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Article

Les Plouffe

Roger LEMELIN's famous novel, LES PLOUFFE, had already been serialized for radio in 1952 before being made into the first, and hugely successful, téléroman (1953-59) for Québec television. The story of the Plouffe family became deeply woven into the fabric of Québec popular culture.

Article

Children's Literature in French

In the periodical L'Oiseau bleu, published by the Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society of Montréal, Marie-Clarie Daveluy's serial story Les Aventures de Perrine et Charlot (1923) can be found. This story is considered to be the first Québécois text specifically written for children.

Article

Winnie-the-Pooh

Winnie-the-Pooh is a popular character in children’s books, movies and TV series. Originally appearing in Winnie-the-Pooh, a children’s book written by author A.A. Milne in 1926, the fictional character was based on a female black bear found in White River, Ontario. The bear, also called Winnie, was resident at the London Zoo, where she had been donated by Harry Colebourn, a veterinarian in the Canadian Army during the First World War.

Article

Alias Grace

Margaret Atwood’s ninth novel, Alias Grace (1996), is a work of historical fiction that centres on the mysterious figure of Grace Marks. She was convicted in 1843 at the age of 16 for the murder of her employer, Thomas Kinnear, a wealthy Scottish Canadian, who was killed along with his housekeeper and mistress, Nancy Montgomery. Alias Grace won the Giller Prize for fiction in 1996. It was also shortlisted for a Governor General’s Award and England’s Booker Prize. In 2017, Sarah Polley adapted Atwood’s novel into a six-part CBC/Netflix miniseries, starring Sarah Gadon as Marks.

Article

The Handmaid's Tale

Margaret Atwood’s sixth novel, The Handmaid's Tale (1985) is a chilling dystopian vision of the future. It is set in the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian America in which fundamentalist Christians have killed the president and Congress and imposed a puritanical theocracy. The Handmaid's Tale portrays a loveless police state that oppresses women and regulates all aspects of human life with constant surveillance. The novel won the Governor General's Literary Award and the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction Literature. It has sold more than eight million copies in English. The Washington Post’s Ron Charles called it “the most popular and influential feminist novel ever written.” It has been adapted into a feature film, an acclaimed opera, a ballet, an Emmy Award-winning television series and a graphic novel. The Testaments, a highly anticipated sequel written by Atwood, was published in September 2019. It was awarded the Booker Prize in a rare tie with Bernardine Evaristo’s Girl, Woman, Other.

Article

Authors and Their Milieu

Contemporary Canadian writers have won prestigious awards and honours at home and abroad. Among the most publicized of these events was Prix Goncourt awarded to Antonine Maillet for Pélagie-la-Charette.

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Centennial Literature

​The 100th anniversary of Confederation in 1967 coincided with a period of self-definition and national assertion that consolidated national literary institutions and produced works that explored national identity.

Article

Anne of Green Gables

Lucy Maud Montgomery’s first novel, Anne of Green Gables (1908), became an instant bestseller and has remained in print for more than a century, making the character of Anne Shirley a mythic icon of Canadian culture. The book has sold an estimated 50 million copies worldwide, been translated into at least 36 languages, as well as braille, and been adapted more than two dozen times in various mediums. A musical version first produced by the Charlottetown Festival in 1965 is the longest running annual musical theatre production in the world, while the award-winning 1985 CBC miniseries starring Megan Follows is the most-watched television program in Canadian history. Thousands of tourists visit Prince Edward Island each year to see the “sacred sites” related to the book, and the sale of Anne-related commodities such as souvenirs and dolls has come to constitute a cottage industry.

Article

Canadian Women's Press Club

The Canadian Women's Press Club (CWPC) was founded in June 1904 in a Canadian Pacific Railway Pullman car, aboard which 16 women (half anglophone, half francophone) travelled to the St. Louis World's Fair. All but one were working journalists who covered the event. The CWPC offered female journalists professional support and development in its mission to “maintain and improve the status of journalism as a profession for women.”

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Nobel Prizes and Canada

The Nobel Prizes are awarded annually for achievements that have significantly benefitted humankind. The prizes are among the highest international honours and are awarded in six categories: physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, peace, and economics. They are administered by the Nobel Foundation and awarded by institutions in Sweden and Norway. Eighteen Canadians have won Nobel Prizes, excluding Canadian-born individuals who gave up their citizenship and members of organizations that have won the peace prize.

List

30 Canadian Books

To celebrate its 30th anniversary, The Canadian Encyclopedia created 30 lists of 30 things that make us proud to be Canadian, from famous people and historic events, to iconic foods and influential artists.

Article

None Is Too Many

Written by Irving Abella and Harold Troper, None Is Too Many: Canada and the Jews of Europe 1933–1948 (published in 1982), documented antisemitism in the Canadian government’s immigration policies as they applied to European Jews fleeing persecution from Nazi Germany. The phrase “none is too many” entered the Canadian political lexicon largely because of this book. Even before its publication, the book played a crucial role in changing the Canadian government’s policies toward refugees, such that the government of Joe Clark welcomed Vietnamese refugees then referred to as the “Boat People.”

List

Children’s Books about Inuit Culture in Canada

Inuit authors have brought the richness and diversity of Inuit culture into the public eye with several enchanting and powerful books. From oral histories to Arctic animals to supernatural creatures, the books on this list explore various elements of the Inuit culture and way of life. Titles listed are recommended for a range of age groups, from toddlers to preteens. These books support efforts to encourage literacy, preserve and promote culture, and educate others about Inuit and Indigenous peoples and history.