When I set out for Canada in December 2011, my friend Charlotte, hungover from a ‘Spurs victory the day before, asked me over a diet coke in a London pub, where I would be living in Montreal. “Verdun,” I replied, which led to brief but uninformed remarks about Canadian involvement in World War I. Uninformed […]
Crémazie
The bookstore is dead, or so we are told, displaced by Amazon, and hollowed out by the parasitic succubi of the coffeeshop and the home accessory. The bookstore is reborn, or so we are told, its managers displaced by passionate hipsters, curators of ideas in print, gatherers of writers, and hosts of events. Some bookstores […]
I am Jean Talon
With Université de Montréal, I completed a full tour of the four sections I have divided Canadian history into, New France, British Rule, Confederation to WWII, and WWII to the present. There are gaps aplenty; they will be dealt with as I review these blog posts and attempt a coherent whole. This is a somewhat […]
Université de Montréal
The tower of the of the Univerisité de Montréal’s Pavillion Roger Gaudry is one of the more imposing structures on the north side of Mount-Royal, an ivory tower in all but substance. This week, thanks to William Ralliant Clark of the university’s press office, and Diane Baillargeon and Monique Voyer, both of the university’s archives, I […]
Plamondon
It often seems that art in Canada did not begin until the early twentieth century, as if the innovations of Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven were painting itself and that before their depiction of Algonquin forests, wealthy Montrealers and Quebec’s devout lived in colonial or forgotten exile surrounded by walls as white as […]
Atwater
At first glance, Atwater seems to tell the dullest history on the metro system. Edwin Atwater emigrated from Vermont in 1830; established himself with his brother, Albert, as a painter and varnisher in Montreal; went on to establish factories and and telegraph companies as well as managing banks through various financial crises (yes, they had […]
D’Iberville
After the predations of Frontenac and Cadillac, New France could be forgiven for looking for an honest man; in Pierre Le Moyne d’Iberville et d’Ardillères it almost found one. In career characterized by ruthlessness and fleeing Englishmen, Iberville’s military success in the Hudson Bay, New York, Newfoundland, Louisiana, and the West Indies covered a multitude […]
