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Mordecai RichlerLeaving St Urbain |
eBook Available
"I didn't want the biography to end. Mordecai Richler seemed so vividly alive...From now on, nobody can write about Richler without reading this book." The Globe and Mail
Master of prose and polemics, Mordecai Richler was, for nearly five decades, one of Canada's most compelling writers. Though Richler insisted that his private life was not important to his work, Reinhold Kramer shows that Richler's uneasy Jewishness, his reluctant Canadianness, and his secularism were central to all of his writing.
Based on never-before published material from the Richler archives as well as interviews with family members, friends, and acquaintances, Mordecai Richler: Leaving St Urbain shows how Richler consistently mined his remarkable life for material for his novels. Beginning with the early clashes with his grandfather over Orthodox Judaism, and exposing the reasons behind his life-long quarrel with his mother, Kramer follows Richler as he flees to Ibiza and Paris, where he counted himself as one of the avant-garde who ushered in the 1960s. His successes abroad gave him the opportunity to remain in England and leave novel-writing behind - but he did neither. More than a biography, Mordecai Richler: Leaving St Urbain is the story of a Jewish culture finding its place within a larger stream, a literary culture moving into the colloquial, and a Canada torn between nationalism and cosmopolitanism.
Based on never-before published material from the Richler archives as well as interviews with family members, friends, and acquaintances, Mordecai Richler: Leaving St Urbain shows how Richler consistently mined his remarkable life for material for his novels. Beginning with the early clashes with his grandfather over Orthodox Judaism, and exposing the reasons behind his life-long quarrel with his mother, Kramer follows Richler as he flees to Ibiza and Paris, where he counted himself as one of the avant-garde who ushered in the 1960s. His successes abroad gave him the opportunity to remain in England and leave novel-writing behind - but he did neither. More than a biography, Mordecai Richler: Leaving St Urbain is the story of a Jewish culture finding its place within a larger stream, a literary culture moving into the colloquial, and a Canada torn between nationalism and cosmopolitanism.
Details
Part of the Arts Insights Series (number 3 in series)
498 Pages, 6.125 x 9.250
15 b&w photos
ISBN 9780773533554
March 2008
Formats: Paperback, Cloth, eBook
"The scope and thoroughness of Reinhold Kramer's engrossing new biography is evidence, if any is still needed, of Richler's importance. Kramer has struck the fine balance between academic rigour and popular biography, representing Richler's life with the epic narrative scope it deserves." Montreal Review of Books
"Reinhold Kramer made prodigious use of old correspondence and two unpublished early novels to draw links between Richler's life and his fiction. But Kramer had no interest in kissing up - while he revels in Richler's successes, he doesn't shy from his follies. Leaving St. Urbain is the best kind of biography: marvelously detailed, but also clear-eyed and even playful." CBC Arts Online
"... a major literary-critical triumph." The Jewish Post & News
"Kramer, a meticulous researcher, digs deeply, unearthing a motherlode of sparkling nuggets about this talented, cantankerous man." The Canadian Jewish News
"Mordecai Richler: Leaving St. Urbain represents required reading for anyone interested in Canadian Jewish literature, or Canadian literature in general." Rebecca Margolis, University of Ottawa
"L'écriture de Kramer est superbe, ironique et enjouée, à la manière de Richler, mais avec une touche d'optimisme et de ludisme qui en fait une lecture fort agréable." Pierre Anctil, Ottawa University
"Professor Kramer writes with wit, challenging Richler's cunning subterfuges where necessary, and adding his own distinctive voice." Glenn Deer, Canadian Literature
"Reinhold Kramer made prodigious use of old correspondence and two unpublished early novels to draw links between Richler's life and his fiction. But Kramer had no interest in kissing up - while he revels in Richler's successes, he doesn't shy from his follies. Leaving St. Urbain is the best kind of biography: marvelously detailed, but also clear-eyed and even playful." CBC Arts Online
"... a major literary-critical triumph." The Jewish Post & News
"Kramer, a meticulous researcher, digs deeply, unearthing a motherlode of sparkling nuggets about this talented, cantankerous man." The Canadian Jewish News
"Mordecai Richler: Leaving St. Urbain represents required reading for anyone interested in Canadian Jewish literature, or Canadian literature in general." Rebecca Margolis, University of Ottawa
"L'écriture de Kramer est superbe, ironique et enjouée, à la manière de Richler, mais avec une touche d'optimisme et de ludisme qui en fait une lecture fort agréable." Pierre Anctil, Ottawa University
"Professor Kramer writes with wit, challenging Richler's cunning subterfuges where necessary, and adding his own distinctive voice." Glenn Deer, Canadian Literature
Reinhold Kramer is professor of English at Brandon University and the award-winning author, with Tom Mitchell, of Walk Towards the Gallows: The Tragedy of Hilda Blake, Hanged 1899 and Scatology and Civility in the English-Canadian Novel.
Acknowledgments xi
Illustrations xiii
Introduction 3
Part I: Tiefste Provinz, 1931-1950
1 Geyt, yidelech, in der vayter velt 11
2 A Light Has Gone Out in Israel 19
3 À bas les Juifs! 27
4 Shabbes Goy 39
5 A Losers’ Finishing School 55
Part II:Yurop, 1950-1972
6 Bohemia among the Fishermen: Ibiza 67
7 Mr. Gauche of the Rive-gauche: Paris 80
8 What Do You Know about the Circus? 92
9 Cathy, Commerce, and Señor Hoore: London 103
10 Friends and Enemies 118
11 Florence Mann, the Golden Shiksa 131
12 The End of the Apprenticeship 143
13 Certified Libel-Free 154
14 Idols of the Tribe 168
15 Cocksure; Spent Worm 183
16 Mortimer Square and the Counterculture 198
17 Horseman 210
Part III: Home Again, 1972-2001
18 Return to Avonlea 237
19 Hollywood North 249
20 Kiddie Author 258
21 Back to Ibiza 268
22 Lily, Round 3 272
23 Last of the Free-Market Scribblers 290
24 The Bronfmans Are Gathering 308
25 Tongue Trooper 320
26 VIP’s Israel 335
27 The Bourgeois Trickster 345
28 Absolute Barney 352
29 A Few Parting Shots 364
Notes 377
Bibliography 459
Index 485
Illustrations xiii
Introduction 3
Part I: Tiefste Provinz, 1931-1950
1 Geyt, yidelech, in der vayter velt 11
2 A Light Has Gone Out in Israel 19
3 À bas les Juifs! 27
4 Shabbes Goy 39
5 A Losers’ Finishing School 55
Part II:Yurop, 1950-1972
6 Bohemia among the Fishermen: Ibiza 67
7 Mr. Gauche of the Rive-gauche: Paris 80
8 What Do You Know about the Circus? 92
9 Cathy, Commerce, and Señor Hoore: London 103
10 Friends and Enemies 118
11 Florence Mann, the Golden Shiksa 131
12 The End of the Apprenticeship 143
13 Certified Libel-Free 154
14 Idols of the Tribe 168
15 Cocksure; Spent Worm 183
16 Mortimer Square and the Counterculture 198
17 Horseman 210
Part III: Home Again, 1972-2001
18 Return to Avonlea 237
19 Hollywood North 249
20 Kiddie Author 258
21 Back to Ibiza 268
22 Lily, Round 3 272
23 Last of the Free-Market Scribblers 290
24 The Bronfmans Are Gathering 308
25 Tongue Trooper 320
26 VIP’s Israel 335
27 The Bourgeois Trickster 345
28 Absolute Barney 352
29 A Few Parting Shots 364
Notes 377
Bibliography 459
Index 485
Winner
Gabrielle Roy Prize
Association for Canadian and Quebec Literatures (2008)
Winner
The Abe and Fay Bergel Award in Scholarship on a Jewish Subject
Helen & Stan Vine Canadian Jewish Book Awards (2009)
Gabrielle Roy Prize
Association for Canadian and Quebec Literatures (2008)
Winner
The Abe and Fay Bergel Award in Scholarship on a Jewish Subject
Helen & Stan Vine Canadian Jewish Book Awards (2009)
