Montreal Stories

by Clark Blaise

Here gathered together are the Montreal-set stories which made Clark Blaise famous -- such stories as A Class of New Canadians', Eyes', and I'm Dreaming of Rocket Richard' -- alongside two new and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0889842701
• ISBN13: 9780889842700
• Release Date: October 2003
• Publisher: Porcupine's Quill
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.6" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

Excellent style & keen, unflinching observations of a lame city

Clark Blaise's creates vivid life on the page with impeccable style. Most of the stories occur in the 50s, 60s & 70s. Granted, much has improved since then including abolition in the 1990s of the "confessional school system" wherein public education was run along religious lines including many clergy serving as teachers and principals. Americans romanticize Montreal as the Paris of North America, however its intensely xenophobic pur-laine-quebecois* denizens elect to live the lower-working-class lifestyle relying on the province's generous unemployment and welfare system. Apart from the more English-speaking western districts, most of the city resembles a barrio in Mexico City. Militant Quebec trade-unions still run the show, and not a year goes by now without a punishing winter strike: be it the snowcleaners, bus drivers, postal workers, hospital workers, janitors, teachers, utility employees, etc. Snow piles high on the duplexes' wrought-iron exterior staircases and 3-foot brown-stained snowbanks line the sidewalk gutters from the street ploughs. Blaise describes teachers, parents and other models as they blaming poverty, unemployment, drinking, violence to on English-speaking Canadians (who in Quebec are simply called "les anglais," even though they're not British) the Protestants & the Jews. Indeed antisemitic commentary is found in most of these stories. Blaise explores the overt pressure placed on French Canadian children to eschew professionalism, internationalism and innovation,for they are the trappings of the anglais. One English-speaking mother is married to a Francophone in Pittsburgh who is fired for worksite violence & they're forced to return to Montreal to lodge with his brother Theophile whose family speaks no English. The narrator starts French school where he is reguarly whipped by nuns and priests to get back at his unruly cousin Dollard. "Tu es hotage, you're just a hostage" they tell him. The mother secretly introduces him to the English department stores and English-style food and to her former friends, English intellectuals. However by this point his mind has already been jawboned to toe the Quebec-victim line and he insists he wants to leave her friends west of boulevard St. Laurent to return to home. Nevertheless, within this theatre-verite compassion abounds for the victims of this form of socialization. We observe English and French Canadian characters of various ages. I enthusiastically recommend this book, I couldn't put it down. *Pur-Laine Quebecois (translates as Pure Wool Quebecers) was a term that the nationalist cultural affairs minister Camille Laurin coined to refer to the racially pure French Canadians.

The More Things Change...

I picked up this book while preparing myself for the next big step in my life: moving to Montreal. I have come through a long journey around the world, lived most of my adult life in the States, and now I am heading to Canada to start everything all over. I could relate to most of the stories in this book even though they describe a time long gone. Clark Blaise narrates through Montreal, and it is exactly what I expect it to be: The city of immigrants, and the entry port for the dreamers all over the world. Most of the characters in his sories are always on the move, in the pursuit of happiness, very much like today's reality. Without ever being to Montreal, through Blaise's stories, I feel that I belong there. I can see the melting pot of cultures, the struggle between the English and French heritage, the love and the pain associated with living in such a different place from the rest of Noth America. The language that Clark Blaise uses is simple and pure, and it comes through as a very pleasant read. Once I started a story I could not put the book down until I finished it. I would highly recommend this book to everyone who intends to move or just visit Montreal, as it would be an eye-opening account of what this city stands for, all beautifully told from a first-hand experience. And if you don't intend to do either one of the above, read this book just for entertainment, personal curiosity, or growth.