Enlarge Image
To embed a link to this book on your own website, please copy the code below.
The Divine
By Michel Marc Bouchard
Translated by Linda Gaboriau
Quebec City, 1908. Two priests-to-be are ordered to deliver a letter to a controversial visitor to their city: the legendary French actress, Sarah Bernhardt.
As part of her long career, Bernhardt – known to her loyal fans as “The Divine” – visited Canada several times ... Read more
Overview
Quebec City, 1908. Two priests-to-be are ordered to deliver a letter to a controversial visitor to their city: the legendary French actress, Sarah Bernhardt.
As part of her long career, Bernhardt – known to her loyal fans as “The Divine” – visited Canada several times between 1880 and 1917, most often visiting Montreal, but once – just once – alighting in Quebec City. It is this singular historic visit, about which little is known, that Bouchard takes as the backdrop for his play, exploring conservative and progressive veins in competition through turn-of-the-century North America, with a focus on Quebec, that province on the verge of great change.
Michaud, the son of the province’s minister of finance, is a theatre lover. Talbot, on the other hand has arrived at the seminary on the very day of Bernhardt’s arrival in town, he comes from a family struggling with poverty and clearly has more pressing concerns. The two are ordered to deliver a letter from the Archbishop forbidding Bernhardt to appear on stage at any point during her one and only visit to Quebec City, on the grounds that she has decided to perform a play in which Adrienne Lecovreur “sings the praises of adulterous love” and “ridicules a man of the cloth portrayed as a plotting habitué of Parisian salons. ”
And so the stage is set for a battle for the hearts and minds of Quebeckers through these two seminarians: the powerful Catholic Church on one side, and the power of the divine Sarah Bernhardt – and the world of the theatre – on the other.
The Divine was commissioned for the 2015 Shaw Festival in honour of George Bernard Shaw and everyone who loves the theatre, and in memory of Sarah Bernhardt, “the woman who dares to say everything that should be left unsaid. ”
Cast of five women and eight men.
Linda Gaboriau
A major figure in Quebec theatre, MICHEL TREMBLAY has built an impressive body of work as a playwright, novelist, translator, and screenwriter. To date, Michel’s complete works include 29 plays (including 2 theatrical adaptations of his own work); 30 novels; 6 collections of autobiographical stories; a collection of tales; 7 screenplays; 46 translations/adaptations of works by foreign writers; 9 plays and 12 stories printed in diverse publications; an opera libretto; a song cycle; a Symphonic Christmas Tale and 2 musicals. His plays have been published and translated into 40 languages and have garnered critical acclaim in Canada, the United States, and more than 50 countries around the world. His name can be found in the Larousse and Robert Dictionaries, the Who’s Who Encyclopedia, the Dictionary of International Biography and the Encyclopedia Britannica. During his career, Michel has received more than 80 prizes, citations and honours including the Grand Prix de la Francophonie, awarded by the Académie française in 2018, as well as the Prince Pierre de Monaco Literary Prize and the Prix Gilles-Corbeil for his contribution to the arts in 2017. A six-time winner of grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, he won nine Chalmers Awards and five Grand Prix du public presented during Montreal’s annual book fair le Salon du livre. In 1999, he was awarded the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards. He has also received six honorary doctorates.
Reviews
“a fascinating, moving, ambitious piece of theatre”
– NOW Toronto
“a wonderful wrestling match between art, religion and business … a moving and entertaining yarn drawn from our own history … a play that is constantly pulling the rug out from underneath itself – and yet somehow keeps landing on its feet with only a few wobbles, quickly righted … The Divine is a rebuttal to its own criticisms about theatre – and [a solid] justification of the Shaw Festival’s own existence…”
– Globe and Mail
“a wonderful wrestling match between art, religion and business … a moving and entertaining yarn drawn from our own history … a play that is constantly pulling the rug out from underneath itself – and yet somehow keeps landing on its feet with only a few wobbles, quickly righted … The Divine is a rebuttal to its own criticisms about theatre – and [a solid] justification of the Shaw Festival’s own existence…”
– Globe and Mail
“It’s [Bouchard’s] best work, and the most exciting new Canadian play in years. … Sex embraced or coerced, religion used or abused, exploitation industrial and institutional, theatre celebrated and satirized and satirizing itself: it’s a heady mix, and I wondered halfway through if the ingredients could be kept in balance. It turns out that they can. This is a play with an all-conquering narrative drive and an abundance of twists; there are no unabsorbing moments. ”
– National Post
“Bouchard takes a real event in history – the visit of legendary French actress Sarah Bernhardt to Québec City in 1905 – and uses it to cast some dazzling new light on the themes that this gifted author has pursued with passion for all of his career: the destruction of innocence, the inequalities in his native province’s social and religious systems, and the healing capability of theatre in the face of these ills. … Bouchard writes with power, using broad strokes of language (muscularly translated by Linda Gaboriau) … Virtually every scene in the play makes its points well and leaves you thinking afterwards. ”
– Toronto Star
“In some ways it is uniquely Canadian. But the power and passion … will resonate with audiences around the world because it speaks so directly to the most fundamental issue of our time – the corruption of and exploitation by the institutions we believed were created to protect and serve us. … profound and timely. … It will become a timeless Canadian classic. ”
– ShalomLife. com
“Michel Marc Bouchard's play quivered with sexual tension. A five-alarm blaze. ”
– Gary Smith, The Hamilton Spectator
“In some ways it is uniquely Canadian. But the power and passion … will resonate with audiences around the world because it speaks so directly to the most fundamental issue of our time – the corruption of and exploitation by the institutions we believed were created to protect and serve us. … profound and timely. … It will become a timeless Canadian classic. ”
– ShalomLife. com
“Bouchard takes a real event in history – the visit of legendary French actress Sarah Bernhardt to Québec City in 1905 – and uses it to cast some dazzling new light on the themes that this gifted author has pursued with passion for all of his career: the destruction of innocence, the inequalities in his native province’s social and religious systems, and the healing capability of theatre in the face of these ills. … Bouchard writes with power, using broad strokes of language (muscularly translated by Linda Gaboriau) … Virtually every scene in the play makes its points well and leaves you thinking afterwards. ”
– Toronto Star
“It’s [Bouchard’s] best work, and the most exciting new Canadian play in years. … Sex embraced or coerced, religion used or abused, exploitation industrial and institutional, theatre celebrated and satirized and satirizing itself: it’s a heady mix, and I wondered halfway through if the ingredients could be kept in balance. It turns out that they can. This is a play with an all-conquering narrative drive and an abundance of twists; there are no unabsorbing moments. ”
– National Post
“Bouchard writes with scathing temper and his play is both touching and frightening. ”
– Hamilton Spectator
“Simply put The Divine is divine. … The writing alone makes the production worth watching. The Divine will certainly leave the audience with plenty to think about … The cast performs admirably in the Shaw production, delivering on the complex themes of the script. ”
– Niagara This Week
“a finely crafted work that soars beyond its seemingly divergent elements. … Ultimately, The Divine speaks to our time. … The Divine does what fine theatre should: provides humour as well as heart-wrenching moments, a gripping and believable story with engaging characters, provocative questions and the possibility of hope. ”
– Canadian Jewish News
“the most extraordinary play of the [2015 Shaw] festival … always compelling, and even intensely moving. Surely this play has a solid future. ”
– Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“Simply put The Divine is divine. … The writing alone makes the production worth watching. The Divine will certainly leave the audience with plenty to think about … The cast performs admirably in the Shaw production, delivering on the complex themes of the script. ”
– Niagara This Week
“a finely crafted work that soars beyond its seemingly divergent elements. … Ultimately, The Divine speaks to our time. … The Divine does what fine theatre should: provides humour as well as heart-wrenching moments, a gripping and believable story with engaging characters, provocative questions and the possibility of hope. ”
– Canadian Jewish News
Reader Reviews
Tell us what you think!
Sign Up or Sign In to add your review or comment.
Related Blog Posts
ALU Summer Book Club: Interview with André Alexis
Greg Frankson's Essay: Black Poets Across Canada
This month, we shine a spotlight on a collection of essays and poems about the contemporary experience of Black poets in Canada, AfriCANthology: Perspectives of Black Canadian Poets (Renaissance Press), edited by A. Gregory Frankson. This anthology includes a variety ... Read more
Writer's Block: Luanne Armstrong
In this week's edition of Writer's Block, we are joined by Luanne Armstrong, author of Going to Ground (Caitlin Press). Her recently released collection of essays is about aging, chronic pain and the healing power of nature. She shares with us how learning to read made ... Read more
Poetry in Motion: Essential Tremor
Barbara Nickel has written about bodies, in one form or another, for many years. In this, her third collection of poetry Essential Tremor (Caitlin Press), her past work coalesces into new and timely perspectives on body—the presence of a unifying and disruptive tremor ... Read more
Reflections from the contributors of Us, Now
Poetry Express: Aaron Tucker + Catalogue d'oiseaux
Recounting a year in the life of poet Aaron Tucker, Catalogue d'oiseaux (Book*hug Press) captures the time, space and love between a couple separated by geographical distance.
In this Poetry Express Q&A, Aaron tells us more about how the collection grew out of daily emails ... Read more
Poetry Express: All the People Are Pregnant + Andrew DuBois
In his debut poetry collection All the People Are Pregnant (Goose Lane Editions) writer Andrew DuBois collects what he considers are poems worth preserving, written and occasionally published since he was 20. Leading readers through a fractured past and present, he defamiliarizes, ... Read more
Gift Guide Week: Natasha Ramoutar
Our annual Gift Guide Week is here, featuring hand-picked selections by authors we admire for all the readers on your holiday gift list.
Our first gift guide recommender is poet and culture writer Natasha Ramoutar who shares five choice titles for everyone from "the one getting ... Read more
Under the Cover: Imagining new worlds in Mirror's Edge
Alex Passey's novel Mirror's Edge (At Bay Press) is a philosophical trip through two polarized worlds — a hyper-capitalist, burgeoning transhumanist society and a community-minded, woodland paradise — and the fallout when those ways of living collide. Below, Alex tells ... Read more
Writer's Block: Bridget Canning
Bridget Canning, author of The Greatest Hits of Wanda Jaynes and the more recently published Some People's Children (Breakwater Books), chats with us about bike riding to discover new perspectives, getting out of the house on a perfect writing day, finding out what ... Read more
- Dimensions 96 pages, 5.5 x 8.5 x .75 in
- Published September 15, 2015
- Publisher Talonbooks
- Category Drama
- Keywords Canadian
Other titles by Michel Marc Bouchard
Other titles by Linda Gaboriau
Get the All Lit Up Newsletter!
We'll send you bi-monthly updates to keep you in the loop on the best of our blog, special campaigns and offers, AND news on the latest in literary fiction, nonfiction and poetry from indie publishers across Canada.
You May Also Like
