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Roy Gabrielle 1909 - 1983 (74)

Ideas often last but a day; feelings, dreams almost forever.


QUOTES

The Road

Past Altamont.


To write, it's a need, it's almost physical. You cannot avoid picking up the pen. Or touching the white page that is there, stretched out. Totally ready to receive . . . And you write precisely because you want to give, because you want to share with others. Because you have felt, or understood, the truth of certain human beings and you must say it.

Gabrielle Roy, Châtelaine, April 1966

Gabrielle Roy (1909 - 1983) was α Canadian author, one of the most prominent figures in 20th century French-speaking Canadian prose. Born March 22, 1909 in Saint-Boniface, Manitoba, she was the youngest in a family of 11 children. She started writing at a very young age, hearing stories from her father, her mother and her older sister. She excelled as a student at school, after graduating she started to work as a teacher. Her experiences between 1929 and 1937 as a teacher in the small town of Manitoba, but also in remote areas of multicultural western Canada, filled her with experiences that would later become the book (Ces enfants de mavie, 1977, Children of My Heart).

She had a love for theater and in 1937 she managed to go to Europe for theatrical studies. After a disappointing 2-year stay in France and England, she returned having given up her theatrical dreams. She moved to Montreal, where she became a freelance journalist, her research in some slums inspired her to write what would become Canada's first major urban novel. (Bonheur d'occasion, Montreal 1945), denounced the plight of workers and the underprivileged at the beginning of World War II, and asked questions about the role of patriotism and religion. She was very successful with this novel and escaped from poverty, since then she lived her life writing successful novels. Some of her novels deal with the isolated rural life in Manitoba, most depicting the hopes and frustrations of the poor in a very realistic way.

Roua died in Quebec City on July 13, 1983. The following year, her autobiography, "Magic and Sadness", was published. Her manuscripts are kept in the National Library of Canada, and an award has been established in her name.