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2.

and some of the best work on English writers has been done by
French scholars.

But I want to speak to you today especially about your
own tongue. I have long been interested in the language and literature
of French Canada. As spoken, especially in the country
parts, your French speech is a beautiful and vivid thing, full of
interesting historical reminiscences, and full of phrases drawn
from the sea voyages of the first French pioneers. I only wish I
understood it better. French-Canadian literature is in the great
classical tradition of France. One can see the French writers who
have influenced it in different generations. Last century in men
like Cremazie and Nelligan one can detect the influence of the
great French romantics. In the poetry of this century, in men
like Paul Morin and Robert Choquette, one can trace more recent
models. What interests me especially is that the influence of
contemporary France always seems to take a little time to make itself
felt in Canada. It is never the latest French fashion which
affects our French-Canadian writers. For example, Victor Hugo,
who is not very popular in France today, seems to me still a living
force in this country. I think that time-lag is all to the
good, for it prevents our writers here being slavish copyists, and
enables them to give their work their own special Canadian idiom.

Since I came to Canada I have given myself the pleasure
of reading a good deal of French-Canadian literature, guided by
the works of my friend, M. Camille Roy, the grand seigneur of Canadian
literature. I have been struck especially by your work in two de-