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The Angel’s Jig

by Daniel Poliquin; Wayne Grady (trans.)

Slavery was abolished in Canada in 1834, but in the years between 1875 and 1925 (roughly), orphans and indigent seniors in parts of New Brunswick were regularly auctioned off as unpaid servants – slaves, in other words. Records of the practice have almost entirely disappeared, but this is the subject of an intriguing – and surprisingly uplifting – fable-like novel from Ottawa-based writer Daniel Poliquin.

AprilReviews_AngelsJigPoliquin is one of French Canada’s leading authors, and translator of books by Matt Cohen, Mordecai Richler, and W.O. Mitchell. Poliquin’s own books in French are frequently nominated for literary prizes; in 2007, A Secret Between Us landed on the Scotiabank Giller Prize shortlist. The Angel’s Jig began life two years ago as Le vol de l’ange, which was nominated for Ontario’s Trillium Prize in the French-language fiction category.

Despite its grim subject, The Angel’s Jig is no tearjerker; it’s more along the lines of bawdy Chaucer than heartbreaking Dickens. Poliquin’s novel never takes itself too seriously; in the preface, the author reveals that even the title is a sly joke. But this does not mean the book is lightweight. It is alternately philosophical, tragic, and joyous, with an unforgettable cast of eccentric, believable characters whose backstories are intriguing, though, at times, far too lengthy. The prose, in able translation by Wayne Grady, crackles with strength and acuity: “The woman was so ordinary-looking, she didn’t seem to be in the room at all. The man looked as though he went around biting dogs.”

Above all, this is a story of resilience, of one man’s ability to survive. The man, called Fidèle, even finds love and contentment (albeit intermittently) in a world that seems lifted from a Brothers Grimm fairy tale.

Fidèle is something of an Everyman, nameless throughout much of the novel, and more an observer than a participant. He inevitably becomes entangled in the affairs of others, and appears irresistible to widows and other lonely women. He speaks eloquently – but only in his head, having chosen to remain mute throughout his life. This choice is never entirely explained, adding to the mystery of a complex, charming character.

The origins of Fidèle’s parents are murky, although it seems his mother, Salomé, is at least partly aboriginal. We know less about his unnamed father, an itinerant lumberjack. The unwed Salomé abandons Fidèle while he is still a young child, at some unspecified date close to Confederation.

The rural family who once employed Salomé as a domestic servant agrees to raise the boy, but death and poverty result in Fidèle being auctioned off at a Catholic church in the Acadian community of Bouctouche. A farm family bids $6 a month, a sum the local parish must pay the family to keep the boy. In return, Fidèle does unpaid work on the farm until he reaches his late teens and strikes out on his own.

The adult Fidèle moves from place to place, job to job, and lover to lover in a series of adventures that often end badly but never break his spirit. He spends time in jail after being implicated in the death of a married woman he loves. He is put in an asylum so doctors can study his muteness. He lingers there for years and is released only because the First World War breaks out and there is an urgent need for beds to house traumatized soldiers.

When, late in life, he finds himself once again destitute, Fidèle is auctioned off to a farm family who treat him kindly. But after a few years, economic reversals force the family to deliver Fidèle to yet another auction, which provides the story with a cliffhanger ending.

Few written records survive regarding auctions conducted by local parishes; Poliquin hit a goldmine during his research when he met Régis Brun, an archivist at the Centre d’etudes acadiennes at Université de Moncton, who told tales about his own grandfather being auctioned off in the 1920s. Some readers may be surprised that Poliquin does not position the auctions as a shameful practice to be condemned. In this story, the chances of being treated well as an unpaid servant are greater than in being sent to orphanages and poor houses, both of which have reputations for abusing residents.

So, is Poliquin’s somewhat benevolent view of the auctions accurate? It is difficult to say. Certainly, he challenges historians to dig deeper into this foggy chapter of our past. Whatever the case, Poliquin delivers a thoroughly enjoyable odyssey about a memorable, yet perplexing character and a shocking custom that has all but disappeared from our collective memory.

 

Reviewer: Paul Gessell

Publisher: Goose Lane Editions

DETAILS

Price: $19.95

Page Count: 300 pp

Format: Paper

ISBN: 978-0-86492-967-2

Released: April

Issue Date: April 2016

Categories: Fiction: Novels