From: clamen+@CS.CMU.EDU (Stewart Clamen)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.canada,can.politics,soc.culture.french
Subject: Re: Quebec Nationalist Writer sells manuscripts to Ottawa!
Date: 17 Nov 92 21:52:19 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.BxvrFA.7Kq.1
Reply-To: clamen+@CS.CMU.EDU
Organization: School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University
Originator: clamen@BYRON.SP.CS.CMU.EDU

In article <1992Nov17.134146.17824@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca> golchowy@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca (Gerald Olchowy) writes:

   From a Canadian Press report in the Globe and Mail, page D1, Nov. 17,
   1992:

   National writer sells manuscripts to Ottawa:  Quebec library 'told us
   to get lost'

   (Canadian Press)--Montreal--: Michel Tremblay, one of Quebec's
   best-known playwrights and a strong Quebec nationalist, has sold his
   manuscripts to the FEDERAL government for more than $300,000.  But
   Tremblay said Sunday he has no regrets about selling papers to a
   federalist institution.

   "The property is very well managed in Ottawa, they have an extraordinary
   collection.  And it's normal for writers to sell their manuscripts, if
   they are worth something."

   Tremblay said his agent offered the papers to Quebec's Bibliotheque
   nationale library in 1986 but was flatly, and rudely, refused.

   "They told us to get lost."

   Tremblay said he sold the documents, which span 30 years of his career,
   because he needed the money after his publisher went bankrupt.

   A second batch of papers was sold last year, and Tremblay says he has
   received more than $300,000 in all.

			[..]


   Robert Savoie, an opera singer who lined up to have Tremblay sign a book
   for him, said he was there to support the playwright after reading about
   the sale of his papers.

   He said he was saddened that the manuscripts of "a Quebecker who has
   given us the joy of reading our language, our culture" are "lost
   forever".  He blamed the Quebec government.

   At a nearby kiosk, Francois Jobin didn't see any moral or nationalist
   dilemma in the Tremblay affair.

   "I'd say [manuscripts] should go to the highest bidder," he said.

   ====================================================================
   End of article
   ====================================================================

   Note:  The constitutional position of the Quebec government is that the
   federal government (which spends 40% of its cultural spending in Quebec 
   though Quebec has only 25% of the population) should
   vacate the field of culture and allow the Quebec government should be
   allowed to be the sole protector of Quebecois culture...

   The irony is of course that Tremblay's papers would truly be "lost
   forever" if the Quebec government had its way...it wouldn't buy them,
   and if Canada accepted its constitutional demands, the federal
   government would have been unable to buy them also.  The Quebec
   government...the great protector of Quebecois culture...NOT!

I recognize the irony, but I don't think the cultural spending powers
issue applies here.  Canadian museums can buy things from whomever
they want.  This wasn't the case of Canada funding a play or helping
to build a museum.  This was Michel Tremblay selling some of his
personal property to "the highest bidder."

There's a difference between a grant and a payment.

--
Stewart M. Clamen			Internet:    clamen@cs.cmu.edu
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Newsgroups: soc.culture.canada