ages, a fact that Is highlighted by Stevens Brown in his letters to Michael

Hotchkiss. Describing the two Atkins cousins he writes. “Je n'arrive pas à

reconnaître ces créatures, mi-femme mi-enfant (cet âge intermédiaire pervers entre tous) (71)” and again describing Nora as he strangled her “Ni tout à fait femme ni tout à fait enfant d'ailleurs, te l'ai déjà dit. cet âge est pervers entre tous (245).” It is an ambiguous status that is even more extreme in the person of Stevens' brother Perceval, described as having a child's brain in a man's body (71). Olivia as she is raped and murdered is likewise described by

Stevens as ambiguous, no longer entre deux âges like her cousin two years her junior (Stevens says she became a woman that fateful summer of 1936 (239)) but rather entre deux états :

L'appeler salope. La démasquer, elle, la fille trop belle et trop sage. A tant faire l'ange on ... Lui faire avouer qu'elle est velue, sous sa culotte, comme une bête (248).

Both angel and beast, salope and fille sage, she is destroyed by Stevens before she can reproduce more of her perverted kind.

Through the exploration of family we see these authors more fully exploring and fleshing out their characters' ambiguities. Both of these women place great emphasis on family background and family ties in their works, yet they swiftly convolute these images, and play games with them. One generally expects that a clear description of a family background and a clear indication of the role one plays in the family serve to stabilize a character's identity. However, this is not the case in the worlds of Marguerite and Hébert.

Explorations of the family ties of the ambiguous characters they favor, particularly the female characters, serves rather to undermine any previously

113 held assumption about family ties and familial roles. We see that mother, sister, wife do not indicate anything necessarily true or concrete about a woman, but that rather they are all roles to be played, and are interchangeable. Consider for example, that it is popularly believed that the Heptameron’s Parlamente is a representation of Marguerite herself, and Oisilie represents her mother, Louise de Savoie. Parlamente addresses her as one who plays the role of mother to the devisants ("vous...qui maintenant à nous, femmes, tenez lieu de mere, (6)”).

Yet, of course, Oisilie is playing the role of Marguerite’s mother, or perhaps rather Oisilie is a role that Marguerite’s mother is playing. This is just one of several instances where we see the distinction between blood family and fictive family or family of adoption blurred. To demonstrate this using the above given example, a woman who “tient lieu de mère" is clearly not the consanguineous mother whose place she is taking. The distinction between “true” mother and substitute mother is completely undermined when the consanguineous mother is described as taking her own place. That "mother” is merely another role to be played, a name that one can wear or cast aside, is clearly demonstrated in

Heptameron 30, where the young widow “obliant le nom de mere (230-my emphasis)” has intercourse with her own son.

Family imagery is very important to the way Marguerite analyzes her relationship to God in the “Miroir de I’ame pecheresse”. Here she plays with her identity as simultaneously mother, sister, daughter and spouse of God. In one line she addresses the Deity as “O mon bon frere, enfant, pere et espoux

(29)," and again later “Vous appelant Pere (parlant à vous/sans crainte avoir)

Enfant, Frere et Espoux./ Vous escoutant, je m’oy Mere nommer,/Soeur, Fille,

Espouse (52).” In her plays that treat the Nativity, we see Mary who similarly explores her manifold relationship(s) to God. God is also addressed as “Roy” in

114 this same poem, forming an interesting link to Marguerite’s human family where

she is sister to a king, wife of a king, and possibly (as she doubtless hoped)

future mother to a king, although notably not a king's daughter. Marc Shell, in

his book Children of the Earth, presents an interesting analysis of the

translation into English of Marguerite’s “Miroir de I’ame pecheresse" by a nearly

contemporary princess, the future Elizabeth I of England, whose family history

was no less convoluted, and indeed far more so. He demonstrates that the

image of Elizabeth as wife and mother of the nation was an important

development in the evolution of English nationalism and her own ambiguous family background enhanced her ability to play this role (61). In France, where the Salic Law kept women from the throne. Marguerite cannot pretend to be wedded to the nation itself, but she can cast herself in the role of the nation as sister and spouse’^ to the king. This is indeed the image Freccero highlighted in Heptameron 42, in her analysis of the young prince courting Françoise, discussed earlier.

The role of family is also explored in Anne Hébert’s work, where one of her most interesting repeated images is the parthenogenetic family. In

Kamouraska we see the failed effort of the Lanouette sisters (Elisabeth’s mother and three maiden aunts) to perpetuate a female family. When Elisabeth returns to their home with her newborn son, having found it impossible to continue to live with the abusive Antoine Tassy, we read:

Le visage de ma mère se brouille. Son regard s’égare à nouveau. Va rejoindre très loin en elle- même un songe bizarre où toutes les femmes mariées, après avoir donné naissance à une petite fille, n’ont plus qu’à devenir veuves le plus rapidement possible.

It is frequently noted in discussions of her life that Marguerite filled the role of Francis’ queen better than did his wife, the unfortunately unattractive and often ill Claude de France. See for example Michel François's introduction to his edition of the Heotameron fivV 115 --Dommage que la Petite n’ait pas accouché d’une fille... Les trois petites Lanouette soupirent en écho. Regrettent aussi que la dynastie des femmes seules ne se perpétue pas éternellement, dans la maison de la rue Augusta. (98)

Parthenogenesis has greater success in Les Enfants du sabbat, with the successful self-replication of the mother superior and elder sisters in the convent. Hébert’s persistence in paralleling the life of Julie de la Trinité in the convent with her life on the mountain of B..., indicates clearly that the Dames du Précieux Sang are to be considered as much a family as the one headed by

Adélard and Philomène. The ecclesiatical titles of “mother” and “sister” are to be taken literally, a point that is underlined as Mother Marie-Clotilde addresses her charges as “daughter. ” The parthenogenesis becomes literal during Sr.

Julie’s nocturnal torment of the convent’s father-confessor as she engenders her mothers and foremothers, opening herself like a matrioshka. ( More commonly referred to in English as a “nesting doll” I prefer to use the Russian term “matrioshka” here because of its derivation from the Russian word for

“mother.”)'^ In close mimicry of Mary in Marguerite’s comédies surrounding

Christ’s nativity, and that of the speaker in her “Miroir”, Sr. Julie appears to have a fourfold relationship to her deity, Satan. She is both his daughter and his spouse. As Sr. Julie explains her heritage;

Je leur fais peur parce que j’ai les yeux jaunes, comme ma mère et comme ma grand-mère. Toute une lignée de femmes aux yeux vipérins, venues des vieux pays, débarquées, il y a trois cents ans, avec leurs pouvoirs et leurs sorts en guise de bagages, s’acouplant avec le diable, de génération en génération, du moins choisissant avec soin l’homme qui lui ressemble le plus, de barbe rousse ou noire, ______d’esprit maléfique et de corps lubrique, le " Interestingly, the matrioshka Is also referred to by Mary McKinley in her analysis of Heptameron 41, as she points out that “closed spaces are where narrative is bom” (“Telling Secrets,"157). 116 reconaissant, le moment venu, entre tous les hommes, à des lieues à la ronde. (92)

For Julie’s mother, this incarnation of Satan was the redhaired Adélard. For Sr.

Julie it is Dr. Jean Painchaud. In her role as a Dame du Précieux Sang, she is sister to the black-haired doctor. She is also, in a sense, his mother. During

her first nocturnal haunting of the convent’s doctor, Julie says, “Je suis ta night-

mère. ta sorcière de la nuit (73- emphasis mine).” What follows is a seduction/ rape much like the one Julie endured when her father initiated her into the cult of the witch. Under the influence of Sr. Julie Dr. Painchaud changes physically:

Son visage change aussi, à vue d’oeil. Ses joues rondes et roses (où jusqu’à présent quelques petits poils follets parvenaient à pousser) se noircissent de barbe forte, des six heures du soir. Il lui faut se raser deux fois par jour. Ses traits poupins et flous (malgré ses quarante ans) se burinent, peu à peu, se durcissent (133).

He is eventually to incarnate the devil as Sr. Julie’s mate’’*. To complete the picture. Sr. Julie also thinks of herself as mate to her own brother. “Je réussirai là où ma mère a échoué. Changer un enfant en homme. J’aime assez Joseph pour cela. Je serai sa femme (110-11).” Her Mary-like aspect is underlined by the fact that she gets pregnant without help from a human male, and also by a perversion of the Hail Mary pronounced by Dr. Painchaud, while thinking of Sr.

Julie: “Vous êtes bénie, entre toutes les femmes... Pleine de grâces, le démon est avec vous... (134).” The multiplicity of family roles played by these women serves to undermine any clear distinction between them. That the same woman can be both mother and wife, daughter and sister to the same man demonstrates vividly that these are not so much true identities as roles to play, social constructs. Their interchangeability would appear to be symptomatic of a

It would appear that this tranformation is complete after Julie gives birth, and Dr. Painchaud is referred to as her master (185). 117 society that can no longer enforce these titles as stable categories, for the society's own identity is in a state of change.

In the novels of Anne Hébert we can also see a phenomenon that one might call family replication. Beyond simple reproduction where a parent creates an offspring of the same species, Hébert has provided us with families where the members are literally replaced. In the case of Kamouraska. we see

Elisabeth is bound to an eternally replaced, and eternally dying husband. As she loses the one, another rises to take his place, and she is always a wife, always a widow, both and neither. At the opening of the novel, she is in a bedside deathwatch for her current husband. Yet Jérôme Rolland never truly worsens, the ceremony of Last Rites seems to have revived him enough to perpetuate his one-foot-in-the-grave condition rather than help him ease the other foot in. Meanwhile Elisabeth continues to see and seek her husband’s

(Antoine’s) death in dreams. Antoine Tassy is dead and dies over and over in

Elisabeth’s tortured subconscious. Jérôme is bound to his deathbed, and stubbornly refuses to die. On the fourth page of text, she says, “Bientôt je serai libre à nouveau. Redevenir veuve (10).’’ The novel ends without (re)attaining this liberty. Elisabeth is bound by a cycle of dead and dying husbands, never achieving the widowhood that would spell her freedom. The reflection- repetition of Antoine in Jérôme is underlined in a particularly effective fashion as the preparations for the administration of Last Rites to Jérôme Rolland are desoribed in the same passage where Elisabeth and George plot the death of Antoine Tassy (162-63). Elisabeth herself remarks on this phoenix-like quality of the man/ men in her life:

Mon mari meurt à nouveau. Doucement dans son lit. La première fois c’était dans la violence, le sang et la neige. Non pas deux maris se remplaçant l’un l’autre, se suivant l’un l’autre, sur les registres de 118 mariage, mais un seul homme renaissant sans cesse de ses cendres. Un long serpent unique se reformant sans fin, dans ses anneaux. L’homme éternel unique qui me prend et m’abandonne à mesure. Sa première face cruelle. J’avais seize ans et je voulais être heureuse. Voyou! Sale voyou! Antoine Tassy seigneur de Kamouraska. Puis vient l’éclat sombre de l’amour. Œil, barbe, cils, sourcils, noirs. L’amour noir. Docteur Nelson, je suis malade et ne vous verrai plus. Quel joli triptyque! La troisième face est si douce et fade, Jerôme. (31 )

Three different men, yet somehow all the same. Two different husbands, yet the

one is seen merely as the re-incarnation of the other. My husband is dying, my husband is dead, my husband must die.

In a different way. Sr. Julie also incarnates a perpetually repeating story, graphically depicted in the above-mentioned scene where she opens herself to

reveal her mother, grandmother, foremothers whose quest to produce the great

sorcerer (through incest with her own son) never reaches completion, yet whose coming is always prepared by the same two individuals, the witch and

her diabolic husband- perpetually summoned by her. That this story of the eternal witch is told against the ecclesiastical background of the convent is no accident. The cyclical nature of the Church year is a vital component to this portrayal of repetitive stillness. The cycle of the convent moves when novices replace the dying elderly sisters.

Le blanc empesé des cornettes et des guimpes, l’étoffe noire, mate, des robes, les mains pâles et les visages défaits. Tout cela posé pour l’éternité. Une religieuse vivante remplaçant aussitôt la sœur morte qu’on vient d’enterrer, sans que l’adversaire s’en aperçoive, semble-t-il. Tant la resemblance est parfaite entre les sœurs en conseil (55).

119 Likewise, the cycle of the witch moves when the new witch rises to take the

place of the old. As Philomène says to her daughter, Julie, “Tu es ma fille, et tu

me continues (69).’’

The repetition of Philomène, dite la Goglue, in her daughter is a highly developped one. At one point we see Julie refer to herself as “l’égale de ma

mère et l’épouse de mon père (67). ” This reproduction-repetition occurs on

two levels. One is a more or less physical one, a repetition of the witch-mother in her witch-daughter that is particularly highlighted during one of the nocturnal

torments of Léo Z. Flagéole, the aumônier of Sr. Julie’s convent.

-Veux-tu voir mes dessous de famille, le père? Elle relève ses jupes, passe sa robe par-dessus sa tête, arrache d’un geste brusque sa guimpe et sa cornette, défroque d’un coup. Elle apparaît un instant en jupon et cache-corset de sœur du Précieux-Sang, se dénude complètement, le temps d’un éclair. Tandis qu’une robuste femme, éclatante dans sa robe rose et ses cheveux jaunes, surgit à la place de sœur Julie subitement disparue. (...) La voix de sœur Julie persiste pourtant, entonne la longue nomenclature de son étrange généalogie. -Julie de la Trinité engendrée par Philomène Labrosse, dite la Goglue, d’une part... La femme en rose sourit, retrousse aussitôt sa robe courte, la glisse par-dessus sa tête. (...) Voici que surgit une autre femme, plus petite, en jupe longue et col baleiné, tout comme elle se fût trouvée à l’intérieur de la femme en rose, la femme en rose étant vide et creuse, en abat-jour, faite exprès pour contenir une autre femme plus petite, plus ancienne dans le temps, qui, elle aussi, accouche d’une autre femme. Des femmes gigognes. Des poupées russes s’emboîtant les unes dans les autres. (103)

In this scene, Julie is depicted as giving birth to her very foremothers (note the use of the verb accoucher in the text). They are also united by the sacrificial role of the witch at the sabbat. During the ceremony, a pig is slaughtered on

120 Philomène’s back. She offers the blood of the pig to those In attendance as

well as the meat. Sr. Julie’s flashback upon this scene coincides with the

consecration at Mass, and so we read Interspersed in this scene “HIc est enim callx sanguinis mel,” and “Hoc est enIm corpus meum (43).” The link between

the pig's meat and Philomène’s own flesh Is reinforced by the fact that the pig

was bought with money Philomène earned working In a whorehouse (44). Her

own body was literally offered In exchange for this pig. “Ma petite cochonne,” Is

one of the terms of endearment that Philomène uses to refer to her daughter, as If foreshadowing her role In future sabbats.

In Les Fous de bassan we see a similar phenomenon of family

replication In Nicolas Jones’ gallery of ancestors. The Reverend Jones carries out his own version of Sr. Julie’s accouchement of her mother and foremothers.

Having failed to perpetuate himself by having a son, he sets out to reproduce

his ancestors In his own Image. “J’engendre mon père à mon Image et à ma

ressemblance qui, lui, engendre mon grand-père à son Image et à sa

ressemblance et ainsi de suite...(15)” He thus makes progeny of his progenitors, creating them In his likeness all the way back to “Henry Jones, né à Montpelier, Vermont (15).’”®

Family replication as found In the work of Anne Hébert appears to echo a

pattern detected by Robert Cottrell In Marguerite de Navarre’s poetry. In

describing Marguerite’s poem Le Triomphe de l’agneau, he writes;

Like a pendulum designed to Illustrate perpetual motion. Le Triomphe Is an artifact constructed so as to generate a motion that leads ever back to Its beginning, defining a movement that Is circumscribed within Its own parameters and Is, therefore. In a sense, ever still. fGrammar. 180)

Is it a subtle irony that the ancestors of English Griffin Creek come from both a city and a state with obviously French names? 121 Like the Lamb who has triumphed, is triumphing, and will triumph, whose moment of triumph is held forever fixed and forever repeated, in Hébert’s

Kamouraska. we see Elisabeth perpetually bound to a husband/ husbands also

perpetually condemned to die, the eternally repeated cycle of the witch in Les Enfants du sabbat, and time rocking back and forth over the night of August 31,

1936 in Les Fous de Bassan.It is an image of movement captured in what is

usually thought of as a still medium that we have already seen in the works of

Michel de Montaigne and Jacques Godbout and will see again in the works of

Louise Labé and Nicole Brossard. In addition to the exploration of family and family roles, another striking technique shared by Marguerite and Hébert in their exploration of the identity in crisis is that of the trial. The trial as a judicial proceeding to determine guilt or innocence is of central importance to Anne Hébert's Kamouraska. Elisabeth’s trial for complicity in the murder of her first husband is for her the moment at which time stands still. It is the focal point around which all else revolves; her girlhood and marriage are reinterpreted by her as leading up to this one moment, and her second marriage is its logical consequence. Elisabeth Rolland lives in paranoid fear of the judging gaze of the rest of the world, and is spiritually exhausted by the maintenance of the innocence forced upon her as a result of this same trial.

The formal judicial trial is also present in the work of Marguerite de Navarre, if on a smaller scale, it occurs in the opening tale of the murderous

Sainct-Aignan and his wife, and is alluded to in the thirty-third tale in which a young woman’s supposedly miraculous pregnancy is revealed to be the result of union between herself and her brother the parish priest. One critic has

August 31,1936, is the night of the murder of the Atkins cousins. 122 presented the entire project of the Heptameron. as a sort of trial with the devisants sitting in judgment. Eliane Kotler writes:

Au fil des différentes narrations, sans que leurs convictions s’érigent en un système organisé, les devisants portent, en effet, des jugements sur les personnages qu’ils mettent en scène, distinguant les fous des sages, les bons des méchants et s’apitoyant souvent sur les «pauvres femmes» ou les «malheureux hommes» (“L’Implicit narratif,” 491).”

In effect, the devisants pass judgment on the identity of these individuals, deciding whether the face they show to the world is a true self or a mere mask.

In Marguerite’s religious poetry one of the images of Christ related to the theme of the trial is that of Advocate for sinful humankind vs. (one may presume) Satan as Adversary.’^ As an example, in the “Miroir de I’ame pecheresse” we read, “O

JESUS CHRIST, des ames vray pescheur,/.../ Mon advocat icy vous estes mis;/

Parlant pour moy, me daignant excuser,/ Ou me povez justement accuser (60).”

A more frequently seen trial image in the work of Marguerite is that which may be considered its spiritual/ religious variant, the confession. An important difference between a trial and a confession is in the role of the “accused.” In confession, one is called to testify about one’s own deeds. The penitent accuses him- or herself. In the case of a judicial procedure the opposite is true, testimony regarding the accused’s misdeeds comes from the outside. The differing roles of accusing witness and confessing penitent serve as valuable tools in the treatment of identity for Marguerite and Hébert. However, before exploring these images, it would be helpful to examine the question of testimony itself.

The question of authentic testimony comes early in the Heptameron.

Indeed we find it in the very description of the project they undertake to pass

This image of Christ is biblical, see 1 John 2:1. 123 their time, that is “de n'escripre nulle nouvelle qui ne soit veritable histoire (9).”

In order to ensure that nothing recorded in the stories to be presented to the

royal court is false or overly embellished, the devisants agree that “dira chascun

quelque histoire qu’il aura veue ou bien oy dire à quelque homme digne de foy (10).” Her poetry betrays a similar concern. Additional evidence of the

importance of expert witness, and testimonial support in Marguerite’s work can be seen in the marginal notes printed in her collection of poetry. If the reader is

in doubt about any of the claims made by Marguerite, she summons the Bible,

the ultimate witness to the truth, on her behalf. The saints and prophets stand as guarantors of the Truth written by Marguerite.

Marguerite presents for us many kinds of testimony, verbal and non­

verbal. The nouvelles of the Heptameron are, in and of themselves, verbal testimonies, and likewise the frequent acts of confession in her works, either in the form of characters from the nouvelles participating in sacramental confession, or confession as found in her religious poetry, particularly the

“Miroir de I’ame pecheresse.” More interesting are the many diverse forms of non-verbal testimony she provides, particularly in the Heptameron. For example, in the second nouvelle, the story of the inspirational molletière, we see (presumably as the woman is receiving Last Rites) that she “respondit par signes si evidens que la parol le n’eut sceu mieulx monstrer son intention (20).”

In the fourth nouvelle, after the nighttime assault by her misguided serviteur, the indignant heroine states, “Asseurez-vous que ce ne peult estre nul aultre que le seigneur de céans et que le matin je feray en sorte vers mon frere, que sa teste sera temoinq de ma chasteté (31-my emphasis)." The presumably decapitated, and therefore speechless, head is nevertheless quite capable of testifying. In a demonstration of the interchangability of linguistic and non-linguistic forms of

124 communication and testimony, we see in the prologue that the tales of the

Heptameron (linguistic) are the equivalent of sacred images (non-linguistic).

(“Et si Dieu faict que notre labeur soit trouvé digne des oeilz des seigneurs et

dames dessus nomméz, nous leur en ferons present au retour de ce voyage au

lieu d'ymaiges et de patenostres (10).”) Here we see two different, yet allied, testimonies of faith. The “ymaiges" (non-verbal) are paralled with “patenostres."

These last can be seen as either verbal, non-verbal, or both as the term could

indicate prayers (the Our Father), the beads of a rosary (those at which one

recites this prayer), or the two simultaneously. The two (“ymaiges” and

“patenostres”) are seen as the equivalent of Marguerite’s planned Decameron,

ten sets of ten tales, and therefore organized much like a rosary itself.’® In the fifth nouvelle, about the bastelliere and the two monks. Marguerite provides a

biblical citation of the value and presence of non-verbal/ non-linguistic testimony. “Et puis une autre voix cryoit: «Par leurs fruictz, cognoissez vous quelz arbres sont.» (36).”

In Hébert’s work, non-verbal testimony of this kind is not as developed.

The striking examples are garments that serve as testimony. In Les Enfants du sabbat we have the habit of the Dames du Précieux Sang. Indeed, this garment speaks more in Sr. Julie’s abandonment of it at the end of the novel than it did while she wore it. In Les Fous de Bassan. we have a particulary eloquent silent witness in the form of Stevens’s hat. In one of his letters,

Stevens goes into great detail as to how this hat is sign and uniform of his manhood. This hat becomes so linked to Stevens’s image, that his brother

Perceval cannot recognize him without it (150). It is particularly telling that he loses this sign of his manhood the night of the murder of the Atkins cousins.

'Tom Conley in T h e Graphics of Dissimulation” also makes note of the equivalency between the tales and the paternoster beads (69). 125 when he behaves less like a man, and more like an animal. It is no less significant that these very murders, and indirectly the loss of this hat, were provoked by Nora Atkins screaming in rage that Stevens is not a man.

Nora's enraged outburst can be interpreted as the overt verbalization of a truth that has remained latent in her every action. Her assault on Stevens’s manhood, triggered by his refusal to treat her as an equal,’® is a sign of her rejection of the repression of women in Griffin Greek. That this verbalization results in Nora's death is just one example of the destructive power of speech found in the work of Hébert and Marguerite, who in her Heptameron provides two parallel examples. In Heptameron 43, the tale of Jambicque, the relationship between Jambicque and her love interest exists only so long as he never tries to find out her identity. He may do with her as he pleases, so long as her identity is unknown, adding an unreal quality to their affair. While

Jambicque is derided as hypocrisy personified, her tactic appears similar to that of a young woman who is considered virtuous, the dame du Vergier. In both cases, the relationship is dependent upon its non-verbalization. In an ironic paradox. Mile du Vergier's lover can only prove he loves her by not speaking of it. The moment he makes his feeling public/verbal, it is proof that the love does not exist. Verbalization of these relationships, and in a sense the confirmation of them, simultaneously destroys them. This is all the more true in the tale of the dame du Vergier in that it results in the death of the participants.

Witnessing to the truth can be a very complicated affair. As seen in the above examples, all that is true is not necessarily narratable and some things true should not be narrated. To illustrate this, we can look at two other tales of the Heptameron. the fourth tale and the sixty-second. There is a certain

This Interpretation of Stevens’s rejection of Nora’s sexual advances is suggested by Peter Noble’s analysis of this novel and of the character of Nora Atkins (50). 126 superficial resemblance between the events of the two tales. The former is of an attempted rape/ seduction and the latter of a successful one. In both cases, the perpetrator was a man known to the woman upon whom he forced himself.

Where they differ is in the choice to verbalize the event. While the devisants have been extolling the value of truth, there is a particular danger for the female storytellers in the group, underlined by François Corn il liât and Ullrich Langer in their analysis of Heptameron 62. “The very fact that she is a lady narrating an unrepeatable true tale is a trap (125).” Whereas it is clear in both tales that the woman was not precisely a consenting partner in either event, it is the choice to narrate or not to narrate that makes the anti-heroine of 62 folle and the heroine of 4 saige. The folle of Heptameron 62 is seen by the devisants as giving retroactive consent to the act by recounting it. By refusing to narrate her ordeal, the princess of the fourth tale in fact denies its reality. Ironically, her honor depends upon her refusing to admit that it has been tested. A shameful truth, it would seem, can be effectively erased by refusing to give voice to it. The event, this personal history, can be refused, cast off like old clothing, by refusing to narrate. As the young lady of the sixty-second tale learns to her chagrin, voicing this truth is to take possession of it, and then responsability for it. For the female storytellers of the Heptameron. repetition of nouvelle sixty-two not only exposes the hapless victim-participant of the originally narrated event, they are similarly exposed as taking pleasure in something of which they should disapprove. They re-create the original dishonor. For the devisante of the fourth tale, the problem is even more precarious. Since the outraged princess decided not to tell the tale, how is it that the narrator is able to? This trap is also pointed out by Cornilliat and Langer (139). If indeed the heroine of tale four is

Marguerite (as is often supposed* ), does she not commit the same fault as the “ See, for example, note125 in Michel François e edition of the Heptameron. 127 young lady of sixty-two by Including this tale in her Heptameron no matter how edifying it may be?

The danger inherent in voicing the truth can also be seen in Hebert's work. As a particular example we can consider the negative value given to voicing the truth and asking for it in Les Enfants du sabbat. Speech in the convent of the Dames du Précieux Sang is marked with a certain sinister aspect. When Sr. Gemma is assigned to work in the kitchen as a punishment, an offhand remark previously made by this sister is repeated and commented on by the narrator.^

—Moi, la cuisine, c'est ce que j’aime le moins au monde! Quelle déclaration imprudente ma sœur! Un jour, comme ça, en recréation, dans un éclat de rire. Vous n'aviez qu'à tenir votre langue. Ceci n'est pas tombé dans l’oreille d'une sourde. Ici, rien n'échappe. Les murs de ce couvent ont une mémoire d'éléphant. Tout peut se retourner contre vous, en temps voulu pour l'épreuve. (46)

Later this same unfortunate nun falls victim once again to imprudent speech, this time not revealing a truth, but asking that one be revealed to her. “Mon

Dieu, faites que je n'aie plus la tasse ébréchée, ou je croirai que c'est un signe de rejet de votre part (49).” As can be predicted, the fatal cup is indeed set at Sr. Gemma's place at the table. The narrator reproaches her foolish prayer;

“Vous avez eu tort aussi de provoquer Dieu. Le silence de Dieu est parfois préférable à sa parole. Entendez donc cette parole dure (49).” Lastly, during the narration of this same meal, referring to the silence that reigns in the refectory, we read, “Espérer atteindre, un jour, la non-parole absolue, tendre à cette perfection (50).” The mother superior, enforcer of all this silence, appears to understand fully the truism that some things are better left unsaid. Some

Presumably Sr. Julie, although this is not always, or necessarily the case. 128 truths are better left unknown, unrevealed. And yet, In the examples given by both Marguerite and Hébert, narration of the truth is the only way to take possession of it. The princess of the fourth tale can only receive the credit due her, and serve as a model, if her unnarratable tale is narrated. We will see this again in the case of Rolandine, and in the case of Elisabeth, whose liberation from the mask is dependent upon the narration of her role in the murder of Antoine Tassy.

In another example of the power of speech to control reality, we can consider Heptameron 30, the tale of the incestuous mother. Her children, already related as brother/father and sister/daughter are allowed to live innocent of all guilt as husband and wife. The sin of their incest is erased by the mother’s silence. The widow's penance is precisely that which keeps her offspring free from sin. She is obliged by her priest confessor to keep forever the secret of the consanguineous relationship between the young couple. This would appear to contradict what was written by Françoise Charpentier in “La

Guerison par la parole,” where we read, “De façon générale, on peut dire que dans les histoires de l’Heptaméron. le silence tue (645).” It is true that speech heals in the thirty-second tale, the story of the German nobleman who kept his wife in a silent confined semi-death, which serves as the focal point of

Charpentier’s article. However, the other examples cited above would seem to demonstrate that the power of speech is not unambiguously positive.

Having discussed the nature of truthful testimony itself, both non-verbal testimony as well as acts of speech, we should now turn to the role played by the speaker of these truths. John Lyons, in his work Exemplum. analyzing the role played by the witness not only in the Heptameron. but in any judicial procedure notes;

129 In fact the witness has an excentric place In all rhetoric. A position on the side of argument is what guarantees the truth of what the witness says, The witness is not himself in question, not the accused party, in a trial. (82, author's emphasis) and he highlights:

...the power of the joining of two presences in the witness: presence at the time of the event or crime and presence at the time of the judgment. The witness is thus temporally dual, but represents the possibility or the illusion of a transcendance of this duality of event and judgment, of past and present. (82)

While written to describe the proceedings in the Heptameron. we can see that this description also fits that of the accusing witnesses in the work of Anne

Hébert.

As alluded to by Lyons, perhaps the primary attribute of a witness is her/ his credibility. In the Heptameron. having eliminated “ceulx qui avoient estudié et estoient gens de lettres (9),” Marguerite’s devisants appear to have a clear idea about who is “digne de foy" and who is not when it comes to recounting a true tale. As if in demonstration of these criteria, the question of witness and testimony is of utmost importance in the first nouvelle. A tale of the evil wrought by a woman upon her lover and her husband, the story in fact hinges upon who is credible and who is not, and upon which testimony is received and which is not. The wicked wife of the tale, who remains nameless, tricks her (ex-)lover by accusing him of telling bad stories about herself and the bishop.

...(C)este malheureuse manda audict du Mesnil qu'il estoit le plus meschant homme du monde et qu’elle avoit bien sceu que publicquement il avoit diet mal d’elle et de l’evesque de Sées, dont elle mectroit peyne de le faire repentir. (13)

130 In short, in this one act, she not only brings a true accusation/testimony against

herself, but she puts this accusation into the mouth of the young du Mesnil,

which is false. Du Mesnil has done nothing of the kind. This woman alludes to

her own sin, but can only do so by putting it into the mouth of another. Both

parties, du Mesnil and the wife, know that this second detail is a complete fabrication. Du Mesnil responds to this accusation with

“ Madame, je viens icy pour vous jurer devant Dieu que je ne parlay jamais de vostre honneur à personne du monde que à vous mesme; vous m’avez faict ung si meschant tour, que je vous ay pas diet la moictyé des injures que vous mentez. Et s'il y a homme ou femme qui veuille dire que j’en aye parlé, je suis icy venu pour l’en dementir devant vous (13).»

After the murder of this young unfortunate, testimony remains a concern for his

murderers. They note that the servants of the deceased will not be believed

(“les serviteurs du mort ne debvoient poinct estre creuz en tesmoignage (15).” Similarly, one of the young maidservants of Sainct-Aignan and his wife, is

brought to Paris “au lieu publicq ” in order to discredit her. Servants, the opening tale points out, are not credible witnesses, and this appears to be due almost entirely to their social class. This is made explicit

in the conclusion to the twentieth tale about the woman caught in flagrante delicto with her stableman.

Ainsi se font louer par les honnestes hommes, celles qui à leurs semblables se montrent telles qu’elles sont, et choisissent ceulx qui ne sçauroient avoir hardiesse de parler; et s’ilz en parlent, pour leur vile et orde condition, ne serovent pas creuz. (155, my emphasis)

131 The social class of witnesses Is of equal Importance In the work of Anne Hébert. In Kamouraska. Elisabeth makes a point of distinguishing Important witnesses from unimportant ones.

Je n'accepte pas d’être confrontée avec ces gens- là: domestiques, aubergistes, bateliers, paysans. Témoins sans Importance. (57)

Her dismissal of lower- and working-class testimony seems to echo the similar disregard for the servant class and peasantry we have seen In the Heptameron.

This Is particularly evident In the trial of Elisabeth d’AulnIères as her aunts set out to destroy the credibility of Aurélle Caron, Elizabeth's maidservant. Aurélle Is denounced as a liar and a drinker, a woman of evil reputation by Elisabeth's aunts and Elisabeth herself.

Quant à la dénommée Aurélle Caron, elle n’a pas très bonne réputation, et la faute la plus grave que l'on puisse reprocher à Elisabeth d'AulnIères, veuve Tassy, c'est d'avoir gardé à son service cette fille dévergondée, menteuse, sans scrupule... adonnée à l'Ivrognerie... Infâme, traînée... (45)”

So reads the deposition of Elisabeth’s aunt, Adelaide Lanouette. While It Is admittedly true that the reputation of Aurélle Caron was less than pristine, this fact was known by Elisabeth before she met her future servant, and Aurélle was hired by Elisabeth In spite of (and Indeed perhaps because of) this same reputation. These faults were not seen as a reason to avoid hiring the woman, but they are a sufficient base from which to attack her testimony.

Social class, however. Is not a guarantee of the truth. Longarlne, In preparing her audience to hear the twenty-fifth tale, shares the following nugget about social class and the truth.

Et vous direz que la chose dont on dolbt moins user sans extreme nécessité, c'est le mensonge ou dissimulation: qui est ung vice laid et Infâme, 132 principallement aux princes et grans seigneurs, en la bouche et contenance desquelz la vérité est mieulx seante que en nul autre. Mais... (202)

After this “mais” there follows a lengthy description of how princes are as subject to the tyranny of love as anyone, and that when in such straits, it is not only permitted to princes to lie, it may even be required (203). The perhaps unintentional result is to call into question the credibility of any of the nobles, indeed even of the devisants, in matters of love. Equally interesting is that the commentary after Longarine’s tale addresses the questions of scandal, sin and repentance, but no effort is made to re-establish the credibility of princes. The dishonesty of the prince in Heptameron 25, his lies, go uncriticized. Indeed, to the contrary we read the comment from Oisille (significantly the oldest and most pious of the company), “...(J)e vouldrois que tous les jeunes seigneurs y prinssent exemple, car le scandalle est souvent pire que le péché (207).” In a further undermining of the credibility of our storytellers, we have the following exchange after the fifty-second nouvelle.

Mais, dist Simontault, combien de foys ont-elles mis leur touret de nez pour rire en liberté autant qu’elles s’estoient courroucées en fainctes? -Encore valloit-il mieulx faire ainsy, dist Parlemente que de donner à congnoistre que l’on trouvast le propos plaisant. - Vous louez doncques, dist Dagoucin, l’ypocrisie des dames autant que la vertu? -La vertu seroit bien meilleure, dist Longarine; mais où elle default, se fault ayder de l’ypocrisie, comme nous faisons de pantoufles pour faire oblier nostre petitesse. Encores est-ce beaucoup, que nous puissions couvrir noz imperfections (335).

In Kamouraska. we have the supreme irony in that the upper-class witnesses, and therefore the more “digne de foy,” lie in order to avoid scandal. It is the

133 lower-class witnesses, and especially Aurélle Caron, who speak potentially damaging truths.

It makes a great deal of difference, of course, whether one Is oneself witnessed, or If one Is the witness. For example, consider the outcome of the twentieth tale, as told by Saffredent:

La pauvre femme ne luy felt autre response, sinon de mectre sa main devant son visalge; car, puisqu’elle ne povolt couvrir sa honte, couvrit-elle ses oellz, pour ne voir celluv qui la voyait trop clairement. nonobstant sa dissimulation. (154-my emphasis)

The gaze of the witness is to be feared, and for this reason the assumption of the role of witness can be a defensive measure. For an example of this we can look at the twenty-first nouvelle, the tale of Rolandine. Accused of dishonorable conduct by her mistress the queen, Rolandine Immediately decides that the best defense Is a good offense, saying:

Madame, si vous ne congnolssez vostre cueur tel qu’ll est, je vous mectrols au devant la mauvaise volunté que de longtemps vous avez portée à Monsieur mon père et à moy; mais vous le sçavez si bien que vous ne trouverez poinct estrange si tout le monde s’en doubte; et quant est de moy. Madame, je m’en suis bien apparceue à mon plus grand dommalge. (167)

Whereas the queen sought to make her confess her own sins, Rolandine turns the tables, taking the active role and testifying to the uncharitable actions of her mistress. By taking the role of witness of another’s actions, Rolandine puts the queen on trial In her place. Rolandine justifies her aggressive posture, saying,

“...mays puys que je n ay advocat qui parle pour moy, sinon la vérité, laquelle moy seulle je sçay, je suis tenue de la declairer sans craincte (169).’’ This appears to be the same tactic used by the supporters of Elisabeth d’AulnIères in

Kamouraska. As noted above, Adelaide Lanouette does not so much address 134 the accusations made by Aurélle as turn the tables, becoming herself an accusing witness. This also reveals, unsurprisingly, an essentially antagonistic relationship between witness and the accused in these works.

We have already seen that the upper-class characters of Marguerite and

Hébert tend to dismiss the lower classes as witnesses. However Aurélie Caron,

Elisabeth’s own servant, is different. The passage cited above wherein

Elisabeth discounted the importance of working-class witnesses continues,

“Contre moi, personne ne fait le poids. Quant à Aurélie Caron...(57)." It is clear that Aurélie is no ordinary witness. Elisabeth as narrator says of her “C’est elle, je l’ai appelée, convoquée par ma peur même (57).’’ There is something unusual about this girl, something supernatural even. In one particularly striking description, “On ne l’entend jamais venir. Tout à coup elle est là.

Comme si elle traversait les murs. Légère et transparente (133).’’ We are given a foreshadowing glimpse of this quality early in the novel. Elisabeth Rolland is experiencing a certain amount of paranoia about her servant Florida, who has suddenly assumed responsibility for the needs of the dying Jérôme, and thereby, in a sense, usurping Elisabeth’s accustomed role as devoted wife. Elisabeth says:

Florida est le diable. J’ai pris le diable à mon service. C’est la seconde fois, madame Rolland. C’est la seconde fille d’enfer que vous engagez chez vous. La première s’appelait Aurélie Caron. Aurélie Caron, madame s’en souvient-elle? (33)

Elisabeth gets to the point as she revisits/ re-enacts her first meeting with

Aurélie Caron. “Aurélie, on dit que tu es une sorcière (63)?”

135 The witch^ in the works of Anne Hébert is a highly developed subclass of

the accusing witness. Maroussia Hajdukowski-Ahmed points out that the witch

(and her allies: fairies, madwomen, and Eve) has figured prominently in women's writing in Quebec for an extended period of time (“La Sorcière,” 260).

The witch plays a role analogous to that of Satan, whose original role (before

his transformation into the author of all Evil) was that of humankind’s Adversary,

the Accuser before God. As Satan's servant, it is then natural for the witch to

also slip into this role as accusing witness. Witchcraft is not an important theme

in Marguerite's œuvre, but it is not entirely absent. In the first nouvelle, Sainct- Aignan visits an invocateur to gain favor with the king and to do away with his

enemies. One of those slated to die is his troublesome wife. To an extent, the witchcraft serves to underline the husband's accusation of the wife as “cause de

tout son mal (17).” In Hébert's work, the most clearly established witch is, of

course, Julie de la Trinité of Les Enfants du sabbat. Anne Hébert's 1975 novel

about the (re)awakening of the witch was researched in several documents

about the history of witchcraft, including Jules Michelet's well-known treatise La

Sorcière.” Her “corruption” of the convent, as noted by Mary Jean Green, rests

primarily on her ability to make overt the impure tendencies latent in those

around her (“Witch,” 141). In a particularly striking example, we see her

exploiting the taste for luxury of the chief exorcist for the diocese of Quebec. As

the narrator exposes the cleric's thoughts to us we read, “Le plus grand

malheur de cette guerre n'est-il pas de priver le haut clergé des merveilleux

tissus italiens et de la coupe élégante des tailleurs romains (170)7' Sr. Julie,

like any temptress worthy of her salt, is aware of this priest's spiritual weakness. ^ h e terms “witchcraft” and “witch” are used here and throughout this study to refer to those anti- Christian practices and their practitioners as understood in and elaborated by medieval legend. There is no intended reference to modern wicca.

“ As noted by the author in a bibliography at the end of the novel. 136 and is able to pervert or subvert his effort at exorcising her; “...le grand exorciste paraissait attendre je ne sais quelle faveur que sœur Julie lui aurait promise en secret au cours de la cérémonie (173).” We are aware as we read this that despite the prescriptions of the ceremony, the exorcist avoided actually touching Sr. Julie whenever possible, merely passing his hand just close enough to give the appearance of having fulfilled the ritual to those in attendance (171-172). That night he receives his promise, as Sr. Julie spends the night dressing him in the finest clerical regalia, including a bishop's miter and the crimson garb of a cardinal (173).

Sr. Julie’s role as a witness is signalled early in the novel as. against her will, she is psychically transported to the bedside of a dying woman.

Admise au chevet de la mourante, tel un témoin indispensable, sœur Julie s’empresse aussitôt d’annoncer la nouvelle. (...)-ll faut prier, sœur Gemma, tout de suite, bien fort. Mme. Talbot est en train de mourir... (17, my emphasis)

In her role as witness to evil, her presence at this bedside may well be indispensible, for there are hints that there is something wrong in this household. Before Sr. Julie’s psychic visitation of the woman. Sr. Gemma had suggested that Me. Talbot’s treatment of his wife was less than admirable

(“...Me. Talbot ne s’est jamais très bien conduit avec sa femme (16).”) One may even have reason to believe that Mme. Talbot’s sickness and/ or death are not necessarily from natural causes. In her visit, Sr. Julie is “mise en présence de la chose intolérable qui se passe au premier étage de la maison (17).” Is this chose intolérable the mere fact of the woman’s death, or how she came to be dying? These suspicions of foul play are bolstered by the fact that Sr. Julie does not appear to have any particular fear of death, which would suggest that the death itself is not intolérable. 137 Stevens Brown of Les Fous de Bassan. although hardly a speilcaster, appears to have something of the witch about him with the unnatural hold he has on the Atkins cousins. It is in his relationship to the storm that Stevens most resembles Sr. Julie, who demonstrates the witch’s traditional ability to summon inclement weather (Les Enfants. 158-59). During the storm that rages shortly t)efore the murder of the Atkins cousins, he becomes drunk and nearly incoherent with the storm’s energy. Of the storm Stevens writes:

Je garde le souvenir confus d’une sorte d’ivresse s’emparant de moi, peu à peu, à force de contempler la mer démontée, me réduisant au rôle d’un fétu de paille emporté par la fièvre, tandis qu’une espèce de chant se formait dans mes veines en guise d’accompagnement à la fureur des éléments. (102)

On the night of the murder, there occurs another storm even more intimately associated with Stevens. While the rest of the world attested to the remarkable stillness of that particular night, Stevens will insist that a storm raged while he strangled Nora (244), which then kicked up again to cover his screams and those of Olivia as he raped and murdered her (246). As Peter Noble points out, this second, private storm becomes Stevens’ accomplice in Olivia’s rape, covering her cries and lifting up her skirts (43). He too, in his letters to Mic, witnesses to the penchant for sin that lurks in the hearts of his relatives and (former) fellow townsfolk. Stevens revels in his role as the observer of imperfection, and he seeks to draw it out of those around him, particularly the women. Hearing of Olivia’s physical defect, the webbed toes on her right foot, Stevens writes:

J’aurais dû la faire déchausser, lui examiner le pied, comme on fait pour un cheval. A qui se fier si la Beauté elle-même cache un défaut dans sa chaussure? Cette fille n’est qu’une hypocrite. Ni plus belle ni plus sage que les autres. Une sainte

138 nitouche. Les démasquer toutes. Leur faire sortir l’unique vérité de leur petit derrière prétentieux. Débarrassées des oripeaux, réduites au seul désir, humides et chaudes, les aligner devant soi, en un seul troupeau bêlant. (82)

Nicolas Jones, in his narrative that opens Les Fous de bassan. seems to concur that Stevens is more of a witness to, or perhaps evidence for, the evil that lurks/ lurked within Griffin Creek. In describing him he writes:

Non, ce n'est pas Stevens qui a manqué le premier, quoiqu'il soit le pire de nous tous, le dépositaire de toute la malfaisance secrète de Griffin Creek. amassée au cœur des hommes et des femmes depuis deux siècles. (27- my emphasis)

Kamouraska's Aurélie Caron yet again appears to be a particular case. The actions of Sr. Julie de la Trinité and those of Stevens Brown are unambiguously evil. Aurélie is on occasion sinister, but hardly evil. It is tempting to see her as the incarnation of Elisabeth's harsh conscience. The servant witch recedes far into the background when Elisabeth assumes the role of the witch herself, as she states quite frankly at one point, “Je suis une sorcière (131)."^“ As a conscience is supposed to keep us on the straight and narrow, Elisabeth acknowledges the role that Aurélie plays in her own salvation as she says, “Si parfois j'appelle cette fille à mon secours, c'est pour qu'elle me délivre du mal, m'absolve et me lave (180).” We already know that Aurélie is present in this novel because Elisabeth summoned her, as cited above (57).

A rapprochement can also be made between Elisabeth d'Aulnières and the witch Sr. Julie. As Sr. Julie is able to move between time and place, to spy on her brother in combat or on her own childhood, we see Elisabeth watching

For more about Elisabeth as witch, see Mary Jean Green’s T h e Witch and the Princess: The Feminine Fantastic in the Fiction of Anne Hebert,” in The American Review of Canadian Studies 1985. 139 the young George Nelson and Antoine Tassy together in their troubled

childhoods. She says:

Jalouse, je veille. Au delà du temps. Sans tenir compte d'aucune réalité admise. J'ai ce pouvoir. Je suis Mme. Rolland et je sais tout. Dès l'origine j'interviens dans la vie de deux adolescents perdus. Je préside joyeusement à l'amitié qui n'aura jamais lieu entre George Nelson et Antoine Tassy. (126)

There appear to be no limits to her ability to affect the past, or at least to take

responsibility/ credit for it. A few sentences earlier, when Elisabeth as narrator

opens the scene between the two young men playing chess we read, “Le vainqueur et le vaincu désignés au préalable (126)." which is of course true.

Mme. Rolland who knows all cannot be watching this scene unless Antoine is

already vaincu. Mme. Rolland is the successor to Mme. Tassy, who must

become la veuve Tassy before giving rise to this last incarnation of Elisabeth. If

Mme. Rolland is watching this scene, then Antoine is already dead, “battu

d'avance" as she describes him on an earlier page (122). George Nelson,

under the influence of Elisabeth, has already vanquished his rival, even before

Mme. Rolland witnesses this chess match. The demonstrated abilities of Sr.

Julie, Elisabeth, and of Aurélie Caron to cross the barriers of time as witches and as witnesses forms a dramatic demonstration of the temporal duality of the witness cited earlier from John Lyons. What Aurélie witnesses, either as witch or as Elisabeth's conscience, is

Elisabeth's guilt. Elisabeth attempts verbally to convince Aurélie of her

innocence (“II y a désistement. (62)"), yet the weak argument of the dropping of

charges as proof of innocence has no effect on the merciless Aurélie Caron.

“Je n'ai jamais été innocente. Ni Madame non plus (61)." or as she puts it later,

“Inutile de jouer aux saintes nitouches (96)." Aurélie casts a clear,

140 uncompromising light on Elisabeth’s hypocritical and ultimately crippling innocence. This hypocrisy appears to be the primary target of Hébertian witches. Hypocrisy is the focus of Sr. Julie’s activity as a sort of plague visited upon the convent. The pious hypocrisy masking the sins of abuse, adultery and incest in Griffin Creek is the focus of Stevens’ destructive act. which results in the eventual dissolution of the town

Hypocrisy is also a subject of importance to Marguerite. The hypocrite in the worlds of Hébert and Marguerite imprisons him/ herself in a mask of deception. The consequences of this may be difficult to live with. The image of the mask, frequent in both Marguerite’s work and Hébert’s. is consistently negative. This is true even if the illusion caused by the mask is a pleasant one. as we read Longarine’s pronouncement in the Heptameron on true honor versus perceived honor: “...(G)ar quant tout le monde me diroit femme de bien. et je saurais seulle le contraire, la louange augmenteroit ma honte et me rendroit en moy-mesme plus confuse (84);” The mask itself may be painful, like

Elisabeth’s "masque froide de l’innocence” or it can become quite comfortable. in which case its removal (as masks are destined to be removed) is greatly to be feared. Lyons, in discussing the status of the procurator’s wife in

Heptameron 1 describes her fear of being unmasked.

When she cannot control what people believe by using words alone, she eliminates witnesses, those who connect words with things and who translate the visual into the verbal. People who see things are her greatest danger; in their words she discovers herself (or finds that she has been discovered objectively, as a case: “elle entendit que son cas estoit descouvert”). (ExemoJum. 89)

141 In unison with this woman. Jambicque and other vilains of the Heptameron. we

hear Dr. Nelson say in Kamouraska that he fears nothing more than discovery

(125).

The nouvelle about Jambicque reveals a very interesting use of mask

imagery. The (anti-?)heroine of this tale wears a mask when she goes to meet

her lover to hide her identity. This literal mask worn in private becomes the

incarnation of the mask she wears in public as an almost puritanical judge of public morality, condemning publicly the very actions she engages in privately. It is clear that the devisants consider this public identity to be the true mask, and her adultery as revelation of her true self. While the story of Jambicque provides the clearest example of the use of a literal mask, figurative ones are everywhere in the Heptameron. Unlike the mask worn by Jambicque, the mask of Elisabeth is imposed from without. As Elisabeth describes her fate;

L’appareil des vieilles familles se met en marche. Médite et discute. Mon sort est décidé, arrêté, avant même qu'aucune parole ne soit prononcée. Apaiser tout scandale. Condamner Elisabeth d’Aulnières au masque froide de l'innocence. Pour le reste de ses jours. La sauver et nous sauver avec elle. (KamotirasKa. 237)

It is a situation somewhat analogous to that of the incestuous mother in the

Heptameron. required to hide any trace of her sin. Sr. Julie in the malady that has her restricted to her cell while she slips in and out of witchy trances has a mask of saintliness imposed upon her, with her sister nuns piously guarding her bandages as holy relics. We can also see the masks of the residents of the

English village of Griffin Creek as they refuse cooperation with the (French) provincial police in the investigation of the murder of the Atkins cousins.

The face plays an important role in Marguerite's storytelling. Changes of heart are often reflected in faces. Faces are used to represent truths that are 142 not spoken on the lips, or are obscured by masks. The tale of Amadour and

Floride provides a particularly striking example of this. In an effort to persuade

Amadour to abandon his foolish pursuit of her, Floride deliberately mars her own features (77). The physical ugliness she now wears not only masks her true inner/ innate beauty, it also provides proof of this same true beauty as an indication of her determination to keep her honor. Exactly one page later, we read of Amadour’s face changing as he determines to get what he wants from her by force: ...son visaige et ses oeilz tant altérez, que le plus beau tainct du monde estoit rouge comme le feu, et le plus doux et plaisant regard si orrible et furieux qu’il sembloit que ung feu très ardant estincellast dans son cueur et son visaige: (78)

In both cases, facial transformation becomes evidence of true inner qualities.

We can see the same thing in Hebert's Kamouraska. For Dr. Nelson, his experience with Elisabeth has visibly transformed him, like the transformed visage of Amadour in his frustrated love for Floride. Seeing his face upon returning to Sorel after killing Antoine Tassy Elisabeth says to herself:

Votre visage au retour posé sur moi, inconnaissable à jamais. Terrifiant. Non je ne connais pas cet homme! Découvert, docteur Nelson. Vous êtes découvert. Etranger. Assassin. (249)

Of course, Aurélie Caron had long been aware of the true face of George Nelson. As he informs her that he had sworn an oath to be a saint, Aurélie replies, “Vous, Monsieur, un saint? O’est une bien grande farce (177)!" The women of Griffin Creek attest to a similar separation between Rev.

Jones and his holy calling. As we have seen repeatedly in the work of

Marguerite de Navarre and elsewhere in Anne Hébert’s work, the male ecclesiastical hierarchy, despite its exclusion and suppression of women,

143 remains subject to the critical gaze of these same women. Nicolas Jones tells us “Un jour j’ai été le Verbe de Griffin Greek, dépositaire du Verbe à Griffin

Greek, moi-même Verbe au milieu des fidèles...(19)’’ Yet we hear the voice of

Felicity Jones, his mother, rising in contradiction, “Mon fils s’écoute parler (29)” and that of Nora Atkins joining her: Mon oncle Nicolas parle de Dieu,...,mais depuis quelque temps je n’entends plus la parole de Dieu dans la voix de l’oncle Nicolas. (...) La voix sonore de l’oncle Nicolas, sans rien de pieux dedans, la belle voix de l’oncle Nicolas comme une écaille brillante, vide de tout contenu, basse et virile, fluide comme de la fumée. (30)

Women are not the only marginalized who exercize a certain power through their often damning gaze. Ghildren can do so as well, as suggested by the

Browns' less-than-secret desire to be rid of their children, as Nicolas writes:

Ne plus avoir enfant du tout. Se retrouver mari et femme comme avant. L’un en face de l’autre. Ghiens de faïence pour l’éternité. Sans témoin. (21, my emphasis)

Perceval Brown, as narrator (along with others) of the fourth book of Les Fous de Bassan. and the last of the Brown children to be removed from the home, serves as a primary example of children as witnesses to the crimes of the parents. He is the one who reports Nicolas Jones’ seduction of Nora to the reverend’s wife. It is also Perceval who records his father’s destruction of evidence of the murder of the Atkins cousins. In the Comédie des Innocents Marguerite points to the power of the witness in Rachel’s speech after Herodes’ men carry out his inhuman order.

She says, “O cruel Herodes, / Tes façons et modes / Seront en mémoire; / La honte et dommage / Auras pour partage, / Et Dieu seul la gloire: (306)” then later as she continues her lament “Dieu par juste office / Punira ce vice / Par 144 mort et par vers (307).” Of course, as Marguerite and her readers know, Rachel

has her revenge, for Christian history preserves the name of King Herod as an

object of revilement and the very image of the tyrant and bad king. It is

interesting to observe that Marguerite makes herself a sort of witness to the

crime and an instrument of God’s justice, as she writes that God will punish

Herod with death and worms. Yet, as we know, the word vers can also be

interpreted to mean “verses/ lines of poetry.” Marguerite's poetry then becomes

part of God’s punishment to the vainglorious Herod, condemning him and

passing along his evil reputation to yet another generation. She inscribes her

important work as witness into the end of this same play, as the martyred

Innocents, united with God, sing, “Qu’un chacun le recorde / Qu’a nous

Innocents fait / Le Seigneur tout parfait / Par sa miséricorde (315).”

Marguerite’s play functions, of course, as the witness and record of what Lord

has done for the Innocents.

Children can also function as non-verbal testimony to their parents’

misdeeds. In Heptameron 30, the incestuous mother must hide her daughter, whose very existence is proof of the mother’s sin. In a like manner, the Brown children serve as physical evidence of something profoundly wrong with Griffin Creek. In describing the Brown twins who work for him as housekeepers, Rev.

Jones writes, “Ces filles sont folles. Non complètement idiotes comme leur frère Perceval, ni maléfiques comme leur autre frère Stevens, mais folles tout de même (17).” In his short recounting of the founding of Griffin Creek, Rev.

Jones identifies the founding families; “Les Jones, les Brown, les Atkins, les

MacDonald.” At first, this strikes the reader as a sampling of the founders of

Griffin Creek. One quickly finds out that this list is complete. In the isolation of the village between Cap Sauvagine and Cap Sec, it is obvious that in Griffin

145 Creek there is an inbreeding problem. As the novel progresses, we become

aware that the spectre of incest hangs heavily over Griffin Creek. All of the

narrators are closely related by blood. Nora and Olivia Atkins are double

cousins, the Atkins brothers having married the Jones sisters. Nicolas Jones is

their uncle, as well as uncle to the Brown children, brother to their mothers.

Stevens Brown is their cousin, and Perceval Brown is Stevens’ brother. It gets

worse. Stevens’ parents, John and Bea Brown, are very likely close cousins,

for Stevens’ grandmother is Felicity Jones née Brown. Intermarriage between

Jones and Brown goes back to the founding of Griffin Creek, as Nicolas Jones

describes himself as “fils de Peter Jones et de Felicity, née Brown, légitimes descendants de Henry Jones et de Maria Brown (24),’’ these last forming one of the founding households of Griffin Creek. The interrelatedness of its inhabitants is mentioned by Jones as he says of those leaving Griffin Creek after the fateful summer of 1936, “Mais en réalité chacun d’entre eux désirait devenir étranger à l’autre, s’échapper de la parenté qui le liait aux gens de

Griffin Creek... (52).” The problem posed by a limited gene pool is not the only image of incest in this novel. Incestuous desire for his niece, Nora, plagues the thoughts of the reverend. The closeness between these two, thus rendering all the more taboo his physical desire for her, is underlined by the reverend’s own wife as she says to him, “Tout le monde sait bien que les deux plus roux de

Griffin Creek se ressemblent, comme père et fille; bien qu’ils ne soient que l’oncle et la nièce (45).” Stevens Brown, even before the rape of his cousin

Olivia, is sexually involved with a relative. Maureen Macdonald is identified as Stevens’ cousin by marriage to his blood-cousin Jack. We are also told that her maiden name is Brown, and is therefore likely to be herself a blood-relative of Stevens Brown.

146 There is a suspicion that incest is rampant in Griffin Creek. We find out from Rev. Jones’ narrative that his father, Peter Jones, cheated on his wife on

innumerable occasions, from the very first year of their marriage (37). As Marc

Shell tells us in Children of the Earth, one of the dangers of adultery, with

resultant bastardy, is that it increases the risk of accidental incest, by making

parentage unclear (16). Assuming that Peter was not the first man in Griffin

Creek to cheat on his wife (and the submissive attitudes of the Griffin Creek women make this likely) all of the residents of Anglophone Griffin Creek may be far more closely related than they think they are. It is Stevens who details the spread of Peter Jones’ offspring.

Tant de rejetons pour un seul homme, les légitimes et les autres,... Mon grand-père s’embrouille, fait le compte des feux du village, on dirait qu’il recense une myriade de prunelles bleues, sortie d’une source vive, au milieu de son ventre d’homme. (64)

At Stevens’ mention of Peter Jones’ harvest of blue-eyed offspring, one recalls

Olivia’s violet eyes. The narrative of Olivia de la Haute Mer speaks of her mother’s sadness, her “offense secrète,” and her “jeunesse tuée (208).” Is it possible that Peter Jones’ infidelity included the seduction of his own daughter, and that Olivia is the result of this act? It would certainly explain the ancient terror mentioned earlier in this same narrative; “La plus profonde, ancienne

épouvante qui n’est plus tout à fait la mienne, mais celle de ma mère enceinte de moi et de ma grand-mère qui... (202)” As the narrative breaks off here, we are not certain of Felicity Jones’ relationship to this terror, but we do know that she has always been aware of her husband’s extra-marital activities. Rev. Jones, in discussing his relationship with his housekeepers the

Brown twins, says, “je les mène avec une trique de fer (18)." The “trique de fer” has been mentioned in a previous work by Hébert, in the hands of the offspring 147 born of the incestuous union of the witch and her own son in Les Enfants du sabbat.^ This is not to suggest that Nicolas is the result of intercourse between Felicity and another of her sons (it is not indicated that she has any), but the intertextual reference only heightens the suggestion of incest that hovers over the town. This suspicion is not eased by the fact that long-term incestuous behavior is typically confined to isolated habitations exactly like Anglophone

Griffin Creek. Perceval’s narrative implicitly links the Atkins cousins to Peter

Jones’ wide distribution of his seed. “Des yeux bleus partout à Griffin Creek.

Dans tous les jardins. Tous les arbres. Poussent comme des fruits bleus. Qu’à tendre la main. Les yeux de Nora, les yeux d’Olivia se cachent parmi les fruits bleus (155).’’ The image makes no distinction between Peter Jones’ legitimate and illegitimate offspring, throwing a shadow over the parentage of the Atkins cousins.

Images suggestive of incest cluster around Nora and Olivia. Both cousins, Nora in particular, are objects of the guilty lust of their uncle, Nicolas

Jones. In Nora’s journal she announces her intention to kiss all of the boys of Griffin Creek before summer is out. This is a project that includes her own cousins, as she has already let Patrick, Olivia’s brother, kiss her (123). There are hints, as suggested earlier, that Olivia is her mother’s half-sister. There is also Olivia’s vow to her dying mother to take care of her father and brothers after her mother has passed on. Both Perceval and Nora in their narratives remark on this marriage-like vow binding Olivia to her male blood-relations.

Nora writes, “Olivia est déjà maîtresse de maison. Trois hommes dépendent d’elle pour le manger et le boire, le ménage et le blanchissage (134).”

Perceval echos this observation with, “Trop d’hommes pour une seule fille ce

“ This “trique de fer" is also alluded to by Stevens’ narrative in a passage cited above when he speaks of wanting to line women up in a “troupeau bêlant" (82). 148 n’est pas normal. Lui ont fait prononcer un vœu (174).” To heighten the

ambiguity of the blood-relation of the Atkins cousins to the rest of Griffin Creek,

after their disappearance we hear the townsfolk asking in the surrounding

areas, “Vous n'auriez pas vu Nora Atkins et Olivia Atkins, nos cousines, nos sœurs, nos filles... (169)?’’ The narrative fails to distinguish between these

roles as though Nora and Olivia could be any or all of these to any given Griffin Creeker.

Les Fous de Bassan is not. of course, the only novel treated in this study

to bring up incest. The incestuous rites of the witch are of great importance to

Les Enfants du sabbat. Julie is raped by her father on more than one occasion,

not all of which are in the context of ritual. We have already discussed

Philomène’s failed effort to conceive with her own son, and of Julie’s efforts to

do the same thing with her brother. We have also mentioned the numerous

references to incest in the work of Marguerite de Navarre. Marguerite offers us

examples of holy incest in her religious poetry and comédies, in the examples

of the speaker in the “Miroir de l ame pecheresse" and the Virgin Mary. She

also presents us with examples of sinful incest in the Heptameron. in tales thirty

(the incestuous mother) and thirty-three (the priest who impregnates his sister).

In both the Heptameron and Les Enfants du sabbat we have numerous examples of still another form of incest. During the Renaissance, the Church taught that any sexual intercourse for the clergy and religious was incestuous

(Shell, 62). So Sr. Julie commits incest when she seduces/ rapes Dr.

Painchaud, as do the lustv cordeliers found in many of Marguerite’s nouvelles.

The rape and murder of the Atkins cousins bears all the markings of what is referred to by René Girard in La Violence et le sacré, as the foundational violence (“la violence fondatrice”) of incest and murder. Summing up his

149 argument in the briefest terms. Girard sees ritual sacrifice as the re-enactment of a violent act that forms the base or origin of any given society or culture. In order to put an end to reciprocal violence, violence that threatens the members of the community, a victim is chosen to be the object of communal, unitary violence. It is from this ritual, hence pure, violence that a society is formed to protect itself from impure violence. The source of this violence which must be prevented is the “sacrificial crisis” da crise sacrificielle! This is the condition or state in which sacrifiable victims are indistinguishable or undistinguished from non-sacrifiable ones. The pure violence of the sacrifice is designed to protect these non-sacrifiable members of society from the impure violence of non­ sanctioned murder and vengeance. This sacrificial crisis is seen as being brought on by incest and parricide.” These two acts are considered to be particularly impure acts of violence because they violate socio-culturally established differences that enable society to regulate itself and to distinguish the sacrifiable from the non-sacrifiable. Girard demonstrates that the solution to the sacrificial crisis is the determination or identification of the scapegoat (\a victime émissaire! This person is identified as the source of the impure violence, and the sacrifice of this victim (through death or exile) resolves the crisis, and order is restored. The communal violence committed against the scapegoat is the restoration of the sacrifice, and the establishment of a new society or social order. He analyzes several myths and tragedies as evidence of this sacrificial crisis, one of which is Euripedes’ The Bacchae fLes

Bacchantes). The restoration of the sacrifice becomes the founding of a new religion, as in The Bacchae with the cult of Dionysos, or of a new nation, as is

“ Girard mentions parricide as a type of murder In violation of socially established differences because he uses Œdlous Rex as an example of the sacrificial crisis. He later makes clear that any family murder (matricide, fratricide, Infanticide, etc.) serves the same symtxDlIc purpose. 150 the case of several African tribal nations; Girard sees a re-enactment of this

sacrifice in their enthronement rituals. The dominant themes common to the works of Marguerite and Hébert, and which touch most closely the national question, have as their focus the foundational violence and the sacrificial crisis discussed by Girard. In short, we see in their work a concern with fault, centered around the image of trial and confession. The importance of establishing guilt is linked to the proper identification of the source of the threat and hence of the sacrifiable victim. We also see concern with the creation and perpetuation of community, the primary function of sacrificial rites, and closely linked to this we see the strong family images, and as indicated, the nearly obsessive presence of incest.

Acts of violence that can be allied to Girard’s theory of foundational violence and the sacrificial crisis are found in Marguerite de Navarre's work and in all three of the novels by Anne Hébert that are studied here. For Marguerite, the sacrificial act that serves to build community is the same in all her work, the

Passion and death of Jesus Christ. The violence triggering this sacrifice is Sin.

The acts of violence in Hébert’s work are more specific. In Kamouraska we have the murder of Antoine Tassy. In Les Enfants du sabbat, there are the deaths of Joseph, his wife Piggy, and their unborn child. Everything about

Griffin Creek seems to have been prepared to enable Stevens Brown to recreate the foundational crime of incest and murder. We can see these even down to the slightest details of the sacrificial victim.^ In describing the two girls at church. Rev. Jones emphasizes Olivia’s violet eyes (28), and we can see

Olivia’s fate echoed through the orthographical and phonological similarity of

Olivia, violets/ violette, and violée. These are the crimes that will be charged to

^ Olivia, and not Nora, is identified as "sacrificial" here, for Nora’s murder is depicted as more or less accidental. Stevens' conscious intention was to silence Nora, not kill her. Olivia’s rape and murder was a choice consciously made. 151 the witch who functions as la victime émissaire in all three novels. As Hébert writes in Kamouraska. “Ne savez-vous donc pas qu’il est parfois utile que les petites sorcières naissent et meurent? Apparaissent sur la terre, le temps de porter le crime et la mort en notre nom (187)?” Aurélie is sacrificed by Elisabeth as she allows her to remain imprisoned for two years, “à l’entière disposition de la justice (8)” while Elisabeth herself is freed. Elisabeth is sacrificed in turn by the “vieilles familles” to the mask of innocence and a loveless marriage to

Jérôme Rolland. In both cases, the sacrifice guarantees the survival of those who perform it. Les Fous de Bassan demonstrates the danger of failing to make this sacrifice. The English of Griffin Creek refuse to sacrifice Stevens Brown and make him the scapegoat for the communal sins of incest and family murder, and we see that the community is destroyed as result. The toad-like baby suffocated by the mother superior and the aumônier in Les Enfants du sabbat functions as a sacrificial surrogate for Sr. Julie. In provoking this murder. Sr. Julie considers her mission to corrupt the convent accomplished, yet Mother Marie-Clotilde has another, very interesting interpretation of what has happened, highlighting the ritual nature of this infanticide.

Nous paierons notre dette à Dieu, ou au diable, peut- être même l’avons-nous payée d’avance? Tant de prières et de sacrifices, depuis le commencement des temps, et l’obscure faute originelle à racheter et le seul fait d’être au monde, dans un pays précis du monde? Notre pénitence sera sans fin. (185)

It would appear that Sr. Julie has not so much truly corrupted a previously pure convent, as finally enabled them to commit a sin worthy of their years of pointless self-denial and penitence. This sacrifice of the witch’s offspring reaffirms the convent’s mission. Mother Marie-Clotilde’s specific mention of

152 being In a pays précis cannot go uncommented. The austere and rigidly controlled lifestyle of the Dames du Précieux-Sang recalls that of the typical

Québécois under the conservative Duplessis regime, living in a society told that

the British Conquest was in part due to the sins of New France. It is a process

remarked on by Albert Memmi in his portrait of the colonized, as he describes

the internalization by the colonized of the negative image painted of him/ her by

the colonizer (The Colonizer and the Colonized. 87). The economic disparity

between the Canadiens” and their anglophone counterparts, coupled with this above-cited inferiority complex intimately associated with a colonized people,

must indeed have left many in the province wondering if being Québécois was itself a sin.

In the worlds of Hébert and Marguerite, there is a close tie between sin and identity. One appears to discover the truth of oneself through sin. In fact, for Marguerite de Navarre, one's Self is. sin. The link between sin and identity is dramatically portrayed in Kamouraska as Elisabeth oscillates between her guilty identity as la veuveTassy and her innocent one as Mme. Rolland. A link is made between the confession of sin and liberty. For Elisabeth, narrating the truth and thereby taking possession of her crime becomes a means of asserting her independent identity, and liberating herself from the cage that is her identity as Mme. Rolland. This is particularly indicated in Marguerite's “Le Miroir de l ame pecheresse" in such lines as “Parquoy il fault que mon orgueil r'abaisse,/

Et qu'humblement en plorant je confesse,/ Que, quant à moy, je suis trop moins que riens:” There seems to be a similar pattern to the lives of Elisabeth d'Aulnières and Sr. Julie de la Trinité. While Hébert's heroines do not necessarily regret their sins (and in the case of Sr. Julie most certainly do not

“ Until roughly the 1950’s or 1960’s this was the term used by the Québécois to refer to themselves. Until the Quiet Revolution, a Québécois was someone from Quebec City. 153 regret them), confession of these sins in one form or another, giving voice to them, is a prerequisite to a certain freedom.

Much like Marguerite’s “Miroir de l’âme pecheresse,” wherein the

speaker confronts her own sinfulness. Les Enfants du sabbat opens with Sr.

Julie de la Trinité confronting her past as the daughter of a witch.

C ’était la première fois que, depuis son entrée au couvent, elle se permettait un tel regard... L’intention d’user à jamais une image obsédante. Se débarrasser de la cabane de son enfance. S’en défaire, une fois pour toutes. Et surtout, ah surtout! être délivrée du couple sacré qui présidait à la destinée de la cabane,...(7).

Whereas Marguerite’s speaker faces her sin in order to reject it. Sr. Julie eventually embraces this sin. This confrontation with the sinful past finds a certain reflection in the evolution of Québécois writing. As Quebec society broke with the Church so too did the literary establishment, and both rejected the “holy calling” of the French-Canadian people established at the beginning of the century by the Church, that of converting the continent. In reaction or response. Quiet Revolution authors shift the focus to the sinful aspects of the

French-Canadian past, murder, incest, and adultery. Yet despite the difference noted between the two authors, there does seem to be an agreement that the

Self is Sin. In rejecting her sin, the speaker in the “Miroir” loses herself in God.

In embracing her own sinful self. Sr. Julie leaves the collective of the convent to the somewhat solitary life of the witch. Different reactions, yet the result appears be the same, for as a result of this introspection, the Self is lost in a greater whole. The speaker in the “Miroir” loses herself in God. Sr. Julie’s Self becomes an integral part of her witch’s heritage.

There is yet another similarity between our two authors, in that they both have recourse to the supernatural and dream visitation as a method of 154 resolving problems where the dreamer is torn between identities. Marguerite

de Navarre wrote two poems wherein she treats the dilemma for the Christian

facing the death of loved ones. Concerning the deaths of her niece and

brother, Marguerite wrestled with her identity as a devout Christian, and hence

a believer in an afterlife of union with God, in which case death is cause for

rejoicing, not mourning. Yet she also had to deal with her identity as aunt and

sister, experiencing the very human desire to grieve. In the two poems in

question, “Dialogue en forme de vision nocturne" and “La Navire," the speaker is guided through her dilemma in visions. There is a similar system of

instruction through visions in the extended dream of Elisabeth that is

Kamouraska. and one can say the same of the dreams that feed the

reconversion of Sr. Julie that will prevent her from ever taking her final vows. In

both of the poems by the queen of Navarre, she seeks comfort and receives inspiration and instruction from the dead, her niece Charlotte and her brother

Francis. An analogous function is played in Kamouraska by Aurélie Caron. Her family name, with its resemblance to the name of Charon, the boatman of

the Styx, would seem to particularly suit Aurélie in her function as guide

through Elisabeth’s drug-induced vision. The parents of Sr. Julie, Philomène

dite La Goglue, and Adélard serve likewise. It is unclear if Aurélie is alive or

dead at the time Elisabeth Rolland attends her dying husband, although there are times when Elisabeth fears she has seen her. In Les Enfants du sabbat.

Philomène is definitely dead, as her death is described in the text. Adélard has disappeared, and since no clear indication is given of his age at any point in the text, it is a bit risky to describe him as presumed dead. Whether they are actually ghosts or spiritual representations of the distant living, by their actions and behavior we see that they are sufficiently non-corporeal to function as

155 ghosts. In either case, both authors make a strong case for a reform of the present by listening to the voices of those who have gone before. Where the

cult of the saints meets the cult of the ancestors, there we find the Founding

Fathers and Mothers of a new nation.

The ultimate Founding Mother is, of course. Eve, and now we return to

the image that opened this chapter. Eve is the unspoken subtext in all of the

works examined here, and this should come as little wonder. The products of

Christian and Catholic societies. Marguerite and Hébert both dealt with what might be called the heritage of Eve. Women’s submission to the dominance of

men was traced to Eve as the first woman, and as responsible for humankind's

fall from grace. Marguerite and Hébert seek to sort out women's identity as the

daughters of Eve. Looking at Marguerite’s “Miroir,” we can see an Eve-ic

subtext in the identity of the speaker. Although she is not directly mentioned in

the poem, her presence is implicit. The speaker’s comparison and contrast with

Mary, implies the presence of Eve as Mary’s traditional counterpart. Eve too bears a multiple relationship to her spouse, Adam. She is his wife, but also his

sister, for they are equally children of God, and Adam’s daughter, for he

identifies her as “bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh (Genesis 2:23).” As

Marc Shell indicates, it is only through the grace of God that impure, physical

incest (the example of Eve in the original sin) can be tranformed into pure

spiritual incest (the example given by Mary) (74). The redemption of Eve’s

heiresses would seem to be behind Marguerite’s examinations of folie and women’s honor. The figure of Eve is also found in Hébert’s text, alluded to in the initiation ritual of young Julie when Philomène speaks of “...l’Arbre de

Science, l’Arbre de Vie, le serpent qui a vaincu Dieu... (69)." Even more striking is Eve as evoked by Nora in Les Fous de Bassan. After her uncle gives

156 in to his lusts in the boathouse, exploring Nora’s body with his hands, he

accuses her of introducing sin into Griffin Greek (129). Nora defiantly casts

herself in the role of first woman, but this time not as subserviant to Adam, but

as his equal.

Faite du limon de la terre, comme Adam, et non sortie d’entre les côtes sèches d’Adam, première comme Adam, je suis moi, Nora Atkins,...(116).

The witch’s tradition and the beliefs of young Nora outright reject the

condemnation and resulting repression of the first woman and hence of her

daughters. Inverting this system, in the world of the witch, it is the male who

comes in second to the female. Against a background of unstable identities

and shifting social roles, Nora radically proposes an Eve that is not derivative

from Adam, but co-original and co-equal with him. In a social context in which

models of identity and behavior have become unstable. Marguerite and Hébert

undermine traditional views of women’s identity and explore a path to a brave

new world in which the heritage bequeathed by Eve to her daughters is re­

examined and redeemed.

157 CHAPTER 4

LOUISE LABE AND NICOLE BROSSARD: JE DESIRE, DONC JE SUIS

As Nicole Brossard’s 1978 experience In Hungary Indicates, it Is all too

easy to Ignore the woman-ness of a woman In many of her dally activities.

J ’al demandé à notre guide, la belle, jeune, et pure Katalln, s'il y avait des féministes en Hongrie. Elle m'a répondu que non mais qu'il y avait une femme ministre. Alors j'ai compris que je connaissais toutes les réponses à mes questions concernant les femmes. De toute façon, les femmes sont des travailleurs qui parfois donnent naissance et II y a des statistiques pour ça. (Journal Intime. 65).

After all, “As a woman, I am using pliers,” is an obscure statement at best. In

stark contrast, the expression, “As a woman, I desire," can be almost graphically

clear. The act of desire. In Western thought at least, Is not gender-neutral. The

centrality of desire In Identity Is Indicated In the question eternally posed to

Quebec nationalists, “What does Quebec want?” This question, usually asked

In exasperation and fear. Indicates that what sets Quebec apart are its wants

and desires. Brossard's work highlights the political kinship between the

troublesome (for English Canadians) Québécois and the equally difficult

women who seek to liberate themselves from centuries of societal constraint.

Despite the differences that may exist between them, there Is one point at which the sovereignty movement and the feminist movement, and Brossard In

158 particular, remain allied- This is the issue of difference. As the nationalist movement in Quebec argues for Quebec’s right to be and to remain a “distinct society”, as is their term for it, Nicole Brossard convincingly argues the importance of gender difference. The articulation of this difference on the national scale forms the primary exploration of a national literature, and

Brossard’s work demonstrates the role of the articulation of women’s difference in women’s literature. This expression of national and gender difference hinges on the articulation of desire.

Preceding Nicole Brossard by four hundred years, Louise Labé also attempts to carve out a literary home for herself, her nation and her sex by wielding the sword of difference. Labé published a collection of work that would meet with sufficient success to be reprinted during her lifetime. This was quite an accomplishment at a period when few women attempted to publish under their own name and of their own Initiative. Labé did so writing in a genre that up until this point was the nearly exclusive domain of men writing in Italian.

We will see that her collection of Euvres makes no attempt to obscure her difference as a francophone woman, but rather celebrates this distinctiveness.

Her collection of love poems is introduced by an open letter to a young noblewoman of her acquaintance, and in this letter Labé incites the other women of Lyon to follow her example, by similarly translating their desires into text. It is, in part, through the aggressive foregrounding of this difference as female and French-speaking (and -writing) that Labé’s work challenges the notion of writing as a male prerogative. Her writings allude to the changes underway in sixteenth-century France, and implicitly allies her feminist appeal to this period of national expansion and proto-nationalist aspiration.

159 Louise Labé and Nicole Brossard are écrivaines. This term, current in

the language of Brossard, comes four hundred years too late for Labé. Yet it

permits one to express the inseparability of three very important aspects of their

identity: francophone (French, Québécois), woman, and writer. The triune

identity of écrivaine is expressed and explored through their writing, and in

particular the writing of women’s desire. As a francophone, it is impossible for Labé to write, “Je suis lyonnais (lionnois)," because she is lionnoize.

simultaneously Lyonnese and feminine. Similarly, Brossard in her own

language is not québécois but québécoise. In writing vernacular love lyric,

Labé brings the simultaneity of her écrivaine-ness to the forefront, since the

French language makes it nearly impossible for a writer writing of love to

obscure both her own gender and the gender of the beloved. Labé makes no

attempt to do either. Brossard accomplishes much the same thing when she

writes in “E muet mutant,” “What does Québec want? Kécé qu’vous voulez, bande de fatigantes? Ben voyons! (Double impression. 57)”' Through her use

of dialectical Québécois French and the English phrase, “What does Quebec

want?” and alluding to Freud’s question, “What does woman want?” through

her identification of the members of the bande as feminine fatigantes. Brossard forms a strong link between the national struggle and the struggle to affirm women’s difference.

Sixteenth-century Lyon, the home of Louise Labé, was a city full of promise and opportunity. The city is favorably placed at the confluence of two major waterways, the Rhone and the Saone. Its geographical position and its

’ Double impression is a collection of several of Brossard’s writings, all of which were originally published elsewhere between 1967 and 1984. Many of these originally appeared in the ground­ breaking feminist ioumals La barre du iour or La nouvelle barre du iour. When referring to texts that appear in Double impression. I will cite them as they appear in this collection and using the page numbers from this collection. The original dates and locations of publication for these writings are available in the bibliography at the end of Double impression. 160 merchant fairs attracted large numbers of foreigners to the city (O’Connor, 14).

Among these resident foreigners, we find not only Italians, but also Germans and Dutch (19). In time, Lyon would be considered nearly as Italian as it was

French, and was in fact celebrated for its reproduction on French soil of the advanced civilization of Italy (35). The presence of wealthy Italian merchant and banking families assured Lyon's role as the banking center of France.

While it was not the political center of the kingdom, it was in many ways the intellectual and cultural center, enjoying the benefits of its cosmopolitanism and its distance from the conservativism of the Sorbonne in Paris.^

Like Lyon, Brossard’s Montreal is an urban area and prosperous. It, too, lies on an important watenway, the Saint Lawrence River, and has always been important as a center of trade. Like Lyon, Montreal is not the national^ capital, but it is arguably the cultural center of the province (and to an extent for all of

Francophone Canada). Likewise, the city is a highly cosmopolitan milieu, and a place of great cultural and symbolic importance. The city ranks as the second-largest French-speaking city in the world; only Paris is more populous.

Montreal also functions as an important intersection between French and

English Canada. This symbolic value is highlighted by Brossard in her novel

French kiss as she writes;

On roule habituellement entre l’appartement de la rue Coloniale et les edifices de la rue Stanley. Mais aujourd’hui: croisière urbaine. Suivre la rue Sherbrooke d’un bout à l’autre, de l’est à l’ouest. De l’ouest à l’est. Manège historique et géographique. (15, my emphasis)

^ Dorothy O’Connor cites specifically the advantages of this distance for Lyon’s growing printing industry (24).

^ As has been true throughout this study, “nation” (and therefore “national”) here refers to Quebec, and not Canada. 161 For more than a century, the economic elite of Montreal were the minority anglophones, whose presence is indicated in the passage above by such place-names as lys. Stanley, for whom bilingualism (French-English) was the exception, not the rule. Today the anglophones are no longer the exclusive economic elite of the city, as Francophone businesses and businesspeople have filled the vacuum left by the departure of anglophone businesses and families who fled from the French-language laws passed in the I970’s. Montreal is not only the place where French meets English in urban Quebec, the city is also home to the province's largest concentration of allophones (Dickinson and Young, 298).'*

The urban settings of Labé and Brossard form an important context for their work, particularly so for Brossard, for whom, according to Louise Forsyth, the City as a construct is a symbol not only of the patriarchal system against which Brossard writes, but also a place for women's self-exploration and expansion (“Emergence,” 218-19). This is portrayed graphically in Brossard’s novel French kiss, where the “present action” of the novel portrays the character

Marielle driving across Montreal on the jne. Sherbrooke. Karen Gould, in her book Writing in the Feminine, describes Montreal as “the metropolitan center of contemporary Québec culture and the privileged site of the writing of modernity

(71).” Modernity, in this sense, refers to a literary avant-garde movement that favored textual experimentation and sought to eliminate all traces of the author in the text, including any indication of the author's sex. In breaking with all literary tradition, the littérature de modernité sought to break with the defeated mentality that plagued Quebec since the British Conquest. While supporting

* An altophone is someone whose native language is not considered to be native to the country s/he inhabits, in Canada, this means someone whose native language is neither French, not English, nor Amerindian.

162 the literary Innovations of the modernité movement, Brossard would eventually

break with this movement over its suppression of gender difference (Gould, 28).

Lyonnese culture had a profound influence on Labe's work in that it was

the home of the école de Lyon. The term is a misnomer, for it was not a literary

école in the formal sense. Rather, the term applies to those writers living and

working in or near Lyon in the 1530’s and 1540’s, whose activity more-or-less

pre-dates that of the Pléiade. The focal point (and arguably the most famous

member) of the école de Lvon was the poet Maurice Scève. Other writers

considered to be part of this école were Olivier de Magny® and Remette du

Quillet. Much of the work emanating from these Lyonnais is love poetry, based

on Petrarchan and neo-Platonic themes. It is a poetry wherein the speaker expresses a desire for someone unattainable. The expression of this love

ranges from the more spiritual “perfect friendship" (“oarfaicte amvtié"! of du

Quillet to the more physical passions evident in the work of Louise Labé. The

école de Lyon represents a tradition Labé wrote both in and against. She writes in the tradition insofar as she uses their common Italian inspiration and several common themes (the absent beloved, the innamoramento. etc.), but as we shall see she also writes against this tradition, criticizing in particular the role it has traditionnally assigned to women. Labé, manifests a definite pride in being Lyonnese, as is demonstrated by her signature, “Louïze Labé Lionnoize."

The presence of the city becomes obvious in her Elegie III, which is addressed to the Dames Lionnoises. and Lyon is alluded to in Sonnet XVII, where she writes, “Je fuis la vile, et temples et tous lieus." The community of women which she evokes is anchored in this urban environment, signalled by the above- mentioned epithet. Dames Lionnoises. These appeals to her fellow city-

® Magny is commonly thought to be the real-life referent for the absent beloved in Labé’s poetry. 163 dwellers, and the dedication to another fellow Lyonnaise ^ suggest that, as

Forsyth noted about Brossard’s Montreal, Labé's Lyon is likewise a privileged site for women’s expansion and exploration/

Not only place, but time is of importance in these works. Although born under the conservative Duplessis regime (1936-39, 1944-59), Brossard’s literary career developed during the days of Quebec’s Quiet Revolution. The Quebec arising out of this revolution was urban, increasingly liberal and secular, and determined to end its traditional isolation from the rest of North

America and the world. Her work reveals the influence of the time in which she wrote, and the importance of her work’s chronological context is something Brossard herself alludes to in her introduction to Double impression, saying that a book is a time period (“Pour moi le livre, c’est un temps (7).”) This is most evident, of course, in a work like her Journal intime, regularly punctated by specific dates, but we can also see examples of this in such poems as

“Tabarnak,” and “Plus après comme avant,” which are both clearly marked by the events of October 1970.®

As Brossard notes the close tie between a work and the period in which it was written, Labé is also aware of the tie between time and text. Labé highlights as one of the pleasures of writing the ability to resurrect the past (42), and the notion of time is evoked in the words which open her Eoitre dédicatoire:

Estant le terns venu. Mademoiselle, que les severes loix des hommes n’empeschent plus le femmes de s’appliquer aux sciences et disciplines: il me semble que celles qui ont la commodité, doivent employer

* The dedication of Labé’s Euvres reads A M.C.D.B.L --À Mademoiseiie Clémence de Bourges, Lyonnaise.

'' For more about the influence of the city on the work of Louise Labé, see Ann Rosalind Jones' article “City Women” in Rewriting the Renaissance.

® See Introduction, pp 3-4. 164 cette honneste liberté que notre sexe ha autrefois tant desiree, à [celles aprendre; (41)

We see the Importance not only of time but of timing. Labé indicates to her dedicatee the opening of a window of opportunity, a notion that will be explored throughout the poetry that follows. Louise Labé seems to have had a keen perception of the time in which she lived, and knew that at this point in the national evolution, women’s writing would be both permitted and encouraged.

Karine Berriot makes the observation that societies in change and classes In expansion often signal this change and expansion through an increase in feminine expression fLa belle rebelle. 219-220). This is exactly what had been noted by John Hutchinson in his description of cultural nationalism, the removal of those barriers that hinder full participation in the renovation of the nation by all of its members (The Dvnamics of Cultural Nationalism. 33). Labé and

Brossard serve to illustrate this point.

The Epitre dédicatoire marks Labé as an early feminist, and this

“manifesto” opens in the way modern politicians might make a call to arms; in the case of Louise Labé, it is a call to pen and paper. Her Euvres are dedicated

“A M.C.D.B.L.’’ - ”A Mademoiselle Clémence de Bourges, Lyonnoise”- a young noblewoman with whom Labé apparently was great friends. In it, as we have seen, she calls upon other women to take up intellectual pursuits (“sciences et disciplines”) in general and writing in particular. Labé is consciously laying a foundation that she hopes will be of great public value. “...(N)ous aurons valu au publiq,” she states in her dedication in reference to the mobilization of women for which she calls (42). As Labé self-deprecatingly indicates to her dedicatee, she dares publish this work in the hopes of inspiring young

Clémence de Bourges to produce a superior oeuvre. Aggressive in its political overtones, this dedication is surprisingly humble in reference to Labé’s own 165 talents and abilities (43). While it is true that this sort of overt humility was a reasonably common rhetorical strategy for some authors,® in Labé’s case it seems to be more than just a matter of form. Labé’s attitude towards her own work falls in line with what would appear to be her philosophy of social engagement. She does what she can to inspire others to do better.

The Epitre dédicatoire implies that not only is writing a personal good, it is actually a civic duty: “II me semble que celles qui ont la commodité doivent emplover cette honeste liberté (41, emphasis mine).”'® What is more, one’s duty to one’s sex and nation does not stop at the mere act of writing. Labé seeks commitment to a cause and identification of the author to the work.

Et si quelcune parvient en tel degré, que de pouvoir mettre ses concepcions par escrit, le faire songneusement et non dédaigner la gloire, et s’en emparer plustot que de chaines, anneaus et somptueus habits: (41 )

Labé’s model is in contrast to women authors who apologized for their writing or for having the presumption to write as opposed to performing more womanly chores. It is most specifically in contradiction to the example of Margaret More, daughter of Thomas More, who was praised not for her erudition, but for her “privacy” (Jones, Eros. 22-3). Labé insists that the women who answer her call do so in the public manner implied when she writes, “non dédaigner la gloire.”

In this she is keenly perceptive. It is not enough for a woman simply to write. It must be done well (“le faire songneusement”) and one must accept the public acclaim that comes from the work. Labé has no time for the woman who writes

® See for example Marguerite de Navarre’s Introductory poem to her collection Les Marguerites de la marguerite de princesses, where she asks the reader to give heed only to the content and to excuse the flawed form.

This idea of obligatory writing is one we have already seen in Godbout's Salut. Galameau! (73). 166 anonymously, or under a man’s name, or who refuses to acknowledge the importance of her accomplishments.

Women’s literary production is as much a concern for Brossard. Like

Labé, she too wishes to encourage women to become writers and participate in the act of literary creation. Brossard has shown this continually throughout her career through her involvement with such enterprises as L’intégrale, éditrice a women’s publishing house. In her writing she encourages women to participate in the literary adventure by signalling that she too, the woman reader, creates meaning in the text written by Brossard (Godard, “Mapmaking,”

15). In a radical departure from the portrayal of writing and literature as a male domain, Brossard remarks in “E muet m utant,” that writing, as an act of self­ disclosure/ self-exposure, is an inherently feminine act (54), and elsewhere she clearly indicates that she sees women’s writing as a launchpad for more women’s writing. This is in part indicated through her frequent mention and citation of other women authors, and particularly feminist authors. This function of writing to produce writing is also implied through Brossard’s repeated use of the spiral as a symbol of feminist reality and feminist endeavor. Every segment added to the spiral increases the area covered by the form and for Brossard, a woman’s text becomes part of the spiral that is women’s presence and experience. Given that in several of her writings the woman’s body and sometimes the woman herself is represented by a curve, one can see that the spiral is, in effect, the composite of these curves, an equation where the whole is truly greater than the sum of its parts.

The community implied by Brossard’s collectively formed spiral has an echo in the work of Labé. Labé’s first Elegie indicates the presence of such a community, “Dames, qui les lirez,/ De mes regrets avec moy soupirez./

167 Possible un jour je feray le semblable...” (w.43-45, 108). She would seem to seek to spread the flame that burns within her not only to her negligent lover, but also to the community of women that have gathered to support her or to criticize her. This mutual support for the woman writer is expressed in no uncertain terms in the Epitre. "Pource nous faut il animer l'une l’autre à si louable entreprise (41).” Like writing itself, this support for the woman writer is transformed by the imperative “faut” into a public duty.

Women’s desire is politicized through Labé’s re-claiming of the “carpe diem" theme, a matter also discussed by Ann Rosalind Jones in her work The

Currencv of Eros (175)." Frequently used by male poets, such as Ronsard, in order to seduce young women resistant to the male poet’s charms, the threat is used to different and less selfish purposes in the Euvres of Labé. More than once she writes of women who disdained love when they were young and who then made fools of themselves in old age trying to find love returned. Because they did not love when the time was right, they find that social pressures will mock their efforts later. Due to Labé’s equation in her work of desire with writing,’^ the same may be implied for those who do not take up pen and paper now that the opportunity is afforded them. This reinterpretation of the message of “carpe diem” lends a political urgency to these poems. Since the time to write is now, as emphasized in the Epitre. the woman who waits runs a considerable risk. In her poems addressed to the Dames Lionnoises she betrays a concern that the other women will be hostile to her efforts and not follow her lead and so she threatens them with losing the opportunity. It is a politicization of desire that may be considered an antecedent to the twentieth- century feminist dogma that the personal is political. Labé’s warnings were not See for example Elegie I, w.95-112 (109-10).

' This subject will be treated in more detail below. 168 alarmist- Berriot. in discussing the social climate soon after the publication of the Euvres. shows that Labé was right. Female authors writing during this period of time would write to apologize for writing or write in praise of the distaff and spindle Labé disdained (175-76). The conservative political forces defining the virtuous woman as a silent woman would win out, and authors such as Louise Labé would have their reputations come under attack as women’s outspokenness became equated with prostitution (Jones, “City

Women," 302-3). That this viewpoint became dominant is revealed in that the prevailing opinion on Labé from the time of her death until late this century was that la Belle Cordière was a courtesan, a high-class prostitute.’^

Labé’s efforts in her poetry to pre-empt her critics (the appeals to the women of Lyon) are an indication of her appreciation of the risks, hence the sense of urgency in her effort to encourage other women to write. Elegie I, in which she promises to return the support for which she asks from the women of

Lyon, follows closely upon the heels of the Débat. Here Apolon’“ sides with

Amour against Folie. In this Débat. Folie comes to stand for all outspoken women, so it is no coincidence that the forces ranged against her are two male gods, one representing the subject matter of Labé’s poetry (Amour) and the other the patron of poets himself (Apolon). Amour and Apolon together represent the severes loix des hommes" evoked in the opening lines of the

Epitre. Apolon and Amour in the Débat both play the role of limiting males.

That is to say, they restrict their gifts to certain individuals as indicated in their disdain for the lower classes and the elderly in matters of love, and (especially for Amour) for women in general. Deborah Baker also notes this limiting role

Dorothy O'Connor in her Louise Labé. sa vie et son oeuvre is an example of just such a twentieth century critic.

This is Labé’s spelling. 169 played by Apolon in her book, The Subject of Desire (95). Amour’s low opinion

of women, his sexism, is most clear when he speaks of Athena, warrior-

goddess of wisdom, and the only one of the gods over whom he has had no

sway. Amour’s explanation for why this is so is pure insult; “Et ne m’a Pallas

espouvanté de son bouclier; mais ne lay voulu interrompre de ses s utils

ouvrages, ou jour et nuit elle s’employe (50).” In typical macho bravado, he daims not to have been frightened off by her attributes as a warrior (her

bouclierl but rather he did not wish to interrupt her weaving (“ses sutils

ouvrages”)- women’s work. The statement rings as false as some of his earlier

boasts where Folie catches him in the lie. In Elegie I. however, Labé indicates that Apolon has (for the moment at least) changed sides, stating that while he earlier did not permit her write poetry, now he prods her to do so (“Encor

Phebus.../ N’avoit permis que je fisse des vers;/ Mais maintenant.../ Chanter me fait” (w .7-11, 107)). With this in mind, this Elegie then becomes an echo of

Labé’s call to action “Estant le tems venu. Mademoiselle, que les sévères loix des hommes n’empeschent plus les femmes de s’apiiquer aus sciences et disciplines:” (41, my emphasis).

As has been mentioned, Labé has made it clear that she has published her work not because she thinks it is brilliant, but as an example for other women to improve upon. Rather than see this as false modesty, perhaps we would do well to take Labé at her word and see exactly to what extent her

Euvres resemble a blueprint of this kind. Intriguingly, her Sonnet II (“O beaus yeus bruns”) can be interpreted as a list of “essay questions” to help her fellow

Lyonnaises respond to her call in the Epitre dédicatoire.

O beaus yeus bruns, ô regars destournez, O Chaus soupirs, ô larmes espandues O noires nuits vainement atendues, O jours luisans vainement retournez: 170 o tristes pleins, ô désirs obstinez, O tems perdu, ô pleines despendues, O mile morts en mile rets tendues, O pires maus contre moy destinez.

O ris, ô front, cheveus, bras, mains et doits: O lut pleintif, viole archet et vois: Tant de flambeaus pour ardre une femmelle!

De toy me pleins, que tant de feus portant. En tant d’endroits d'iceus mon cœur tatant. N’en est sur toy volé quelque estincelle.

Her first two quatrains and the first two lines of the first tercet present to her women readers a list of subjects suitable for poems. She says as much in the final line of the first tercet if one permits an interpretation of "ardre" as "to inspire.” Her final tercet could then be read as a reproach to her readers for not having written yet. The speaker is filled with inspiration to write, and complains that her enthusiasm has not rubbed off on her (ideally female) reader. It is not a particularly unrealistic interpretation, for Labé has already established a precedent by which her calls to other dames to be open to love or desire can be interpreted as calls to write. After all, "le plus grand plaisir qui soit après amour, c’est d’en parler (Débat. 76).” This sonnet’s role as “instructions” to a potential woman poet is highlighted by its position in the work. It appears not merely near the beginning of her sonnet cycle, it is the first in this cycle written in French.’® We remember that Labé, in her Epitre. has addressed her work to women she wishes to encourage to intellectual pursuit. So her sonnets open with a list of instructions (Sonnet II), followed by numerous examples (Sonnets lll-XXlll), and close with a remark to her female readers not to fault her for having loved and written about it (Sonnet XXIV, “Ne reprenez. Dames, si j ay aymé”).

Sonnet I is In Italian. 171 In making this call to aspiring or potential women writers, Labé and

Brossard confront the issue of nationalism. The concept of nation was still in its infancy in the sixteenth century. In many cases regional ties were as strong and perhaps even stronger than national ones. As Labé signs her works “Louïze

Labé Lionnoize” we see that she was no exception to this rule. Her identity as a citizen of Lyon was of great importance to her. and her work reveals that she felt

Lyon to be her primary social context. If Labé demonstrates more profound provincial ties compared to the other sixteenth-century authors we have seen, this may be linked to one of two possible causes. One the one hand she wrote earlier in the century than did Michel de Montaigne or Marguerite de Navarre and it is not unreasonable to presume that the idea of “Frenchness" may have held greater meaning at the end of the century than at the beginning for any number of reasons. We also cannot forget that Lyon's particular status as a cultural rival to Paris and former Capitale des Gaules would certainly have encouraged a strong local pride. Yet we can also read in Labé’s work signs that she was warming to the idea of Frenchness, and participation in a nation on the ascendant seems to have appealed to her, and her choice of language

(not merely the decision to write in French, but as we shall see the kind of

French which she used) may be evidence of this. A sense of nationalism may also be perceived in Labé’s aggressive Frenchification of the sonnet form and the manner in which she vigorously argues with the traditions inherited from Petrarch (Rigolot, Louise Labé Lyonnaise. 104). A particularly striking indication of nationalist sentiment can be found in the way in which she describes her international fame in her second elegy. She writes:

Non seulement en France suis flatee. Et beaucoup plus, que ne veus, exaltee. La terre aussi que Calpe et Pyrenee Avec la mer tiennent environnée, 172 Du large Rhin les roulantes areines, Le beau païs auquel or’te promeines, ont entendu (tu me l'as fait à croire) Que gens d'esprit me donne quelque gloire. (Elegie II, w.60-68; 112-113)

Reading over this one might note that she describes her fame has spreading

out from France to Spain, Germany and Italy. However, France is the only one

of these four countries that Labé actually mentions by name. In particular we

should notice how she deals with Italy, France's primary cultural rival. To

reduce Italy's relative importance it is not described by any distinguishing

geography, as are Spain (“Calpe et Pyrenee") and Germany (“Du large Rhin les

roulantes areines”). In this passage, Italy is described only as the country

where the beloved, presumably a Frenchman, is to be found (elsewhere this

poem reveals the beloved to be somewhere along the Po). In other words,

what distinguishes Italy is that a particular Frenchman is there. One can even

wonder if Italy is “beau" in its own right or only because of the presence of the

French beloved. So what we have here is not really “France, Spain, Germany

and Italy” but something rather more like “France and the surrounding

territories" or even “France and Greater France," the former empire of

Charlemagne. Karine Berriot remarks that the expansion of France was a

source of pride in sixteenth-century Lyon, a period when Brittany, Provence and

Roussillon had recently been definitively attached to the kingdom (La belle

rebelle. 55). Equally significant to a nationalist reading of this passage are the claims of the king of France to large parts of “le beau païs or'te promeines" and the rival pretentions to European dominance of the king of France and the Holy Roman Emperor. We could almost read this description of Labé's spreading fame as a nationalist prophecy of the growth of France.

173 Brossard’s intersection with the nationalist movement in Quebec is

somewhat different. Quebec’s feminists during the early 1970’s were allied with

the nationalist movement, an alliance signalled by the slogan used by the

Québécois feminist movement of this time, “Pas de Québec libre sans libération des femmes! Pas de femmes libres sans la libération du Québec! ” (Gould,

Writing in the Feminine. 11). However, the two movements eventually parted ways. Disaffection with the nationalists among feminists and women’s organizations stemmed largely, as we have seen, from the tendency among the nationalists and the littérature de modernité that accompanied them to neglect or erase gender difference (Gould, 26-28). Another point of tension between feminists and the nationalist movement was a growing concern over the declining birthrate of francophone Québécois. Obviously Quebec’s feminists were not eager to take the blame for Quebec’s population problems, and were certainly not going to advocate selling their bodies to the nationalist cause in a reprise of the revanche des berceaux.'^ Brossard’s writing reflects this, a disappointment in the particular nationalism, not a rejection of their goal of a free Quebec. Québec libre, yes; but not just any free Quebec, and not at any price, particularly not at women’s expense.

Still, we can see evidence of a certain sympathy with the national cause in several of her works. Consider for example the poems “Plus après comme avant" and “Tabarnak,” both of which refer to the War Measures Act of October

1970. In the latter poem Brossard writes: l’encre vive abcdePghijkLmnopQrstuvwxyz

The revanche des berceaux refers to the astronomical birth rate typical of the French-Canadians until about the Quiet Revolution, and which is credited with maintaining a French presence in Canada after the Conquest despite British assimilationist policies and a lack of French immigration.

174 Here she deconstructs the power of the FLQ (Front de Libération du QuébecV which so frightened the Canadian federal government that it Invoked the War

Measures Act against Its own people. She separates the components of the abbreviation harmlessly among the other letters of the alphabet, where as only

3 capitalized letters out of twenty-six reveals them to be the minority the militants of the FLQ always were. Yet also, by embedding the sign of the Front de Libération du Québec In the alphabet and revealing that they occur

“naturally” In this order, F-L-Q, she also visually emphasizes the vital link between the issue of Quebec’s liberation and national aspirations- violently foregrounded by the FLQ’s terrorist campaign— and the Québécois language, represented by the most basic units of writing Itself. To this extent, the activities of the FLQ and the political power of the abbreviation bring the ink to life, “I'encre vive.”

In this nationalist light, it Is also significant to read from Brossard’s Journal Intime, the passage describing a visit to her sister living in London.

Le 39 Emperor’s Gate, là où habite ma sœur Francine, dans son exil londonnien qu elle choisit et aime quotidiennement. Peut-être à cause de nos ancêtres les Anglais et de ma grand-mère Alice Gretham De Lorimler. Moi, j’ai gardé le côté Chevalier De Lorimier. C’est maintenant l’heure du thé. Je me plie de bonnes grâces à l’usage. Une voisine de chambre se joint à nous pour la tradition. C’est une vieille dame très distinguée. Elle répète souvent l’expression «civilized people» et tout l’empire britannique à chaque fols me r’vole dans face. (82)

One can easily appreciate the Irony In the passage, evident in the sister’s address at “Emperor’s Gate,” the expression “nos ancêtres les Anglais” In echo of the French text-book phrase “nos ancêtres les Gaulois,” and the crowning irony that the anglophile sister Is named Francine. Separating “nos ancêtres 175 les Anglais” from an actual English ancestor (the grandmother Alice Gretham)

seems to signal a jab at a tendency within Canada to present English traditions

as a pan-Canadian heritage. It is the encounter with the elderly neighbor that

most clearly reveals Brossard’s nationalist streak. Her reaction to the repeated

invocation of “civilized people” is expressed in Québécois dialectical French.

We are reminded that in the eyes of the British masters of Canada the French

Canadians were (are) not “civilized people.” It is also interesting to note the slight subversion that Brossard introduces into her citation of this woman. She cites her. not in her own system of orthography, but in the American, writing

“civilized” instead of “civilised.” We should also note that this entry is dated “le 3

juin 1970,” the year of the FLQ kidnappings and the War Measures Act. Still

more interesting Is that the nationalist streak evident in these touches seems to

have prevented Brossard. at least in this encounter, from reaching out to these

two women in their common womanhood. As we have seen that she will not be

nationalist at the cost of her feminism, so too it seems that she will not be feminist at the cost of her québécité.

In French kiss the linguistic-cultural conflict is again invoked as Marielle’s

mauve automobile passes through the city. (The unusual color of this vehicle

may well be the result of introducing the blue of Quebec into the Canadian

colors of red and white.)" While Marielle drives through Montreal we are able

read the names of the streets which she passes by: Charlemagne, Jeanne

d’Arc, d'Orleans and Bourbon (the only streets where it is suitable to park (42))

The original design upon which the current Canadian national flag is based had two blue stripes on both ends instead of red (William Crampton. The Complete Guide to Flags. “Canada."130). The blue stripes were to represent the Canadian national motto, “A Mari Usque Ad Mare." “From Sea to S e a ” The decision to change the blue panels for red was to avoid the same red, white and blue combination found in the flags of the U.S., Great Britain, and France in order to create a distinctly Canadian combination (Crampton, 130). However, it has not escaped notice that this excised the French-Canadian blue from the national colors, leaving only the colors of the flag of England (a white field with a red cross throughout). 176 and the Plains of Abraham. These names invoke great figures in French history, the last French sovereigns to govern Quebec (Bourbon), and the site of

French Canada’s last stand against the conquering English. Lastly we can point to a passage in her Journal intime where once again she speaks of nationalism with an implied criticism, but not a condemnation in Note 24. This note is almost certainly a reference to June 24, la Saint-Jean-Baptiste. the national holiday for French Canadians in general and the Québécois in particular. “Note 24” reads:

A force de regarder de biais, les yeux du politique se sont éteints. Il n’y aura pas de pays, il n’y aura que des chansons pour les anciens de Brébeuf et du Sainte-Marie. (88)

Notice that the object of the criticism is not the nation, not le oavs. but la politique. The warning “il n'y aura pas de pays,” seems to imply that this loss is a bad thing, thereby indicating possible support for the nationalists’ ultimate goal (a sovereign French Quebec) if not their politics.

In encouraging women to write, Labé and Brossard consciously seek to make a contribution to a national literature, this contribution being the inclusion of a woman’s voice into the national literary dialogue. One way in which they accomplish this is through the invocation of famous women. These women have two functions, either to serve as literary precedents, or as national symbols. For Louise Labé, these female precedents come largely in the form of famous women of Antiquity. Perhaps the most famous of these is Sappho, and the importance of Sappho to Labé’s work as a precedent for women’s writing is the subject of the first chapter of François Rigolot’s work on Labé, Louise Labé

Lyonnaise ou la Renaissance au féminin. She will also evoke Diane de Poitiers, mistress of Henri II, and Laura, the object of the poet’s desire in

177 Petrarch’s Canzoniere. For Brossard. these appeals to the model provided by

famous women are largely made to other women writers, but she also invokes the legendary figures of La Corriveau. and the Québécois mother.

Labé’s Sonnet XIX (“Diane estant en I’espesseur d’un bois”) invokes an

image at once both feminist and nationalist. Here we have a reference not only

to the strong female Diana, goddess of the hunt, but also to Diane de Poitiers,

mistress of Henri II, king of France. In the woods, the speaker (addressed in the

poem as “Nynfe estonnee”) hears a voice asking her, “Que ne t’es tu vers Diane tournee?” Diana has excelled in a field considered to be dominated by men (hunting), and does so with no thought or concern for besmirching her

reputation. She remains Diana the chaste. Diana is properly a woman’s patron and inspiration, as the goddess neither requires nor desires the company and approval of men. The goddess can also serve as a defender of outspoken women, and protectress of their interests against the chauvinistic gods presented in the Débat. As an archer, she is able to rival the impudent Amour and is sister to Amour’s advocate, Apollo. She also shares her name with the king’s consort, Diane de Poitiers, probably the most highly favored woman in the kingdom of France, a coincidence which adds nationalist colors to Diana’s patronage in this period of growing national pride. It may seem a bit odd for a woman with a feminist bent like Labé to hold up a consort or mistress as a model of any kind. Still, it must be remembered that in sixteenth-century France opposition to the Salic Law through the suggestion that a woman might become a reigning Queen in her own right would have been the equivalent of supporting the claim of the English king to the French crown.’® The position of the king’s mistress was probably the highest political office to which a French The king of England’s matrillneal claim to the throne of France was the cause of the Hundred Years War. This claim was refuted by the Salic Law, which prevents a woman from becoming a reigning queen and also prevents her from passing a claim to the throne to her sons. 178 woman could aspire, and French history has several examples of kings’ mistresses who exercized political influence for good or ill. It is also of significance, particularly for the work of Labé, that the function of the king's mistress effectively demonstrates the political potential of desire. The importance of the dynastic and diplomatic functions of royal marriages at this time would tend to pre-empt any role desire might play in the influence a king's wife might exercize on affairs of state. Laura also functions as a national symbol for Labé, especially as Labé must confront the issue of writing in French as a woman in a genre long dominated by men writing in Italian. Labé invokes Petrarch's beloved in her first elegy when she describes Phebus as “ami des Lauriers vers." The meanings of “Lauriers vers" are multiple insofar as “vers" could mean "green" or

“lines of poetry." “Lauriers” means, of course, “laurel(s),” the tree sacred to

Apollo (Phebus) as patron of poets. Yet it also invokes the name of Laura, beloved of Petrarch in his famous Canzoniere. To inscribe her verse under the sign of Laura rather than that of Petrarch himself has strong implications for both her nation and her sex. Marking her verses as “Lauriers” (if one reads this as an adjective derived from the name “Laure") rather than “Petrarquistes” shows that she is now speaking for the silenced female partner of all the

Petrarchan tradition. This role of Laura as, like Sappho, a female precedent for

Labé’s literary project is the subject of the second chapter of Rigolot's Louise Labé Lyonnaise. His chapter focuses primarily on giving a voice to Laura as a means of likewise permitting the woman writer to speak. However Labé, in using Laura's name as a label for her works, not only feminizes the tradition under which she writes, but nationalizes it as well. Laura, as the tradition goes, was French, having lived and died in Avignon, in France. The Frenchness of

179 Laura would have been prominent In the minds of Louise Labé and her contemporaries since the poet Maurice Scève, Lyonnese like Labé, had just

“discovered" Laura’s tomb in 1533. This find was of such national importance that Francis I himself made a pilgrimage to this tomb (O’Connor, 28). Petrarch, therefore, had silenced not just a woman’s voice, but a French-speaking voice as well, a historical wrong that Labé's Euvres would correct. In this way Labé responds to the twin problems noted by Deborah Baker in her work. The

Subject. Of.Peslrg.: ...(T)he quandary of whether to write in French when the dominant tradition is Italian could be viewed as analogous to the global problem... that of how to write love lyric as a woman when the dominant tradition is male. (130)

Writing in Laura’s tradition rather than in Petrarch’s, Labé has found the precedent she needs for women’s French-language love lyric, that of the silenced partner in this tradition’s famous antecedent, Petrarch’s Canzoniere. The first sonnet in Labé’s collection is written in Italian, and so demonstrates she is able to write in this medium. By switching to French with the second sonnet, we can read a rejection of Petrarch’s silencing of the French voice and a nationalization of the sonnet form.

Likewise invoking famous women, Brossard’s L’Amèr is regularly punctuated by citations from other women, and especially feminist, authors, such as Luce Irigaray, Monique Wittig, and France Théoret. The citations reinforce the impression that women’s writing is a collective effort, anchoring

Brossard’s own writing within a distinct tradition with its own heroines. It produces an effect similar to the one we have seen in Marguerite de Navarre’s work where Marguerite supports her statements with citations from Scripture. In

Quebec legend, Brossard finds a national feminist symbol in the figure of ia_ 180 Corriveau. The legend of la Corriveau is a fairly old one in Quebec folklore and is based in historical fact. In 1763 Marie Josephte Corriveau was convicted of the murder of her husband. For this crime she was executed and her body displayed along a public road in a gibbet.’® According to legend, la Corriveau now haunts the stretch of road where she was displayed, trying to seize the unwary through the bars of her cage (or, alternatively, carrying the cage on her back). The literary history of la Corriveau is also old. We can read of it in the work of one of Quebec’s first novelists, Philippe Aubert de Gaspé (père) in his

Les Anciens Canadiens (40-43). La Corriveau is also alluded to in Anne

Hebert's Kamouraska.” Interestingly, la Corriveau. long a morbid legend inspiring some dread, was also at one time recuperated as a nationalist symbol, portrayed as the first Québécois victim of the English oppressors.^ Brossard uses la Corriveau as a feminist symbol. In French kiss, liberated of her cage, ia_ Corriveau becomes a symbol of female power (“des super sorcières chimères, des Corriveau sans cage" (92)). Nicole Brossard’s writing also extensively explores the figure of the mother, and the role of motherhood in women’s lives. To understand the importance of the mother in Quebec’s literary and national heritage, one must remember that, unlike the English, the French-Canadians could not rely on immigration from a French-speaking mother country to increase their numbers. The historical details and documentation for this trial are provided by Philippe Aubert de Gaspé (père) in an end-note to his novel Les Anciens Canadiens. The gibt>et is described as follows: “La cage... était constmite de gros fer feuillard. Elle imitait la forme humaine, ayant des bras et des jambes, et une boîte ronde pour la tête." Aubert de Gaspé also provides the rather fascinating information that this cage was eventually sold to Bamum's museum in New York (289- 294).

“ The influence of the legend of la Corriveau on Hékiert's novel is the subject of an article by Paul Cote, “Kamouraska ou l’influence d’une tradition." The French Review 63:1 (Oct 1989), pp99- 110.

Marie Josephte Corriveau was tried by court martial about three years after the British conquest of Canada (Aubert de Gaspé, 289). 181 The maintenance of a French-speaking population in Canada was due almost entirely to la revanche des berceaux, the astronomical birthrate typical of French-Canadian women until the Quiet Revolution. The result was to enshrine the Mother as a figure of national salvation. An important theme of Brossard’s

L’Amèr. we see the mother invoked in the title of the work; the presence of the grave accent over the “e” visually reinforces the homophony between the expressions “I’amer” and “la mère.” Translated into English under the title

“These Our Mothers" the work invites us to interpret the famous women cited within as (fore)mothers to the aspiring female writer. The alliance that is established between motherhood and writing functions to bestow upon the woman writer a part of the Mother’s grace. These famous women are called upon, particularly in the work of Louise

Labé, to provide the safety of numbers to potential women writers who might fear the public eye. Labé’s Débat de Folie et d’Amour is in part a lesson in the importance of accepting public acclaim. Four times in the first discours Amour makes statements that he has no idea who Folie is (49, 50, 52, 54), twice calling her an unknown woman (“femme inconnue’’- 50, 54) and using this epithet insultingly. To a certain extent this demonstrates Amour’s own hubris and ignorance, but there are undertones of a critique of Folie on the part of the author, for up until now Folie has let Amour take the credit for a lot of her work.

This is implied when Folie explains, “Je suis celle qui te fay grand, et abaisse a mon plaisir. Tu lasches l’arc, et gettes les flesches en l’air; mais je les assois aus cœurs que je veus (52)." Obviously she wouldn’t need to explain this to him now if previously she had made more of an effort to get credit for her own efforts. Similarly, Mercure would not need to go into detail on the accomplishments of Folie if they were already generally known. Looked at in

182 this manner, the Epitre and the Débat read like a defense of famous women and through this defense Labé establishes a motivation and a justification for

those passages in her elegies and sonnets that might otherwise seem like

bragging. If indeed women of the sixteenth century are being accused of loose

morals for their public writing and fame, Labé rightly sees that the solution is to

have more women accept public fame for their accomplishments, not fewer.

Labé writes, “S'il y ha quelque chose recommendable après la gloire et

l'honneur, le plaisir que l'estude des lettres ha acoutumé donner nous y doit chacune inciter (42, my emphasis)." The importance of women attaining honor

and glory are such that Labé mentions these as more important results of study and writing, which therefore come before the pleasure that one might derive from it.

Of great importance to both Brossard’s and Labé's work is what is often called in Canada the “language question." Although there is some debate about how many and which languages were truly at Labé's disposal,“ one never gets the Impression that she wishes she had a different or better linguistic instrument. Since her first sonnet is written in Italian, and therefore demonstrates her ability to manipulate this language, Labé makes her writing in

French that much more of a deliberate choice. By opening her sonnet cycle in a privileged international language and then rejecting it for the native tongue,

Labé makes an obvious and deliberate choice of the one over the other. We have already seen to what extent Sonnet II (the first of her cycle in French) reads like an opening poem, listing the many virtues of her beloved as an inspiration. Labé indicates the foreign origin of her chosen artistic medium, the sonnet cycle, but then aggressively nationalizes the tradition.

“ See for example Kenneth Varty’s article “Life and Legend of Louise Labé" pages 97-98. 183 Labé’s language use indicates certain traits one might identify as

“nationalist." Dorothy O'Connor comments extensively on the “Frenchness” of her French, remarking a preference for more traditional French grammatical constructions and vocabulary over Italianisme (117-18). In fact, O'Connor describes her language use as “plutôt réactionnaire que novatrice (119).”

Continuing her analysis of Labé's language, she notes the relative absence of provincialisms and folk expressions with which one would expect her to have been familiar, given her social background as wife and daughter to ropemakers. O'Connor attributes this to an effort on Labé’s part to hide or suppress her humble origins (123). O'Connor's characterization of Labé's language is quite interesting, but the motivation that she assumes is behind this language use is questionable. Rather than seeing her preference for “true”

French vocabulary (as opposed to “Italianized" French) as merely indicating an opposition to innovation, it would seem that pride in the national language, which inspires resistance in France today against anglicisms, is an equally likely motivation. We must also remember that Labé is working in a genre whose Italian origins are known, and in her day this genre may still have been considered foreign. Avoiding italianisme is a persuasive way of nationalizing the sonnet form. “Class embarassmenf seems an unlikely motivation for a woman celebrated in her lifetime under the name “la Belle Cordière,” and far from supressing these “humble origins" she frequently invokes her status as ropemaker s wife and ropemaker s daughter through the repeated mention of

“cordes” in her poetry. Her avoidance of provincial and folk expressions may more likely be attributed to a desire to contribute to the development of a national literature rather than a local one, hence the preference for expressions accepted on a wider distribution. This last consideration would bring her writing

184 into line with the nationalist goals of the Pléiade as outlined in DuBellay’s

Deffence et illustration de la langue françoyse.

Brossard’s work reveals a similar linguistic strategy, that being the literary adoption of Québécois French. On the far extreme of this strategy we have the “littérature ioualisante.” discussed in the introduction. Brossard’s writing reveals some influences of this literature in joual particularly in her earlier poems and texts. More generally we see what might be considered the

“moderate” position. Québécois authors today, Brossard included, write in so- called “standard” French, but include québécismes without apology. On the one hand this espousal of regionalism may appear opposed to the language use we have noted in the work of Labé. A second examination, however reveals that the tactic is nearly identical. The “standard” French of Quebec is not the same as the “standard” French of France. Use of the Gallic standard would mean, therefore, to write in someone else’s national language. As the use of ioual marks a work as unmistakeably Québécois, Brossard’s feminist project seeks a similar form of expression for women, a “women’s ioual.” as it were. Karen Gould comments upon the writing of the body n 'écriture du corps”) as a focus for radical subversion and innovation in Quebec women’s writing (Writing in the Feminine. 45), and in this light it is tempting to regard this “body writing,” particularly as practiced by Brossard, as a sort of women’s jouai.

In pursuing this woman-centered writing, Brossard subverts language, grammar and literary genre. Her French kiss is a subversion of the form of the novel, as she plays with different fonts of type and even includes a comic strip as one of the chapters. We see in her Journal intime a profound subversion of the journal form. Stating clearly at the beginning of the work that it was begun

January 26, 1983 and ended on March 28, 1983, we find that Brossard

185 nevertheless includes dates both before and after this period of time. The chronologically earliest (but not first) entry in the journal is dated July 31, 1963, and the chronologically latest June 1. 1983, while there are undated entries listed after this one that appear to refer to dates after June 1. Not only that, but she does not follow chronological order in the presentation of the entries. An important result of this subversion of the traditional journal is that it removes the focus from the authority of linear time and places this focus squarely on the woman to whom the journal is supposed to be intime.

For both of these women, Labé and Brossard, what seems to be apparent is that traditional literary forms are inadequate to express the voice of women. While women’s desire may not be new, overt expression of it is, and in order to create a place for it in a national dialogue, a space must be created through literary innovation and a challenge to the traditional views of writing.

Barbara Godard observes that in making this challenge Brossard’s work rejects the Lacanian-inspired image of writing by positing not a pen-phallus penetrating a passive blank page- vagina,^ but rather a pen-clitoris that explores the female body as blank page. This page-body is portrayed not as a passive victim, but rather as an active participant, where the spaces and blanks of the page participate in the creation of meaning as much as do the marks left by the pen (Godard, “Mapmaking,” 16). As Brossard describes it in “E muet mutant,” “Sexe son sexe son écrit, elle n’écrit pas les jambes croisées (Double impression. 59).” Writing is here depicted as a sexual, genital act. In stating that a woman’s sex is sex and her writing is also sex, Brossard demonstrates that for a woman to write as a woman, it is tantamount to revealing her genitalia, a clinical demonstration of one’s gender echoing the obstetrician’s announcement of an infant’s sex. ” It is Godard who Identifies this interpretation of writing as “Lacanian.” 186 The appropriation of the phallic pen is also evident in the work of her sixteenth-century sister. On the one hand, Labé makes a clear declaration along these lines in the opening Epitre. calling upon her fellow women to write.

Folie in the Débat similarly appropriates the phallic tools of Amour, as she indicates that even though he is the one who releases the arrows, it is she who plants them into her selected targets; “Tu lasches I'arc, et gettes les flesches en l’air; mais ie les assois aus cœurs que je veus (52, my emphasis).” It is also evoked in her poetry. In her first sonnet, “ Non havria Ulysse o qualunqu’altro mai,” Labé makes a reference to the scorpion’s stinger (“Punta d’un Scorpio”).

This penetrating object is allied to the pen, and is appropriated by the female speaker through Labé’s identification in the Epitre of writing as a woman’s activity by right. This move is supported in Labé’s sexually most risqué poem.

Sonnet XVIII (“Baise m encor”), especially by the final line “Si hors de moy ne fay quelque saillie.” Baise m’encor, rebaise moy et baise; Donne m’en un de tes plus savoureus, Donne m’en un de tes plus amoureus: Je t’en rendray quatre plus chaus que braise.

Las, te plains-tu? ça que ce mal j ’apaise. En t’en donnant dix autres doucereus. Ainsi meslans nos baisers tant heureus Jouissons nous l’un de l’autre à notre aise.

Lors double vie à chacun en suivra Chacun en son ami vivra. Permets m’Amour penser quelque folie:

Toujours suis mal, vivant discrettement. Et ne me puis donner contentement. Si hors de moy ne fay quelque saillie.

This word “saillie” has been much analyzed by François Rigolot and others as an intentionally sexually aggressive move, having not only military 187 connotations, but also indicating the role of the male in intercourse between

animals. These repeated appropriations of the pen could also be considered

as military saillies, forceful attempts to carve out a space for women’s writing.

Importantly, though, we must remember in this poem, it is not the military

aggression that is foregrounded, but rather the baiser. If the use of the term

saillie indicates that her actions have a military style or intention (the conquest

of the domain of writing) her writing itself is not allied to swordplay, but kissing.

Like the image Godard notes in Brossard’s writing of clitoral pen collaborating

with corporal page, the kisses here are clearly identified as a desirous exchange.

For both of these writers, the mouth plays a privileged role in their

exploration of desire and identity. As the organ of language, it highlights the

language-based national identity for both women. In both societies, post-Quiet

Revolution Quebec and Renaissance France, national difference is most clearly

expressed linguistically and forms the basis of a strong similarity in their

exploration of identity. Women’s identity is expressed and explored through the

exploration and expression of desire, and especially the physical expression of

that desire. Labé and Brossard make extensive use of oral physical expression: talking, but also kissing (as we have seen in Labé’s Sonnet XVIII)

and licking. For Brossard this is seen in her use of the French kiss, title of her

1980 novel. This kiss with tongues permits her to unite this expression of desire with Quebec’s language question, as both tongue and language are langue in

French. In her “Je veux revoir cette séquence” she writes, “bouche, j’écris et je pense (Double impression. 113).’’ This mouth, a privileged tool of francophone and, as can be seen in Brossard’s work, of lesbian expression works here to identify the speaker.

188 For Labé, the mouth, its lips and its kissing are very personnally

identified with herself as poet, woman and Labé. Rigolot points out how

aggressively Labé inscribes herself into her own work (“Les baisers,” 15). What

he indicates is an ingenious play on the poet’s preferred surname, Labé.^ Due

to the similarity of the name “Labé” with the Latin word for lips (‘labia”), Louise identifies herself with the act of expression through her lips, speaking and

kissing, especially (as we have seen) in Sonnet XVIII ("Baise m encor"). Rigolot states that because she is Labé -lips -the kiss belongs to her intimately. While the link between this homophony and her Sonnet XVIII may seem a bit of a stretch, one of the poems published in her Euvres among the poems written in

her praise is the Latin poem “De Aloysæ Labææ Osculis” - “On the Kisses of

Louise Labé”- where the play on Labé-labia is made obvious.^ Thus Labé

reconstructs and reappropriates her own identity under this sign of the oral expression of desire.

It is this eighteenth sonnet that highlights the écrivaine identity of Louise

Labé. This union of Woman, Francophone and Writer is accomplished primarily through her use of the word saillie, deliberately left open to multiple interpretations. On the one hand, this saillie can be identified to the aggressive kissing described in the two quatrains. It can also be read as referring to her frank speech to her beloved. However, both the kissing and the conversation are hypothetical, for the speaker’s beloved is not there. His absence is indicated as she complains of her life lived “discrettement." discretely, but also separately (Rigolot, Louise Labé Lvonnaise. 223). In fact, the only truly present possible referent for this saillie is the writing and publication of this work of “Labé" was the name used by her father as a business name, having inherited it from the late husband of his first wife. Labé’s legal last name, as indicated in her will, was “Charly."

“ “Kiss" poetry, especially in Latin, was a widely practiced genre in the Renaissance. Rigolot cites several examples in his book Louise Labé Lyonnaise, ou la Renaissance au féminine (217-181. 189 poetry. In discussing Brossard’s French kiss. Gould writes, “In this way the

narrative of French kiss intentionally disconcerts and fascinates the reader by

fusing and confusing kissing and writing (74) " She could easily have said the

same thing of Labé’s work in the light of this Sonnet XVIII. The confusion of the

sign of love that is the kiss with the act of writing is an idea shared by Hélène

Gixous, who in her “Coming to Writing” states “Writing is a gesture of love (42).’’

Allying kissing with writing and through the semantic interconnections

established between baiser, labia and Labé, the poet has identified her writing

with her desire and ultimately her expression of self.

In “Simulation, ” Brossard writes: Face à la prose comme à l’histoire, pouvant susciter le nombre et les sécrétions du corps, de la structure, tout un rhythme dans la voie des mots de vive voix de l’echo: les musiques d’arômes à une époque où la proximité de la partenaire excite en moi le texte, un autre forme de résistance et de défaillance. fPouble impressiorr 95; my emphasis)

A parallel can be established between the function of arousal and desire in this

passage and in Labé’s Sonnet XVIII. Although there is the difference in the

location of the partner, absent for Labé but nearby for Brossard, we read of

arousal in both cases as a reaction inspired by the beloved. Brossard makes

explicit what is implicit in Labé’s poem: desire in both cases triggers text. In

characterizing writing as desire, Brossard overtly makes this desire a physical, even genital, act. In her poem “Si par exemple," we read its subtitle, “Les lèvres

sont l’origine." The origin indicated by the lèvres, already grammatically feminine, becomes more emphatically feminine as this line is transformed at the end of the poem into “les lèvres sont I’origyne (my emphasis).’’ The association between this origvne and writing occurs in the last two lines as a homophonie link is established between “lèvres" and “livres." 190 une fille dans un corps qui tend vers les livres les lèvres sont l’origyne (Double impression. 123)

The “origin" cornes up again in L’Amèr with the repeated references to “A” as

the origin, as in for example, “A I’origine. AAAAA (17).” This recalls the function

of the letter “A” as the origin of writing due to its position as the first letter of our

alphabet, and the string of A's gives the impression of a sort of primal cry. “A”

read as “alpha” calls forth a sense of universal or spiritual origin as it is used as

in the title of Christ as the Alpha and the Omega. Indeed, one may ask whether

or not it is a coincidence that the number of A’s in the above citation

corresponds exactly to the number of letters in the words “Alpha” and “Omega."

This description of the origin is given a sexual sense when Brossard re-writes

the phrase as “L’origine du Ah! (12)”. Here the Alpha becomes a cry of sexual

pleasure. As the poem “Si par exemple” establishes a symbolic link between the text and the woman’s body, allvino livres to lèvres, this passage in L’Amèr

does so via the Alpha. The shape of the letter “A” suggests the figure of the

woman writer, she who “n’écrit pas les jambes croisées (“E muet mutant.

Double impression. 59).” In the work of Brossard, the origins of writing and of

life and of sexual pleasure become semantically linked.

In Labé’s Euvres. the implied gender of the object of desire is male.

Labé’s poetry is in part addressed to an absent male beloved. In Brossard’s work, the object of desire is usually another woman. One of the outstanding counterexamples is the incestuous relationship between Marielle and

Alexandre in French kiss. However the novel as a whole is no exception to this rule. Lesbian encounters take place between all three women of the ménage à cinq formed by the characters of this novel. In fact, given that three of these characters appear to be somewhat allegorical (the characters named Elle,

191 Lexa, and Georgraphie-- Woman, Text, Geography) we are left with a lesbian

relationship between the two remaining characters whose function seems more

"literal" (as opposed to allegorical), Lucy and Camomille. It should come as no surprise that one of these women, Lucy, is a writer. It is the relationship

between Marielle and her brother Alexandre that provides an interesting

illustration of the relationship between the woman writer and the text. As their

nicknames “Elle” and “Lexa" indicate, their relationship is symbolic of a

desirous, sexual relationship between Woman (Elle) and Text (Lexa), a point which is made clear in this citation:

Lexa je t’aime songe Marielle. (...) Lexique au choix. Lexa double salive et l’orthographe qui se laisse faire des touchers partout surtout. (79)

Once again we see the link between oral physical expression, signalled by

“salive.” and writing (‘orthographe’”). Lexa incarnates the text, the reading of

which is here depicted as exploring caresses. Portrayed both as lovers and as

brother and sister of unseen parents,^ Elle and Lexa recall another similar

couple, that of Eve and Adam, and at the birth of their child we can read the

interaction of Woman and Text as fulfilling the command given in Genesis to be fruitful and multiply.

As Labé and Brossard demonstrate that women write with their bodies, we also see these authors write the body. This image is brought to the fore as

Brossard explores what she refers to as the “cortex” (corps-texte. body-text) producing a synonymy between an author’s body of work and her own physical body. This notion was not foreign to the sixteenth century. We have seen

Michel de Montaigne use it in his Essays and this imagery figured prominently in sexist arguments against women’s writing. As a woman’s body should not

“ There is no mention of their parents in the novel. 192 be exposed to public view, neither should her writing. For her to expose her

texte is as indecent as the exposure of her coros.^

The woman’s body is present in Brossard’s text on a very graphic level.

Lips, breasts, vulvas, clitorises, blood, saliva and other bodily fluids abound in

her text, making the exploration of the female body, the bodily presence of

Woman, very literal. This has the effect of re-placing the female in a social

structure where male-dominated sciences and other intellectual disciplines

have posited only the male body, under the guise of a supposed “neutral,"

where the Human has been in fact a huMan. The very graphic presence of the

female body reinforces this depiction of the act of reading as a lesbian

performance. In her presentation of women’s experience, Brossard’s text is unequivocally a lesbian text. As she writes in L'Amèr. “S’il n’était lesbien, ce

texte n’aurait point de sens. Tout à la fois matrice, matière et production (L’Amèr. 14).’’ The text is written as a lesbian economy, produced by a lesbian

writer for a lesbian reader. The act of writing itself in Brossard’s text is

described in this citation as a lesbian act. The mutual creation of meaning by

woman writer and woman reader, so important to Brossard’s literary project, is

achieved as the two women meet in mutual desire at the surface of the cortex/

corps-texte. this surface being the skin-page.

Louise Forsyth describes Brossard as believing that the discovery of

women’s reality involves not only an encounter in textual space, but also a

physical encounter through touching (“Nicole Brossard,” 215). Brossard’s text,

as we have discussed, seeks not only to facilitate this sexual encounter but also to become this encounter, hence her development of the notion of the corps-

texte. This body-text is the point of encounter between writer and reader. The

^ This observation is discussed in many works treating women’s writing in the Renaissance, as in Jones’s The Currency of Eros, among many others. 193 eroticization of the act of writing, coupled with the repeated portrayal of the interaction between writer and reader as a sexual one, makes clear that the reader in Brossard's text is expected to respond to the writer’s performance of lesbian desire with a lesbian performance of her own. As we have seen that a woman who writes as a woman subjects herself to a literary exposure of her woman's body, similarly, in the work of Brossard, we see that to write as a lesbian is effectively to expose one's sex life, an implication Brossard makes no effort to avoid, but rather embraces. The lesbian exchange insisted upon between writer and reader is portrayed vividly in Brossard s short work. Sous la langue. The moral and legal codes of sixteenth-century France would have made it impossible for Labé to be as graphic as Brossard in her portrayal of female desire. Still, Labé joins this action of Brossard, attempting to re-instate the human female reality. On the one hand, she has rejected in more than one sonnet the tradition of the enumeration of the beloved's physical traits, most specifically in Sonnet XXI (“Quelle grandeur rend I'homme venerable?"). This may well be a protest against those unreal Petrarchan women created out of bits and pieces- eyes of suns, hair of gold, skin of alabaster, cheeks of roses and coral lips. These are not the bodies of women born of the union of male and female, but a creation by male alone, a sort of freakish combination of

Pygmalion’s Galatea and Frankenstein's monster. The lesbian interaction that characterizes Brossard's corpus is also not necessarily absent from Labé's text.

As has been mentioned, sixteenth-century ideology established the equivalency between a woman's words and a woman's body. Labé is therefore inviting the Dames Lionnoises to a lesbian, or at least homoerotic, exchange. She calls upon her fellow Lyonnaises to explore her exposed

194 corps-texte, an act of readership which she promises to reciprocate by reading/ exploring their own exposed corps-textes. produced through the act of desire that is writing.

Instead of Brossard’s frank descriptions of human sexuality, what one finds in Labé’s Euvres is a subtle undercurrent of implied nudity in her work.

This can be elicited most easily in her Débat. As gods of the Greek pantheon,

Folie and Amour are most probably naked, for the Greeks preferred to portray their gods in the nude, and tradition has always portrayed Cupid as a naked child. For the ancient Greeks, the perfection of the deity is honored in the portrayal of a perfect physical form. The same is also true of classical heroes and athletes. On the other end of the spectrum, nudity is also common to witches and whores. Witches are associated with nakedness, because their legendary sabbaths were envisioned as being part orgy, and also because nudity is said to have symbolized the equality of the participants. The association of nudity with whores is obvious, and is the unstated accusation made by those who condemned women writers for exposing too much text.

The association of the witch to the outspoken female is made by Amour in

Labé’s Débat as he says to Folie, “A ce que je voy, tu dois estre quelque sorciers ou enchanteresse (52).” The historic example of the accusation of prosititution is the often-cited fact that John Calvin accused Labé of being a plebeia meretrix. It is evident in this list is that the honorable forms of nudity

(gods, heroes, athletes) are predominantly male and the dishonorable forms

(witch, whore) nearly exclusively female. Folie’s retort to Amour, “Je suis

Déesse comme tu es Dieu,” in effect establishes her right to present herself in this manner. The implication for writers is obvious. The male author can ally his self-exposure (or desire for self-exposure, as is the case for Montaigne) to

195 heroic nudes. For a female author like Labé, her right to heroic self-exposure is one that must be assertively made and closely defended. In one of the early aggresive saillies made by a woman in Labé’s Euvres. Folie in reaction

Amour’s challenge to her right to divine naked perfection does not cover herself, but rather strips Amour’s ability to see her perfection by blinding him.

Nicole Brossard discusses this nakedness as inherent to the writing experience. In “E muet mutant,” as Brossard discusses the féminité of the writer she writes, “S’offrir à la lecture, sans voile, au regard de l’autre (54).” This is a sentiment matched in Labé’s Euvres by Labé’s appeals to the Dames Lionnoises asking for a sympathetic reading, as she is aware that she, too, has offered herself to them in her work, sans voile.

The body of the text, like the woman’s body, is produced and explored through an act of desire, for both Labé and Brossard equate écrire with aimer/ désirer. This is particularly obvious in Labé’s appeals to women who have loved or will love and her pledge of mutual support in the first elegy, paralleling a similar pledge in the Eoitre dédicatoire. Another way in which this parallel is established is in her description of her receiving inspiration to write in the first Elegie (w9-16, 107) and of the inspiration to love in the third Elegie (w.60-72,

116-17). Both the innamoramento of the Elegie III and the coming to writing (to borrow the expression of Hélène Cixous) are characterized as a “fureur divine" inflicted by a reckless god upon a not necessarily willing subject, and once again we recognize the united front presented by Amour and Apolon. There are many other references to the substitution of writing for loving. In the Débat.

Apolon speaks of how Amour inspires the greatest poets (108), and he also states, “Brief, le plus grand plaisir qui soit après amour c’est d’en parler (76)."

196 These images are tied together through the reassignment of the object of

desire, something that is made possible due to the beloved’s absence. Baker

notes that the dedicatory Epitre establishes “educational freedom” as the

elusive object of desire in the place of the absent lover (11 ). Labé herself

indicates that her incitements in her poetry to young women to accept love

should not be taken literally. As she writes in her Epitre. study is of greater value than sentiment, and its pleasures of greater quality and longer duration

(“les plaisirs des sentiments se perdent incontinent et ne reviennent jamais, et en est quelquefois la mémoire autant fascheuse, comme les actes ont esté délectables (42)"). In this way, she makes clear that she does not wish her work to be read as a defense of amorous adventure, for in her dedication she denounces emotional pleasures as being of poor quality. Through the substitution of intellectual achievement for the beloved as the object of this desire, her work indicates that educational freedom is a primordial urge in women. As a woman is compelled by her human nature to seek a mate, so, too, is she compelled to seek an outlet for her intellect.

As this discussion has insisted, it is impossible, or at least a grave oversight, to read the work of Labé and Brossard and remain ignorant of (or deliberately ignore) the fact that these authors are women. For both of these écrivaines, the voice of the woman writer is an absence in the national literature that is to be remedied as quickly as possible. It is through the active inscription of desire into the literary text that Labé and Brossard render this woman’s voice essential and unavoidable. This is a woman-centered writing -b y women, about women, and for women. As the woman-ness of the author is foregrounded in the text, similarly for both authors the subject matter is Woman or a woman’s desire, and both have a woman as the inscribed reader. This is

197 despite the fact that Labé’s work is followed by a collection of poems in praise of Labé, written by men. Brossard carries out this female-centering one step further as in her text the object of desire is another woman, configured as reader, who implicitly returns this desire. She not only seeks to encourage the woman writer, but also hopes to form a cooperative bond with the woman reader. This is enunciated most clearly in her article, “Mouvements et stratégies de l’écriture de fiction, ” where she presents the notion of “syncrones,”® those women writers and readers who achieve a perfect congruity of meaning through their interaction in the text. This assumption of a female readership is far different from the assumption by a male writer of a male readership. For while there is a long tradition of male authors for whom a female readership was either not imagined or actually undesirable, in the case of Labé and

Brossard both of these women know that their work is being read by men. This is demonstrated dramatically in Labé’s Euvres by the publication of poems written about her by men at the end of her work. The femaleness of the implied reader is no accident.

In common with Brossard, the work of Louise Labé both assumes the existence of and seeks to consolidate a community of women. Her writings that point to this community of women the most concretely are her dedication, Elegie III and Sonnet XXIV in their references to the Dames. By her invocation of the

Dames as collective, she implies that a female community already exists. She is hoping to convert it to her cause. Jones notes that Labé identifies all women as potential victims of love (Eros. 177). This hinted at in Elegie I, but is made even more evident in Labé’s Sonnet XXIV.

Ne reprenez. Dames, si j ay aymé; Si j ay senti mile torches ardentes.

“ The expression “les femmes svncrones" is coined by Brossard in this article. 198 Mile travaus, mile douleurs mordentes: Si en pleurant, j’ay mon tems consumé,

Las que mon nom n'en soit par vous blâmé. Si j’ay failli, les peines sont présentes. N’aigrissez point leur pointes violentes; Mais estimez qu’Amour, à point nommé.

Sans votre ardeur d’un Vulcan excuser. Sans la beauté d’un Adonis acuser, Pourra, s’il veut, plus vous rendre amoureuses:

En ayant moins que moy d’ocasion. Et plus d’estrange et forte passion. Et gardez vous d’estre plus malheureuses.

This universalizing of her personal experience may function to pre-empt or

diffuse criticism of her morality by implying that all women feel or could feel as

she does. This commonality of women’s desire is to be the focal point for the

sense of unity in which this community is grounded. The exclusively female

nature of this reading community is observable in part because Labé’s

dedication is addressed to a female dedicatee, Clémence de Bourges. While the men are scolded for having previously excluded women from intellectual

endeavors, she does not now address them. If this were not enough, the

potential male reader of her work, the beloved, is defined by his absence. In

Sonnet XXI (“Quelle grandeur rend I’homme venerable?”) Labé dismisses the

theme of the description of the beloved. He is not physically present, as the

speakers repeated complaints about his absence show, and so there is no

need to counterfeit his presence in a poetic portrait. We do find in the Euvres individual poems that seem to address a male reader, but the assembled work as a whole clearly has a female intended audience. The aggressive foregrounding of the female assumed reader combined with the equally aggressive female voice of the speaker in the writings of Labé

199 and Brossard has a twofold effect. The first is the political goal already mentioned of encouraging their fellow women to write, to explore this domain from which they were previously excluded by the “severes loix des hommes."

The second effect is what may be called social subversion, for both writers engage in an extensive project of gender and gender role subversion.

Keith Cameron, in his studv Louise Labé: Renaissance Poet and

Feminist, states the following in his introduction; “If my interpretations of Louise

Labé as a feminist (...) do not meet with the approval of the reader, then I trust that s/he will forgive me for being a male (ix)." In an equally interesting move,

Gould writes the following reaction to Brossard’s text:

And yet, although explicitly lesbian in its inspiration and intent, Brossard’s poetic depiction of female loving is, I find, remarkably inviting for the heterosexual reader as well. (Writing in the Feminine. 81)

In essence, like Cameron’s above-cited apology for being a man, Gould is justifying her position as a heterosexual reader of what she has identified as a lesbian text. In Cameron’s statement there is some ambiguity as to whether it is the act of reading Louise Labé that is properly done by a woman or the act of interpreting her as a feminist. Either way, this unexpected apology appears to have been inspired by the feeling that he has somehow trod upon a woman’s prerogative.

These somewhat surprising reactions must be considered as resulting from Labé’s and Brossard’s deliberate effort to assign the reader of their text a gender and a sexuality. In the case of both writers, the assigned gender is the same, female. The feminine reader of Brossard’s text is also presumed to be lesbian. The sexuality of the reader of Labé’s text is not as certain. While she implies in her first Elegie that writer and reader share the common experience 200 of desire, the orientation of this desire -whether heterosexual or homosexual -

is not indicated. Although we are aware that the object of the poet’s desire as expressed in the Euvres is a man, nothing in the text implies that the reader

also desires men. Both writers, as we have seen, make clear that they expect a certain response from their reader, principally the production of more text,

specifically women’s text. However, since according to Brossard the male writer is a female impersonator (“L’homme qui écrit est un travesti (“E muet

mutant," 54).”), one does not need biologically to be a woman to produce the

response desired by the text, one need merely perform as one. Through their aggressively demonstrated assumption of female readership, Labé and

Brossard urge a drag performance by the male reader. Louise Labé, in the

identification of her intended audience as female, has In essence defined the

act of reading the Euvres as a feminine performance. There is no male

performative role, as the only potential male addressee of these Euvres. the

beloved, is characterized by his absence. In other words, absence is the only performance inscribed in the text for a male reader performing as male. The

male reader is obligated to adopt a female persona or reduce his role from that of a participant in the text to that of spectator.

The transformation of the male reader into a (temporarily) female one is

not the only instance of what we might call “literary drag" in these works. The

careful construction of a gendered and sexualized reader should be

considered within the context of a pattern of gender and sexual subversion in the works of both writers. In the Euvres of Louise Labé, we can consider as an

example of this the confusion that occurs between Folie and Mercure in her

Débat de Folie et d’Amour. In his defense of Folie, Mercure usually refers to the young goddess in the third person, which is normal and expected. Yet there

201 are times when he adopts first person pronouns and verb forms in discussing

actions that are clearly to be attributed to Folie (84, 88, 98, 102). This confusion

of identity seems only to contribute to the confusion of gender in the Œuvres.

particularly noted in the gender of Amour, as discussed by François Rigolot in

his article “Quel genre d’Amour pour Louise Labé?” In his discussion, Rigolot

notes Labé’s “feminization” of Orphée, altering his traditional sexual identity,

but bringing his name into conformity with French patterns of grammatical

gender (311 ). Through the confusion of Mercure with Folie, Labé could well be

similarly “feminizing” Mercure, bearer of name traditionally perceived as

masculine, but with an ending that usually signals a feminine noun in French.

As Rigolot noted in his article, “Gender vs. Sex Difference in Louise Labé’s

Grammar of Love,” the Frenchification and the feminization of these figures go

hand-in-hand (293). Labé effectively causes the mythological figures of

Mercury and Orpheus to do twin performances of female drag and French drag in her text.

We can see similar indications of gender confusion and subversion in

Brossard’s work. Mirroring Labé’s feminization of Mercury and Orpheus, Brossard feminizes two male characters from her novel French kiss. The first of these, Alexandre, is most often referred to as “Lexa." Whereas “Alexandre” is clearly a man’s name, the gender of “Lexa” is more ambiguous. The character of Georges is more decidedly “feminized” as his full name is given as

“Georgraphie,” a feminine name according to the rules of French grammar.

Additionnally, as we have already seen, Brossard dramatically projects her subversion of gender beyond the literary to the social text as well, stating in her

“E muet mutant” that the act of writing is an inherently feminine act, thereby

202 characterizing all male writers as female impersonators fPouble impression. 54).

While Gould states that the lesbian exchange implicit in the textual

encounter between writer and reader does not exclude the heterosexual female

reader, the text nonetheless does require of her a lesbian performance. In

L'Amèr Brossard writes, “Folles et incompatibles comme deux hétérosexuelles

avortées et qui ne peuvent se pénétrer mutuellement (26)." In addition to

characterizing female heterosexuals as somehow incomplete or arrested in

their development (because avortées), they are also incapable of the act of

mutual interpenetration which characterizes the interaction between writer and

reader in Brossard’s text. The mutual creation of meaning, so important to her

literary project, is achieved as two women meet in mutual desire within the text.

So we see that Gould’s observation cited above was correct. The lesbian

exchange explicit in Brossard’s text does not exclude the heterosexual reader.

It does require, however, that this heterosexual reader, for the duration of the textual encounter, perform as a lesbian.

These drag performances (male-as-female and heterosexual female-as-

lesbian) can be considered in the light of the legend of “Capiteine Loys,”

according to which, Louise Labé, disguised as a man, fought for the French at

the battle of Perpignan under the name Capiteine Loys. Some have proposed

that while Labé probably did not participate in the actual battle, she may have

participated in a re-enactment of this battle staged in Lyon.® Whether one

believes the legend or not, it appears clear that Labé had a reputation for

challenging male prerogative that was indeed wide-ranging. Berriot notes that it was no more daring for Labé to dress as a man for military demonstration that

“ See, for example, Kenneth Varty, “Life and Legend of Louise Labé," Nottingham Medieval Studies 3 (1959): 99. 203 it was for her to write and publish under her own intitiative (La belle rebelle. 59). This military experience, whether in tournament or battle, would seem on the

one hand to put Labé in company with the tradition of “passing women,” women

who live in male drag. This, coupled with her casting herself in the traditionally

male role of pining lover in Petrarchan-inspired love poetry, would seem to reinforce this classification. Yet, the almost aggressive femaleness of the

speaker in Labé’s elegies and sonnets makes it impossible to consider this character a “passing woman.” Rather than abandoning the supposedly

“female” symbols of the distaff and spindle -referred to in her opening Epitre -

for the “male” symbols of pen and sword, Labé would appear to be challenging

the very nature of this sexist binary. She demonstrates that military and

intellectual pursuits are not “men’s work” inherently, but merely because women have not been allowed to try them yet. Taken altogether, Labé’s

challenges to women’s traditional social roles reveal these very roles to be arbitrary. These traditional roles are as much an imposed performance as the drag performance her text urges on the male reader.

It is worth repeating that Labé and Brossard, while separated by nearly four centuries and living in two different countries, nevertheless wrote in

remarkably similar social contexts. Both societies are marked by profound

political, social and religious change. Brossard’s society was and is influenced by the changing perception of what it means to be French Canadian and what it

means to be Québécois. Labé’s society, in the throes of evolutionary change as the kingdom of France transformed itself into the French nation, experienced a similarly changing awareness of the implications of a French identity. As a society’s image of itself changes, the role that the individual is expected to play

204 in that society also comes Into question. The result Is to open a window of

opportunity for anyone with an Interest In changing their traditional role.

It Is within the context of these periods of changing social roles and

social Identities that we should examine Labé’s and Brossard’s subversive play with gender and sexual Identity. Both authors have as Implicitly and explicitly stated goals the achievement of greater Intellectual and social freedom for women. By questioning and subverting the sexist and heterosexist assumptions of society in their texts, they seek to produce a similar subversion outside of their text. The reader In drag becomes a means to this end. The reader serves as an Important point of Intersection between their written text and the social text they hope to Influence, and drag serves as an Important means of subversion. In reference to drag, specifically female Impersonation by men, Judith Butler writes,

If the anatomy of the performer Is already distinct from the gender of the performer, and both of these are distinct from the gender of the performance, then the performance suggests a dissonance not only between sex and performance, but sex and gender, and gender and performance. (...) In Imitating gender, drag Implicitly reveals the Imitative structure of gender Itself- as well as Its contingency. fGender Trouble. 137)

By aggressively gendering and sexuallzing the Implied reader In the text, Labé and Brossard produce a disquieting effect on the reader whose gender and/ or sexuality do not match those Inscribed In the text. A dissonance Is created between the performance this reader expects to give, and the performance actually required of them by the text. It Is this dissonance which provokes reactions such as those of Cameron and Gould cited above.

205 The dissonance experienced by a man suddenly asked to perform as a woman, or that of a heterosexual woman asked to perform as a lesbian, is very little different from the dissonance experienced by a woman who finds herself incited to write after years of imposed silence. This discomfort is one of the images conjured up by Labé’s description in her Elegie I of her coming to writing as a “fureur divine (v.9)," a sentiment to be echoed centuries later by

Hélène Cixous describing her coming to writing; “ ‘Writing’ seized me, gripped me, around the diaphragm, between the stomach and the chest, a blast dilated my lungs and I stopped breathing (“Coming to Writing, ” 9).’’ Brossard and Labé invite women to come into contact with each other and with the nation of which they are an integral part. It is certainly significant that this call to women to expand symbolically their realm of influence comes at a critical time in both societies. For Labé the call for the expansion of women’s roles comes at a time of a similar French expansion, the wars in Italy and the beginnings of France’s colonial empire. For Brossard, she is encouraging women to come forward at a time when Quebec has decided to step forward on the North American stage.

However, as Labé’s repeated appeal to the Dames for a sympathetic reading indicates, this endeavor is not without risk. The element of risk entailed by their project of self-exposure is seen in the “now or never” feeling one can find in

Labé’s and Brossard’s work. These women are aware of the time in which they write, of the social context in which they write. Running a certain calculated risk, they seize a window of opportunity for the re-awakening of a silenced woman’s voice, the creation and/ or recognition of a community of women who express themselves as women. The desiring female in Labé’s Euvres is shown as strong, determined and energized. Her models are women of action, the nymph-huntresses who

206 accompany Diana and the warrlor-queen Semiramls. Semiramis, mentioned specifically In Elegie I, Is again alluded to In Sonnet XVIII, when Labé uses the

military term saillie to characterize her desire and, by association, her writing.

The “Royne tant renommee" serves to Illustrate the Importance of activity (as

opposed to passivity) but also of desire In Identity. Reduced to a passivity against her nature due to the Inappropriateness of her attraction for her own

son, Labé’s Semiramls becomes completely unrecognizable to herself; “Ainsi

Amour de toy t’a estrangee/ Qu’on te dirait en une autre changée (w89-90, 109).’’ The speaker In Labé’s sonnets seeks to avoid a similar fate, described

In the tercets of Sonnet XIV (“Tant que mes yeux pourront larmes espandre”). Je ne souhaitte encore point mourir. Mais quand mes yeus je sentiray tarir. Ma voix cassee, et ma main Impuissante,

Et mon esprit en ce mortel séjour Ne pouvant plus montrer signe d’amante: Prirey la Mort noircir mon plus cler jour.

Rather than be reduced to passivity, like the unfortunate queen of Babylon, the day she can no longer send the signals of a woman In love, she hopes to die. It

Is In this manner that we are able to appreciate the close tie between the speaker’s ability to recognize herself and her ability to articulate her desires. Consistent with the project outlined In her Epitre. Labé does not permit the reader to forget that the speaker Is a woman. Like the precision afforded by the neologism "écrivaine." “amante" Is a term exploited for Its gender specificity by both Labé and Brossard. and the Importance of gender to their work should cause any reader or translator to hesitate before rendering or translating this term by the English neutral term “lover." In translating Amantes- the title of a collection of poetry by Nicole Brossard- as Lovhers. Godard underlines the

Importance of the femininity Inscribed within this word. The strongly presented 207 female presence in Labé’s work would appear to recommend “lovher” as a possible translation for “amante" In this context as well.

There is another message contained within the story of Semiramis. Her distress may not be so much caused by the actual desire, so much as the risk that it may be fulfilled. Desire fulfilled is no longer desire, and once again the fulfilled desirer is reduced to passivity. Labé is able to produce text, writing of her desire, precisely because the beloved is not there. This is an idea suggested by Cixous when she states that she writes because of disappearance (“Coming to Writing,” 3). The absence of the beloved for Labé’s work is just as vital as the absence of Etienne de la Boétie for Montaigne’s

Essais. Precisely because the beloved is not there, it is the desiring amante that is the matter of Labé’s book, not the desired aimé. Brossard initially appears to be a counterexample of the necessity of absence for the text of desire, for she configures the reader as the partenaire. However, the reader she seeks, the syncrone with which she hopes to achieve textual congruity. is an impossibility, an absence that is in fact more profound than that of Labé’s beloved. Although she may claim in her writing to seek the syncrone, this claim cannot be taken at face value, for the existence of the syncrone would spell the death of her literary project, the spiral that is women’s reality and experience. If in fact the syncrones exist, and two of Brossard’s womanly curves are able to find perfect congruity, then the spiral is closed, and the form ceases to grow.

The orbiting pattern that is the spiral is caused by the continuing desire of Woman to seek one like herself, and it is in this search that she turns in ever­ growing circles. In short, what the writings of Brossard and Labé demonstrate is that identity is affirmed and explored through the expression of desire, and not in its satisfaction.

208 CHAPTER 5

CONCLUSION

The Winchester Mystery House is an unusual rambling edifice covering

six acres in San José, California. The house has 160 rooms. 10,000 windows,

950 doors, 47 fireplaces and 40 staircases, to give only a sampling of the building’s statistics. The story of this house is as striking as the building itself. Sarah Pardee Winchester, heir to the Winchester rifle fortune, began construction on this house in 1884. Believing that the ghosts of those killed by the Winchester rifle sought to avenge themselves upon her, she was told she could appease these spirits by living in a house that was continually under construction, and that is exactly what she did. Twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year for thirty-four years construction continued without pause until the day Sarah Winchester died. In a sense, the house is still unfinished. Tour guides at the Winchester Mystery House can point to a row of nails driven only halfway, where the carpenters stopped work upon hearing of Sarah

Winchester’s death (Arthur Myers, “The Weirdest House in the West,” The

Ghostly Register). Like the Winchester house, a nation is a project upon which one may work, but which is never finished. For this reason there is something ironic in writing a conclusion to a study of nation-building. A collective may reach a 209 point at which it is recognizable as a nation, but this is not the same as saying the building process is complete. The members of this community live within the nation while continually seeing to its evolution, ensuring that the edifice continues to fulfill its mission. Reading the works that form the body of this study, one becomes aware that even though these six authors participate in this process of nation-building, they have no more idea than Sarah Winchester did of what the result will be when it is finished, if indeed it is ever finished. John Hutchinson’s description of nationalism as occuring in alternating cycles, a cultural movement followed by a political one which in turn triggers a new cultural movement, seems to argue that the nation is indeed perpetually under construction.

As has been indicated, post-Quiet Revolution Quebec and Renaissance

France are emergent nations. That is to say they are both in the early stages of nation-building, and as such the form they will take upon reaching full national status is that much more difficult to discern. There is no way Michel de Montaigne or Marguerite de Navarre could have predicted the French nation as it existed under Louis XIV and even less chance they could have foreseen the

French nation under the Third Republic. The national future is no easier to predict for their Québécois counterparts. The nationalism that led to the 1995 referendum on sovereignty is not the nationalism of Quebec under Duplessis, this difference being a result of the profound changes that swept Québécois society during the 1960’s. What Quebec may yet become is equally unpredictable. In presenting these two societies together one may well ask the question why compare these examples of nationalism and not any two others.

What this study has tried to emphasize is that for sixteenth-century

France and Quebec of the late twentieth century, the predominant social

210 phenomenon is change. Both societies are in profound, shocking and even violent change. It is a change that manifests itself in almost all aspects of social

life. On the political stage in France we witness the end of feudalism and the

beginnings of autocracy through the growing centralization of power in the

hands of the monarch. The Quiet Revolution in Quebec effectively marked the death of the isolationist politics of the Union Nationale party. Both societies witness a serious blow dealt to the hegemony of the Roman Catholic Church, with the result that religion is noticeably weakened as a factor in a national

identity, creating a void that is not easily filled. The growth of the bourgeoisie in sixteenth-century France and the increased involvement of francophones in the business life of Quebec mark a noticeable change in the economic lives of these societies. We even see evidence that Renaissance France and Quiet Revolution Quebec are re-evaluating their own history. Myriam Yardeni’s study reveals the process by which the various regions of France sought to unite local history with that of the nation. In Quebec we see a growing interest in a re­ examination of their national history, from a criticism of the overpowering role played by the Church, to articles like Hubert Aquin's La Fatigue culturelle du Canada français, where he analyses the effects of the British Conquest. It is a historical burden which Quebec of the 1960’s will seek to overcome if not reject outright. In her study of Nicole Brossard, Karen Gould indicates the importance of the Conquest on the literature of the Quiet Revolution by asking the following rhetorical question;

Could it be that because of the Conquest and of a conquered mentality in relation to the past, the affirmation of a collective identity in the late 1960’s could only be played out for some Québec writers through the textual creation of a radically new present? (22-3)

211 It is a present that is to be created throught the development and repetition of new myths like that of Jacques Godbout’s schoolchild in Le Couteau sur la

table. “Le fleuve Saint-Laurent est le plus beau fleuve du monde(119)." It is a

present in which Quebec is not conquered. Perhaps the only factor of national

identity that was not subject to change for Renaissance France and post-Quiet

Revolution Quebec was the linguistic identification. Both societies were/ are

still French-speaking.

Our work of comparison has indicated that far from resisting the instability

inherent in their social and cultural contexts, the authors represented in this study have embraced it. Their writing in fact becomes a textual incarnation of these societies in change, through the creation of a literature that presents itself as constantly evolving. The literary explosion that marks these societies

indicates that these six authors are not alone in this endeavor. This creation of a national literature that marks the changing and changeable nature of the

nation itself appears to have been carried out through three principal paths: literary innovation, the use of images or figures of movement, and the highlighting of the sexual quality of the text. The innovation that marks the literatures of these two societies is perhaps the easiest of these to discuss, and also perhaps the most obvious.

Sixteenth-century France would perform literary experiments in a number of fields. On the one hand we see French Renaissance authors creating a new French literature through the adoption of literary genres from foreign cultures and from Antiquity and nationalizing these forms by using the French language.

This is the project of the Pléiade, designed to bring the French language to international prominence. It is a process that has been noted in Louise Labé’s

Frenchification of the sonnet form, and similarly Marguerite de Navarre’s

212 is a nationalization of the Italian Decameron by Boccaccio.

Montaigne’s Essais represent literary innovation via the creation of a whole

new genre. Innovation in Quebec in the 1960’s is most easily seen in the subversion of inherited literary genres, or even the rejection of them. Nicole

Brossard provides examples of both, subverting the form of the novel in her

French kiss and that of the journal in her Journal intime. Other examples of her

writing demonstrate her deliberate efforts to eliminate the distinction between

the most basic division in literature, the distinction between poetry and prose.

We can also see a certain innovation in the choice of subject matter, as discussed in the chapter on Montaigne and Godbout. Their insistance upon

using as their focus a subject presented as ordinary or even unworthy is an

innovative element that may be one of the most nationalist of all. By choosing ordinary or even grotesque subjects as their focus instead of classically heroic subjects they turn their literary focus precisely on those elements that consitute the nation and make it distinct. As we have seen, their writing essentially redefines what makes a worthy subject. The most dramatic innovation of this kind is, of course, the growth and expansion of the woman’s voice in literature.

While there were certainly women writers before the Renaissance, and even French women writers, women’s writing at this time attained a prominence and notoriety it had not previously enjoyed. Likewise for Quebec there is a tradition of women’s writing pre-dating even the Conquest in the writings of the missionary sister Marie de l’Incarnation. What characterizes women’s writing of this study is the foregrounding of sexual difference, and the use of women’s writing as part of a political and social agenda on women’s behalf. In the writings of Marguerite de Navarre and Anne Hébert we see a sustained analysis of the roles assigned to women in the national culture and, mirroring

213 the re-exam [nation of national history, they re-examine the heritage assigned to

women within their cultural traditions. The works of Louise Labé and Nicole

Brossard make a deliberate effort to explode these traditional restraints and use their literary voice like water priming a well, calling forth a flood of writing from

their previously silenced sisters. The extent to which nationalism or natlon-

bulldlng plays a role In this expansion of women’s literary voice Is difficult to

determine. Hutchinson Indicates that this inclusion of women’s voice Is a trait

Inherent to some types of cultural nationalism (33) and Karine Berriot In her study Louise Labé: La belle rebelle et le françois nouveau notes that this

expansion Is a common phenomenon of societies In change, asking:

L’expresslon feminine seralt-elle done le mode spécifique par lequel, dans notre monde occidental, les sociétés «mutantes» et au sein de celles-ci les classes en expansion tendent à marquer leur neuve dignité? (220)

However, even In “notre monde occidental,” there are far toc many examples of

nationalism and class expansion that have proved hostile to women’s liberation, a reality that leads us to doubt the general applicability of Berrlot’s hypothesis. In the two societies which are the focus of this study, what may favor women’s liberation Is how these societies react to this change.

Renaissance France and post-Quiet Revolution Quebec, as has been Indicated, appear to welcome the change and propose for themselves literary models that reflect this state of change, avoiding static models and Imagery In an almost systematic manner. This aversion to the static model Is best represented by Montaigne In his

Essais as he writes “Je ne peints pas l’estre. Je peints le passage (III: 2, 22).”

The evocation In literature of movement. Indicated here In the opposition between estre and passage Is another common trait to the literatures of these 214 emergent nations. The end of the sixteenth century would see the development

in the arts of the style known as baroque, one of the primary traits of which was

an attempt to convey the idea of movement in a static medium. As the authors

studied here demonstrate, this ideal of movement is not limited to baroque

writers. This sort of movement can be seen in the brossardian image of the

spiral, the ever-growing form created as women’s writing produces still more

women’s writing, and as each woman contributes her curve to the total of

women’s experience and reality. Labé’s writing demonstrates a sort of movement as it follows the path traced by the protagonists of her Débat. Folie

and Amour. These two are set in motion by the judgment pronounced by Jupiter, “Et guidera Folie l’aveugle Amour, et le conduira ou bon lui semblera

(103).’’ The often-cited ambiguity of the antecedent of “lui” in this sentence

indicates that the destination of this path is as unclear as that of the nation itself.

Marguerite de Navarre and Anne Hébert convey this perpetual movement in a

chronological sense. Robert Cottrell has described this movement in Marguerite’s poetry as pendulum-like. In these works we read this pendulum

moving in a progressive circle, but always rocking between the speaker’s life

and the major events of salvation history. Similarly in Anne Hébert’s novels we

witness this rocking back-and-forth between the protagonist’s past and her

present. In Les enfants du sabbat, this motion is set against the background of

the cycle of the Church calendar, a forward-moving yet forever cyclical vision of time. In the works of Jacques Godbout and Michel de Montaigne the ideal of

movement is expressed in the living quality given to the work itself. Deliberately allying the evolution of the text with the life of the narrator, they present a text that, like a living being, explores and expands, chooses a direction and then changes direction. Montaigne’s painting of “le passage,” is, as we have seen,

215 little different from Gaiarneau’s vécriture. It is this notion the subtitle

“Conceiving the nation" is intended to convey, the creation of a work in progress

as opposed to “birth of a nation" which implies bringing forth a finished product.

The lifelike and even biological quality of these texts is reinforced by the

fact that they are also highly sexual texts. The sexuality of the text is perhaps

the most obvious theme in the writings of Nicole Brossard. One of the effects of

her subversion of literary forms, through unusual punctuation, unexpected

spacing, use of drawings instead of words, etc, it that it disrupts the act of

reading. The eye is not permitted to flit back and forth across the page but

instead is obliged to explore the page in a visual caress, guided by the hand of the author. As a woman author, she has deliberately sought out a woman

reader, and makes of her text a point of lesbian intercourse. In defining both reading and writing as sexual acts, Brossard’s text has a close affinity with the literary project of Mireille and Mariette, the roommates of Godbout’s D'Amour.

P.O. They have literally turned the study of literature into the sexual exploration of the author. Mireille and Thomas dramatically combine sex and text, alternating between the two activities without ever leaving bed. It is the roommate Mariette who characterizes writing as making love to the language, suggesting that the quality of the work produced matches the quality of the love that produced it (33-4). This statement is a close echo of Montaigne’s description of writing as conceiving children through intercourse with the

Muses. This notion even finds a resonance with Marguerite’s Heptameron. which is, after all, a collaborative effort between equal numbers of men and women. The sexual implications of this scenario are only highlighted by the frequency of sexual encounters found in the tales themselves and by the strong

216 sex drive Marguerite has written into the character of the devisant Hircan, said to be based on her own husband.

If Hélène Cixous can be taken as a model, then desire is a universal factor in the coming to writing. In her essay on the topic she states, “I write out of love. Writing, loving: inseparable. Writing is a gesture of love (42).” Lest one think that this may be a platonic sort of love, she dispels this image as she proclaims, “Write, dream, enjoy, be dreamed, enjoyed, written.” Desire is conjured up as she matches “enjoy/ be enjoyed” with the anticipatory “dream/ be dreamed” and the physical action and contact implied in “write/ be written."

Roland Barthes tells us that if we have taken pleasure in reading a text, it is because pleasure was taken in the writing of it fLe plaisir du texte. 11 ). This is an appealing notion, yet Barthes undermines his analysis of pleasure in the text by excluding politics from the text of pleasure. A peine a-t-on dit un mot, quelque part, du plaisir du texte, que deux gendarmes sont prêts à vous tomber dessus: le gendarme politique et le gendarme psychanalytique: futilité et/ ou culpabilité, le plaisir est ou oisif ou vain, c'est une idée de classe ou une illusion. (91)

This standpoint may be justifiable from Barthes’s position of cultural privilege, that of a male citizen of a former colonial métropole. From this position, pleasure and politics don’t mix, and these are all political texts. This is especially true for the works of Labé, Brossard and Godbout. David Quint argues persuasively that it is also the case for Montaigne, although the essayist does not foreground this aspect of his work. Marguerite de Navarre and Anne

Hébert likewise betray a political agenda in their work, although they are not as blatantly confrontational as are Labé and Brossard.

217 It is as though the Immediacy of the political and social Issues in the work of these authors is a result of the instability which reigned in their societies.

This word “instability” should be read with caution, as it is prone to negative interpretation. A moment’s reflection, however, confirms that some things stable may, in fact, need to be destabilized in order to allow for improvement. This is certainly the case in the destabilization of women's social roles presented in the writings of Marguerite and Hébert. Instability may be avoided or exploited, but doing either involves setting one's political agenda with care, and apparently driving the Barthesian pleasure from the text. Pleasure exiting the scene, it is replaced by its rival, and here Barthes announces a familiar presence.

Son rival victorieux, c’est le Désir: on nous parle sans cesse du Désir, jamais du Plaisir; le Désir aurait une dignité épistémique, le Plaisir non. [...] Curieux cette permanence philosophique du Désir (en tant qu'il n'est jamais satisfait) [...] (91)

If we cannot agree with Barthes assertion that pleasure and politics are mutually exclusive, it is nonetheless appealing to characterize these works as texts of desire. It is desire, not pleasure, that is more appropriate to the text of movement and hence the text of nation-building. Much like the Winchester

House, desire can never be satisfied. If desire is tricked into the non-movement that is satisfaction, it ceases to exist. The death of motion caused by the satisfaction of desire explains the unreachable desires evoked by our authors, most notably Montaigne's La Boétie, Labé's beloved and Brossard s syncrone.

In each case, the sudden appearance of the object of desire- the missing friend/ lov(h)er- would simultaneously cause the sudden death of writing.

Of the six authors the only one likely to describe himself as a nationalist is Jacques Godbout, and even he is not a given, for his writing indicates that his 218 class interests are at least as important to him as are his national ones. Michel de Montaigne’s Essais are presented as a self-exploration and Marguerite de

Navarre’s work foregrounds its spiritual and moral exploration. Anne Hébert,

Nicole Brossard and Louise Labé all clearly highlight women’s issues. Hébert focuses on the rival claims of differing social roles and identities, whereas Labé and Brossard are overtly calling upon women to break out of these roles. Yet despite these diverse goals and points of focus, each of these writers has allowed their work to be colored by the national question, a question that not only colors their work but may even, as we have seen, have inspired it.

This is not to say that all literature in a nationalist context is going to resemble the works we have seen here. History provides ample evidence that not all national movements have the liberating effect seen in these works and some have exactly the opposite effect. What appears to set these two societies apart is their reaction to the instability that is nation-building. The people of post-Quiet Revolution Quebec and Renaissance France knew that the world of their grandparents was no more. It is worth wondering to what extent they experienced the passing of medieval and Duplessiste stability with some relief. At least for the moment the instability which accompanies nation-building affords a certain freedom, or at least the potential opportunity to lift the old restrictions, an opportunity encouraged by a cultural nationalism which urges maximum mobilization of the nation’s citizens in order to achieve their goals.

For our authors, as their writing flourishes due to the continued elusiveness of the Friend/ Lov(h)er, so does their intellectual and personal freedom flourish as long as the ultimate goals of nation-building also remain elusive. Like Sarah

Winchester, they appear to find their comfort in the very unfinishability of their constructs.

219 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Texts

Brossard, Nicole. L'Amèr ou le chapitre effrité. Montréal: Quinze, 1977.

— . Double impression: poèmes et textes 1967-1984. Montreal: L'Hexagone, 1984.

— . French Kiss: étreinte/exploration. Montréal: Les Quinze, 1980.

— . Journal intime. Montréal: Les Herbes Rouges, 1984.

— . Sous la langue. Under tongue, trans. Susanne de Lotbinière-Harwood. Montréal: L'Essentielle, éditrices; Charlottestown, PEI: Gynergy Books, 1987.

— . Suite logique. Ottawa: L'Hexagone, 1970.

Godbout, Jacques. Le couteau sur la table. Paris: Seuil, 1965

— . D'amour P.O. Paris: Seuil. 1972

— . Salut Galarneau! Paris: Seuil. 1967.

— . Les têtes à Papineau. Paris: Seuil. 1981

Hébert, Anne. Les enfants du sabbat. Paris: Seuil. 1975.

— . Les fous de bassan. Paris: Seuil. 1982.

— . Kamouraska. Paris: Seuil. 1970.

Labé, Louise. Oeuvres complètes. François Rigolot, ed. Paris: Flammarion, 1986. de Montaigne, Michel. Essais, ed. Andrée Lheritier, 3 vols. Paris: Union Générale d'Editions. 1964. 220 de Navarre, Marguerite. L'Héotameron. ed. Michel François, Paris: Garnier, 1991.

— . Les Marguerites de la Marguerite des princesses, ed. M.A. Screech, London: S.R. Publishers, Ltd. 1970

Critical Works and Other Texts

Works on Nicole Brossard:

Anderson, Marguerite. “Subversive texts: Quebec Women Writers," Studies in Canadian Literature. 13.2 (1988): 127-141.

Forsyth, Louise. "Nicole Brossard and the Emergence of Feminist Literary Theory in Quebec Since 1970," Gynocritics. Feminist Approaches to Canadian and Québec Women's Writing. Gvnocritioues. Démarches féministes à l’écriture des Canadiennes et Québécoises, ed. Barbara Godard. Toronto: EWC Press, 1987. 211-221.

Godard, Barbara. “La Barre du jour: Vers une poétique féministe,” Féminité., subversion, écriture. Suzanne Lang, ed. Québec: Editions du Remue- Menage, 1983. 195-205.

— . "Mapmaking: A Survey of Feminist criticism," Gynocritics. Feminist Approaches to Canadian and Québec Women’s Writing. Gvnocritiques. Démarches féministes à l’écriture des Canadiennes et Québécoises, ed. Barbara Godard. Toronto: EWC Press, 1987. 2-26.

— . “Producing Visibility for Lesbians: Nicole Brossard’s Quantum Poetics,” English Studies in Canada. 21.2 (June 1995): 125-37.

. “Women Loving Women Writing: Nicole Brossard,” Resources for Feminist Research. 12:1 (March 1983) 20-22.

Gould, K. Writing in the Feminine: Feminism and Experimental Writing in Quebec. Carbondale: Southern Illinois Univ. Press, 1990.

— . “Writing and Reading ‘Otherwise’: Québec Women Writers and the Exploration of the Difference.” Studies in Canadian Literature. New York: Publications of the Modern Language Association, 1990. 207- 225.

221 Office national du film. i as tprrihies vivantes, directed by Dorothy Todd Hénault. Canada, 1986.

Roy, André. “La Fiction vive: Entretien avec Nicole Brossard sur sa prose,” Journal of Canadian FictioO.. 25-26 (1979): 31-40.

Verduyn, Christl. “Lunatic Vistas'? Contemporary Women's Writing in Quebec," Gynocritics. Feminist Appfp.acbes to Canadian and Québec w omen's . Writing. Gvnocritiques. D^marclies féministes à J-’écriture dee Canadiennes et Québécoises- ed. Barbara Godard. Toronto: EWC Press, 1987. 71-75.

Works on Jacques Godbout:

Bellemare, Yvon. .largiifis nnrihrjut romancier. Montréal: Parti Pris, 1984.

— . “Jacques Godbout, manstP " Voix et Images. 10. 3 (Spring 1985): 152-164

Bernd, Zila. “La Quête d'identité: une aventure ambiguë,” Voix et Images: littérature québécoise. 12. 1 (Fall 1986): 21-26.

Bond, David J. “Jacques Godbout and the nature of reality," Journal of Canadian Fiction. 31-32 (1981): 203-217.

Coates, Carrol F. “Le jouai comme revendication québécoise: D'amour P.O. de Jacques Caodbout,” French Review 52 (1978): 73-80.

“Entretien avec Jacques Cnrihnni-." Incidences 2 (Springl967): 25-35.

Hodgson, Richard. “Etat présent des études sur l'œuvre romanesque de Jacques Godbout, 1962-1986," Œuvres critiques 14. no.1, Paris: Jean-Michel, 1989. pp.29-^8-

Juery, René. "Le discours de Galarneau,” Voix et Images 51. 36:33-49.

Pelletier, Jacques, l e roman national. Montreal: VLB, 1991.

Sarkany, Stéphane. "La sociologie du texte biculturel: Salut. Galarneau! de Jacques Godbout," Québec. Canada. France. Le Canada littéraire à la croisée des cultures Aix-en-Provence: Université de Provence, 1985.

Smith, André. L’Univers romanesav&ila.J.acques GodbOUt- Montreal: Editions Aquila, 1976.

222 Smith, Donald. “Jacques Godbout et la transformation de la réalité. Une entrevue," Lettres québécoises 25 (Spring 1982): 53-61.

Van’t Land, Hiiligje. La fonction idéologique de l’espace et de l’écriture dans les romans de Jacques Godbout. Groningen: 1994.

Works on Anne Hébert:

Amyot, Georges. “Anne Hébert et la renaissance," Ecrits du Canada français 20, 1965. pp.235-53.

Backès, Jean-Louis. "Le retour des morts dans l'œuvre d'Anne Hébert," L'Esorit créateur. 23. 3 (Fall 1983): 48-57.

Boak, Denis. "Kamouraska. Kamouraska!" Essays in French Literature 14 (1977): 69-104.

Bodart, Marie-Thérèse. “Anne Hébert, canadienne-française," Synthèses. 292- 293 (Oct.-Nov. 1970): 121-5.

Bouchard, Denis. Une lecture d'Anne Hébert: la recherche d’une mythologie. Montreal: Hurtubise HMH, 1977.

Cohen, Henry. "Le rôle du mythe dans Kamouraska d'Anne Hébert," Présence, francophone. 12 (Spring 1976): 103-111.

Cote, Paul Raymond, "Kamouraska ou l'influence d'une tradition," The French. Review. 63. 1 (Oct. 1989): 99-110.

Emond, Maurice. La Femme à la fenêtre. Quebec: Presses Universitaires de Laval, 1984.

English, Judith and Jacquelin Viswanathan. "Deux dames du Précieux-Sang: A propos des Enfants du sabbat d'Anne Hébert," Présence francophone. 22 (Spring 1981): 111-119.

Ewing, Ronald. "Griffin Creek: The English World of Anne Hébert," Canadian. Literature. 105 (Summer 1985) 100-110.

Gingrass, Katherine. "Writing the Unconscious: Dreams and Reverie in Anne Hébert's Kamouraska." Quebec Studies. 12 (Spring- Summer 1991): 149-145.

223 Green, M.J. “Dismantling the Colonizing Text: Anne Hébert’s Kamouraska and Assia Djebar’s L’Amour. la fantasia.” French Review. 66. 6 (May 1993): 959-66.

— . “The Novel in Quebec: The Family Plot and the Personal Voice, " Studies on Canadian Literature: Introductory and Critical Essays. Arnold E. Davidson, ed. New York: MLA, 1990. 178-192.

. "The Witch and the Princess: The Feminine Fantastic in the Fiction of Anne Hébert," The American Review of Canadian Studies (1985)

Hadjukowski-Ahmed, Maroussia. "La sorcière dans le texte québécois au féminin." The French Review 58.2 (Dec. 1984): 260-268.

Jacques, Henri-Paul. “A propos d’une lecture d’Anne Hébert,” Voix et Images: études québécoises. 3 (1978): 448-58.

Kells, Kathleen. "From the First 'Eve' to the New 'Eve:' Anne Hébert's Rehabilitation of the Malevolent Female Archetype," Studies in Canadian Literature. 14.1 (1989): 99-107.

McPherson, Karen. “The Letter of the Law in Anne Hébert’s Kamouraska.” Québec Studies. 8 (1989): 17-25.

Noble, Peter. Anne Hébert. Les fous de Bassan. Glasgow: University of Glasgow, French and German Publications, 1995.

Slott, Kathryn. "Repression, Obsession and Re-emergence in Hébert's Les fous de Bassan." American Review of Canadian Studies 7. 3 (1987): 297-307.

Works on Louise Labé:

Baker, Deborah Lesko. The Subject of Desire: Petrarchan Poetics and the Female Voice in Louise Labé. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 1996.

Berriot, Karine. Louise Labé: La Belle rebelle et le françois nouveau. Paris: Seuil, 1985.

Cameron, Keith. Louise Labé: Renaissance Poet and Feminist. Oxford: Berg, 1990.

Jones, Ann Rosalind. "Assimilation with a Difference: Renaissance Women Poets and Literary Influence." Yale French Studies. 62 (1981) 135-153. 224 . "City Women and Their Audiences; Louise Labé and Veronica Franco," Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan, et Nancy Vickers. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986. 299-316.

— . The Currency of Eros: Women's Love Lvric in Europe. 1540-1620. Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press, 1990.

Knapp, Bettina L. “Louise Labé: Renaissance Woman.” Women and Literature (New Brunswick, NJ) 7:1 (1979) 12-23.

Larsen, Anne R. "Louise Labé's Débat de Folie et d'Amour: Feminism and the Defense of Learning." Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature 2:1 (Spring 1983) 43-55.

Mathieu- Castellani, Gisèle. La Quenouille et la lyre. Paris: J. Corti, 1998.

O'Connor. Dorothy. Louise Labé: Sa vie et son œuvre. (1926) Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1972.

Petrey, Sandy. "The Character of the Speaker in the Poetry of Louise Labé," The French Review. 43: 4 (March 1970) 588-596.

Rigolot, François. "Gender vs. Sex Difference in Louise Labé's Grammar of Love," Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, eds. Margaret W. Ferguson, Maureen Quilligan and Nancy J. Vickers. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1987. 287-98.

— . Louise Labé Lyonnaise, ou. la Renaissance au féminin. Paris: H. Champion, 1997.

— . "Louise Labé et la Redécouverte de Sappho," Nouvelle revue du seizième siècle. 1 (1983) 19-31.

— . "Quel genre d'amour pour Louise Labé?" Poétique. 55 (Sept. 1983) 303- 317.

— . "Signature et signification: Les baisers de Louise Labé," Romanic Review 75.1 (Jan. 1984) 10-24.

Wright, Julianne Jones and François Rigolot. "Les irruptions de Folie: Fonction idéologique du porte-parole dans les Œuvres de Louise Labé," L'Esprit créateur 30: 4 (1990) 72-84.

225 Varty, Kenneth, "Life and Legend of Louise Labé" Nottingham Medieval Studies 3 (1959): 78-108.

— . "Louise Labé's Theory of Transformation," French Studies 12 (1958): 5-13.

Works on Michel de Montaigne:

Bauschatz, Cathleen M. “‘Leur plus universelle qualité, c'est la diversité’: Women as Ideal Readers in Montaigne’s Essais. ” Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies. 19 (Spring 1989). 83-101.

Bonenfant, Joseph. “L’essai: Entre Montaigne et l’événement, ” Etudes françaises . 8 (1972) :101 -108.

Cave, Terence. The Cornucopian Text. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979.

Cottrell, Robert. "Gender Imprinting in Montaigne's Essais." L'Esprit créateur. 30: 4 (Winter 1990). 85-96.

— . Sexuality/Textualitv: The Fabric of Montaigne’s Essais. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1981.

Defaux, G. Marot. Rabelais. Montaigne: l’écriture comme présence. Paris: Champion-Slatkine, 1987.

Garavini, Fausta. "La Présence des «monstres» dans l'élaboration des Essais." Le Parcours des Essais: Montaigne 1588-1988. Marcel Tetel and G. Mallary Masters, eds. Paris: Aux Amateurs de Livres, 1989. 33-46.

Gray, Floyd. Montaigne bilingue: Le latin des Essais. Paris: Champion, 1991.

Hoffmann, George. Montaigne's Career. Oxford: Clarendon, 1998.

La Charité, Raymond C.. ed. From Marot to Montaigne. Essavs in French Renaissance Literature. Kentucky Romance Quarterly. 19, suppl. 1 (1972).

Mathieu-Castellani, Gisèle. Montaigne: L'écriture de l'essai. Paris: PUF, 1988.

McGowan, Margaret. Montaigne’s Deceits: The Art of Persuasion in the Essais. London: University of London Press, 1974.

226 Nakam, Géralde. Les Essais de Montaigne: Miroir et procès de leur temps. Paris: Sorbonne, 1984.

O'Neill, John. Essavinç Montaigne: A Studv of the Renaissance Institution of Writing and Reading. London: Routledge, 1982.

Quint, David. Montaigne and the Quality of Mercv: Ethical and Political Themes in the Essais. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998.

Regosin, Richard. The Matter of Mv Book: Montaigne's Essais as the Book of Self. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977.

Starobinski, Jean. Montaigne en mouvement. Paris: Gallimard, 1982.

Works on Marguerite de Navarre:

Bauschatz, Cathleen M. " 'Voylà mes dames...': Inscribed Women Listeners and Readers in the Heptameron." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 104- 122.

Bideauix, Michel. "Du «bruict» à la «tapisserie»." L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 113-131.

Cazauran, Nicole and James Dauphiné, eds. Marguerite de Navarre. 1492- 1992: Actes du colloque international de Pau (19921. Mont-de-Marsan: Editions Interuniversitaires, 1995.

Cazauran, Nicole. "La Nouvelle exemplaire ou le roman tenu en échec" L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 11-26

Charpentier, Françoise. "La Guérison par la parole: A propos de la XXXII® nouvelle de l'Heptaméron." Marguerite de Navarre n 492-1992): Actes du colloque international de Pau (1992). eds. Nicole Cazauran and James Dauphiné, Mont-de-Marsan: Editions InterUniversitaires, 1995. 645-656.

Conley, Tom. "The Graphics of Dissimulation: Between Heptameron 10 and l'histoire tragique." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Early Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 65-82.

227 Cottrell, Robert. The Grammar of Silence: A Reading of Marguerite de Navarre's Poetrv. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1986.

— . "Inmost Cravings; The Logic of Desire in the Heptameron.". Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 3-24.

Cornilliat, François and Ullrich Langer. "Naked Narrator: Heptameron 62," Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993.

Davis, Betty J. The Storytellers in Marguerite de Navarre's Heptameron. Lexington, KY: French Forum Publishers, 1978.

Délégué, Yves. "La signification du rire dans l'Heptaméron." L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 35-49.

Desplat, Christian. "Ordres et «estats»: Les représentations sociales dans l'œuvre de Marguerite de Navarre," Marguerite de Navarre (1492-1992): Actes du colloque international de Pau ri992). eds. Nicole Cazauran and James Dauphiné, Mont-de-Marsan: Editions InterUniversitaires, 1995. 205-234.

Dubois, Claude-Gilbert. "Fonds mythique et jeu des sens dans le 'prologue' de l'Heptaméron." Etudes seizièmistes offertes à M. le professeur V.-L Saulnier par plusieurs de ses anciens doctorants. Travaux d"Humanisme et Renaissance 177 (Geneva: Droz, 1980). pp151-68.

Freccero, Caria. "Practicing Queer Philology with Marguerite de Navarre: Nationalism and the Castigation of Desire," Queering the Renaissance, ed. Jonathan Goldberg, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1994. 107- 123.

Fontaine. Marie-Madeleine. "Les enjeux de pouvoir dans l'Heptaméron." L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 133-149.

Glidden, Hope. "Gender, Essence, and the Feminine (Heptameron 43V" Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 25-40.

228 Jeanneret. Michel. "Modular Narrative and the Crisis of Interpretation." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Early Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 85-103

Kotler, Ellane. "L'ImpllcIt narratif ou la morale Incidente de l'Heptaméron." Marguerite de Navarre (1492-1992): Actes du colloque international de Pau (19921. eds. Nicole Cazauran and James Dauphiné. Mont-de- Marsan: Editions InterUniversitaires, 1995. 491-510.

de Lajarte, Philippe. "D'une fiction l'autre: Pour une pragmatique de la nouvelle dans l'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre," L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 93-112.

Lyons, John D. and Mary B. McKinley, eds. Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heptameron and Earlv Modern Culture. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993.

Mathieu- Castellani, Gisèle. "Le Jeu de l'hlstoIre et du discours dans L'Heptaméron." Cahiers de l'UER automne 1978. pp58-72.

McKinley, Mary. "Telling Secrets: Sacramental Confession and Narrative Authority In the Heptameron." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Early Modern Culture. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 146-171.

Norton, Glyn P. "Narrative function In the Heptameron Frame-Story," La Nouvelle Française à la Renaissance, eds. Lionelle SozzI and V .L Saulnier. Geneva: Slatkine, 1981. 435-47.

Perouse, Gabrlel-André. "L'Heptaméron dans l'histoire de la narration brève en prose au XVIe siècle," L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 27-34.

Russell, Daniel. "Some Ways of Structuring Character In the Heptameron." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 203-217.

Stone, Donald. " 'La Malice des Hommes:' 'L'Histoire des satyres' and the Heptameron." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 53-64.

229 Tetel. Marcel. Marguerite de Navarre's Heotameron: Themes. Language and. Structure. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1973.

— . "The Rhetoric of Lyricism in the Heotameron." Critical Tales: New Studies of the Heotameron and Earlv Modern Culture. eds.John D. Lyons and Mary B. McKinley, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993. 41-52.

Tournon, André. "«Ignorant les premiers causes...» Jeux d'énigmes dans l'Heptaméron." L'Heptaméron de Marguerite de Navarre, ed. S. Perrier. 73-92.

Works on Nations/ Nationalism/ Nation-Building:

Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso, 1983.

Aquin, Hubert. Blocs erratiques: textes (1948-19771. Montreal: Quinze, 1982.

— .Writing Québec. Edmonton: Univ. of Alberta Press, 1988.

Beaune, Colette. Naissance de la nation France. Paris: Gallimard, 1985.

Bloch, R. Howard. “Naturalism, Nationalism, Medievalism," Romanic Review. 76. 4 (Nov. 1985): 341-360.

Bourgeault, Guy. “Le Nationalisme québécois et l’Eglise,” Canadian Review of Studies in Nationalism. 5. 2 (Fall 1978): 189-208

Brossard, Nicole. "December 6, 1989 Among the Centuries," trans. Marlene Wildeman, Boundaries of Identity: A Quebec Reader, ed. William Dodge, Toronto: Lester, 1992. 114-15.

Chadbourne, Richard M. “Three Expressions of Nationalism in Modern Quebec Literature.” Canadian Review of Studies in Nationalism. 4.1 (Fall 1976): 38-51.

Colloque internationale de Clermont- Ferrand (1993). Littérature et origine: actes du Colloque internationale de Clermont-Ferrand (17-18-19 novembre 1993). Saint-Genouph: Nizet, 1997.

Cook, Ramsay. Canada. Québec and the Use of Nationalism. 2nd ed. Toronto: McClellan and Stewart, 1995.

230 Coleman. William D. The independence movement in Quebec 1945-1980. Toronto; Univof Toronto Press, 1984.

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