In all the celebrations commemorating 400 years of French
history in Canada, one figure stands larger than life--Samuel de
Champlain. The story of this country could not have been the same without his determination, his vision, and his love for the wild, mosquito-infested forests of the New World. His is one of the most recognizable names in our
history, and yet much of what we know about him is based on conjecture. Even his appearance is debatable, since no portrait was painted during his life. In fact, the most familiar depiction was created in the nineteenth century and was mistakenly modeled on a portrait of Michel Particelli, an eighteenth-century con artist.
This book, another installment in XYZ Publishing’s “The Quest Library,” reveals the story behind Champlain’s portrait as well as other intriguing details in a lively, engaging manner. It could be called a fictionalized biography, since the author takes the facts and dramatizes them somewhat, inventing probable dialogue in an attempt to flesh out a list of facts into a real story. The result is a very readable biography that doesn’t skimp on historical details.
It also has some eye-catching additions to the main narrative. Maps and pictures from Champlain and other contemporary sources embellish the text, while each chapter begins and ends with appropriate quotations from Champlain. The book concludes with some valuable resources, including a timeline, an index, and a list of sources to consult for further research. Of these, Champlain himself is his best chronicler, and yet he leaves many gaps in his life story.
His marriage is just one area in his life in which the plain facts are tantalizingly obscure. Whether it was for politics or affection is not known, but he was betrothed to Hélène Boullé when he was 39 and she was 12. Shortly thereafter, he returned to New France, where he named a newly discovered island after his bride. Two years later when the marriage became official, the bride rebelled against the new relationship and ran away from her
husband, hiding for several days with some sympathetic relatives.
From this rocky start grew a fond friendship, although Hélène soon came to realize she had a rival for her husband’s devotion—“a country as great as infinity.” After a horrible two months at sea and four brutal years in Quebec, she returned home to France and communicated with her husband only through letters and his occasional visits. She later requested that he give her permission to resign her married state and retreat to a convent of the Ursuline nuns, where she lived until she died 1654, nineteen years after Champlain.
The book gives details on major episodes in Champlain’s life besides his marriage: his war on behalf of the Huron, his survival of an assassination attempt, his adoption of three daughters, his pressuring of government officials to take New France more seriously, and, most of all, his heroic efforts to make Quebec a viable settlement. The plan of the book is more topical than chronological, a fact which makes the timeline at the end all the more valuable.
At the end of the book, I was left with the impression that if Champlain had not been thwarted by court officials in his attempt to establish a firm footing for more settlers, and if he could have persuaded them to enter into his vision, the history of the New World would surely have taken a far different path. I was surprised to come to this conclusion, because I had thought that I knew all about Champlain. However, this book has shown me how much I undervalued his potential impact and how little I really knew of him. Through this work, Ms. Legaré has made an entertaining, thought-provoking contribution to this country’s historical record.