Oh Canada! Oh Quebec!: Requiem for a Divided Country

by Mordecai Richler

Book Overview

A humorous look at Quebec's movement toward independence from Canada, remarking upon the Draconian language laws imposed on English-speaking Quebecois, the economic problems posed by the movement, and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0679412468
• ISBN13: 9780679412465
• Release Date: May 1992
• Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf
• Length: 277 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.9" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

An Australian View Point

As an Australian who lived for three and a half years in Quebec, I found this book very useful to show my friends here in Brisbane what I have told them is true. This book is invaluable because we in Australia are not only geographically a million miles away from Quebec we are a million miles ahead, and Mordecai Richler has cpatured everything that is Quebec. This book is a must for those trying to understand the psyche of the Quebecoir.

Requiem for a derided country

For anyone hoping to gain an understanding of the pre- (and now post-) millennial angst that often grips great swaths of our country at the mere mention of the terms 'distinct society' and 'sovereignty association', Richler's book is a solid and engaging read. If nothing else, Oh Canada! Oh Quebec! serves as a useful counterpoint to the tightly-held yet misguided notions of many indépendantistes regarding the terms on which sovereignty is to be negotiated between Canada and a new nation of Quebec. And for anyone familiar with the oft-maligned language laws in effect in Quebec, Richler's satirical notion that similar constraints might usefully be placed on the volume of spoken English can sometimes cut too close for comfort ...

Yes, I liked it, too.

My husband is an American of Canadian heritage, and we have spent a lot of time in Montreal. Of course, we've been interested in this language problem for many years; and I found Richler's book to be extremely informative because here in the Southwest, we are faced with the Spanish-English dilemma. Richler's wit and knowledge of his subject made the book extremely interesting. So what if it reeked of anti-simitism--he was just making a point about people who have values that they think should be shared by all; and if they're not shared, boy, are, "those outsiders" stupid.

A defense of Richler's book

As an American of Canadian descent, I found Richler's book to be a trenchant analysis of the problems the country faced with its separatist movement. I read the book a year or two after it came out in paperback, and I still recommend it to people who want to understand the divisions in Canada - whether they be English vs. Francophone, or Christian vs. Jew, a schism Richler knows well. If you have no stake or interest in what happens to Canada, perhaps it is indeed boring. But for those of us who care, it's indispensable...