29 May 2013

A Man, a Plan, a Dam – Labrador!



Fermez la porte, on gèle
René Carrier
Westmount, QC: Desclez, 1981

This review now appears, revised and rewritten, in my new book:
The Dusty Bookcase:
A Journey Through Canada's
Forgotten, Neglected, and Suppressed Writing
Available at the very best bookstores and through

Related posts:

5 comments:

  1. In the same vein, there was talk of an underground tunnel between Labrador and Newfoundland a decade or so ago. Hasn't gone far. Still hoping for Quebec to exetend the highway along the North Shore to the Newfoundland border.

    http://www.economist.com/node/2254532?story_id=E1_NNVQVPN

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    1. Anon, you've reminded me that the subsequent government report is available online here. I read it years ago, so remember little other than this: one danger is that the icebergs coming down the strait are so large that they often scrape along the floor. Amazing.

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  2. Cartier is a disciple of Lucien Beaugé (1879-1958), a pioneer of french oceanography from the Office scientifiques des pêches maritime. Beaugé was considered as a specialist of the Grand Banks, Groenland and Gulf of St-Lawrence. I work presently on the Beaugé's biography who was at the end of is life a fervent promotor of what he calle "the obturation of Belle Isle strait". I found the manuscript of the never publish book he wrote on this subject.

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  3. A wonderful find. There's a short story by Sylva Clapin from about 1911 ("Le Roi de l'or") that mentions the damming of the Belle-Isle strait.

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    1. It is an interesting read, reminding me somewhat of Florent Laurin's Erres boréales. Both are fantasies in which grand projects are used to warm the planet to no adverse effects. In retrospect, these same schemes seem suicidal.

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