35 - The Institutionalization of Literature in Quebec

Summary

From the Institutionalization of Literature to Literary Institutions

IT SEEMS IMPOSSIBLE TODAY to discuss Quebec literature without considering its institutions and, in particular, its institutionalization over the past century. This predicament explains Gilles Marcotte's (1925–) remarks on “Institution et courants d'air” (1989), in which he observes that “the literary institution is not a new topic in Quebec literature. On the contrary, it is our oldest idea. Just as God exists before creation, the institution predates the works” (26). The narrator of Catherine Mavrikakis's (1961–) novel Deuils cannibales et mélancoliques (2000) makes a similar statement: “In Quebec, there are more literary prizes than books published…. It's all about building the institution, whatever the cost” (150). Marcotte's critical analysis of the inverted chronology of institution and production in Quebec's literary landscape and business has become commonplace; and although in the case of Mavrikakis's narrator the comment may sound rather cynical, the observations of Marcotte and Mavrikakis illuminate the crux of the problem: Both criticize literature as an apparatus that has become a matter of course.

The institutionalization of Quebec literature after the Révolution tranquille opens a vast field of inquiry: In what ways and to what extent have critics, universities with their respective curricula, journals, publishers, and organizations awarding literary prizes participated in this institutionalization? What has been the role of literary histories, anthologies, essays, new media, and funding agencies in the process of determining an autonomous Quebec literature, independent of the former motherland France?