Mémoire - Violette DROUIN

Strangers at Home: Imperial Landscape and Contested Places in Literature about Nova Scotia

Violette DROUIN

Nova Scotia has for many years been constructed by state and commercial interests as “Canada’s Ocean Playground,” a rugged and relaxing natural retreat removed from the concerns of modernity. This picture, developed in the early 20th century as the province was undergoing large-scale deindustrialization and reorienting its economy to focus on tourism, intentionally obscures the violence and displacement suffered by marginalized groups throughout Nova Scotia’s history. This study seeks to trace how Gaelic, Black, Acadian, and Mi’kmaw authors have sought to challenge their communities’ erasure from or assimilation into the landscape of Nova Scotia by engaging in acts of place-making in literature. The study brings together works across a variety of genres, focusing on No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod (fiction), And I alone escaped to tell you by Sylvia D. Hamilton (poetry), Whylah Falls by George Elliott Clarke (long poem), L’isle Haute: en marge de Grand-Pré by Serge Patrice Thibodeau (creative non-fiction), and Elapultiek by shalan joudry (drama). Drawing on theories of place and landscape set forth by Doreen Massey, Tim Cresswell, and W. J. T. Mitchell, this study argues that each of the aforementioned authors articulates a unique relationship to Nova Scotia informed by their history and cultural background.