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Elizabeth Jane Howard’s Eclectic Literary Career
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A JOURNEY THROUGH CANADA'S FORGOTTEN, NEGLECTED AND SUPPRESSED WRITING
The Globe & Mail 10 January 1944 |
Because I've received requests for links to my writing on the titles mentioned in the list and article:
The Globe & Mail, 19 November 1955 |
(cliquez pour agrandir) |
There was no doubt about it, his rock in Berthet's pond had made waves! He must be biting his nails now! Just wait, just wait!That was the narrator.
They were there to hear Charles Trenet sing "Boum! When my little heart goes boum!" and "The sun has a rendezvous with the moon," and "When I was small," and "Ménilmontant." Charles Trenet's genius symbolized gaiety and youth, relegating pre-war songs to the mothballs and anticipating Presley and the Beatles.
The Dusty Bookcase:A Journey Through Canada'sForgotten, Neglected, and Suppressed Writing
The Globe & Mail, 12 April 1948 |
Prior to the discovery of their little saint, these parasites, disappointed at being refused admission to the Daughters of Mary and the Ladies of the Holy Family, had felt themselves to be of little importance, without an object in life. In view of this, it is not so hard to understand their sudden and furious devotion to this dead youth, whom they in a manner of speaking had rehabilitated. These elderly spinsters had a purpose now; and if their past was wholly taken up with their virginity, the Ark of the Covenant for them, their future was filled with the disembodied form of a heavenly stripling.
Avant la découverte de leur petit saint, ces parasites, dépitées d'être refusées parmi les Enfants de Marie et les Femmes de la Sainte Famille, s'étaient senties comme diminuées. Aussi ne songeait-on pas à convaincre de futilité ces vieilles filles dont tout le passé était rempli par le conservatisme de leur virginité et dont tout l'avenir se remplirait des formes désincarnées d'un céleste jouvenceau.I offer the original French because the greatest problem with The Town Below isn't Lemelin, rather translator Samuel Putnam. An American francophile who, one presumes, knew much more about France than Canada. After misspelling Wilfrid Laurier's name in the Introductory Note, he writes:
The term "restaurant" has here been employed in the Canadian sense, that of a small shop where candies, ice-cream comes, liqueurs, and the like are sold.I have no idea what he's talking about.
— Les beaux livres! Prêtuez-les moi.Putnam's translation adds both dialogue and description:
Il eut sourire embarrassé.
— Ils sont à l'index.
Ell masqua son désire plus ardent de les lire.
"What have you there?" she asked.The exchange serves as a reminder, as if any were needed, that this is a novel written and set in Duplessis-era Quebec. That it was published during that dark time, escaped the censor, sold over 25,000 copies in year one, and received the Prix David and the Prix de la langue française has had me questioning my understanding of the Grande Noirceur.
"Some books."
"How nice! Lend them to me, will you?"
His own smile was an embarrassed one. "They are on the Index."
That made her all the more anxious to read them, but she was careful not to let him perceive it.
The Gazette, 15 May 1946 |
There was silence, possibly filled by the stammerings of a limp and deflated Pritontin. He was heartbroken over what had happened in the church and no longer counted on anything less than a miracle. That firecracker had destroyed something more than his trousers.