Maurice Duplessis
Duplessis campaigning in the 1952 election.
16th Premier of Quebec
In office August 17, 1936 – October 25, 1939
Preceded by	Adélard Godbout
Succeeded by	Adélard Godbout
In office August 8, 1944 – September 7, 1959
Preceded by	Adélard Godbout
Succeeded by	Paul Sauvé
Personal details
Born	Maurice Le Noblet Duplessis (1890-04-20)April 20, 1890 Trois-Rivières, Quebec
Died	September 7, 1959(1959-09-07) (aged 69) Schefferville, Quebec
Political party	Union Nationale
Profession	Lawyer
Religion	Roman Catholic

Maurice Le Noblet Duplessis (French pronunciation: [dzyplɛsi]; 20 April 1890 – 7 September 1959) served as the 16th Premier of the Canadian province of Quebec from 1936 to 1939 and 1944 to 1959. A founder and leader of the highly conservative Union Nationale party, he rose to power after exposing the misconduct and patronage of Liberal Premier Louis-Alexandre Taschereau. ^[1]

His reign is often referred to in Quebec as La grande noirceur ("The Great Darkness"), especially due to the prevalent corruption and for the scandal surrounding the Duplessis Orphans. During the time, the Liberal opposition was unsuccessful in challenging Duplessis' power. Duplessis championed rural areas, provincial rights, anti-Communism and opposed the trade unions.

Early life[link]

Born in Trois-Rivières and son of local politician Nérée Le Noblet Duplessis, Duplessis studied at the Séminaire Saint-Joseph de Trois-Rivières, obtained a law degree from Université Laval's Montréal branch (later renamed Université de Montréal) and was admitted to the Barreau du Quebec in 1913. He returned to his home town to practice law until running for public office. He was a life-long bachelor.

Political career[link]

Duplessis in 1936

Maurice Duplessis sculpture in front of Parliament Building (Quebec)

Duplessis first won a seat as a Conservative Party of Quebec candidate in the 1927 Quebec election. In the 1931 election, he was reelected in his seat, but Conservative leader Camillien Houde lost both the election and his own seat. The Conservative caucus chose C. E. Gault to be interim Leader of the Opposition but, after Houde resigned as party leader in 1932, Duplessis won the leadership of the party during the 1933 convention over the only other candidate, Onésime Gagnon.

Two weeks before the 1935 provincial election, he engineered a coalition with Paul Gouin's Action libérale nationale (ALN), a party of dissident reform Liberals and nationalists who had quit the governing Parti libéral du Québec. While he lost that election, Duplessis was soon able to exploit a patronage scandal involving the family of Premier Louis-Alexandre Taschereau to force Taschereau's resignation.

Gouin withdrew his support from Duplessis on June 18, 1936, but the ALN caucus sided with Duplessis and joined with his Conservative caucus to formally merge into the Union Nationale party. Duplessis and the UN won the August 1936 election in a landslide, putting an end to thirty-nine consecutive years of Liberal rule. Duplessis's first government was defeated in the 1939 election, a snap election called by the premier in hopes of exploiting the issue of Canadian participation in World War II.

Duplessis returned as premier in the 1944 election, and held power without serious opposition for the next fifteen years, until his death, winning elections in 1948, 1952 and 1956. He became known simply as le Chef ("the boss").

He was elected to five terms of office in all, the last four of them consecutive. Duplessis remains the last Quebec premier to have won three or more consecutive majority governments. After him, no political party in Quebec elections at the provincial level had managed to win more than two terms of office in a row until the December 2008 victory of Jean Charest's Liberal party, its third consecutive win.

Policies[link]

Duplessis favoured rural areas over city development and introduced various agricultural credits during his first term. He was also noted for meagre investment in social services. Duplessis also opposed military conscription and Canadian involvement in World War II. The Union Nationale often had the active support of the Roman Catholic Church in its political campaigns and employed the slogan Le ciel est bleu; l'enfer est rouge: Heaven is blue (UN); Hell is red (Liberal).^[2]

Roncarelli v. Duplessis[link]

Duplessis actively opposed Jehovah's Witnesses and once used his influence to revoke a liquor license from one of their member's businesses. This decision was overturned by the Supreme Court of Canada, Duplessis being ordered to pay $33,123.53 in damages. He died shortly thereafter.

Death and legacy[link]

This section may contain inappropriate or misinterpreted citations that do not verify the text. Please help improve this article by checking for inaccuracies. (help, talk, get involved!) (November 2011)

This section has been nominated to be checked for its neutrality. Discussion of this nomination can be found on the talk page. (November 2011)

Queen Elisabeth Hospital, Montréal August 1959

Duplessis died in office in Schefferville, Quebec, on September 7, 1959, after suffering multiple cerebral seizures. After his death, Quebec society was caught in the Quiet Revolution (Révolution tranquille), a swift socio-cultural change away from his conservative policies toward a highly secular, socially liberal welfare state. Many of these major changes occurred when the Liberals regained power in 1960 under Jean Lesage.

Most of his surviving relatives have not handed down the "Duplessis" name to their children, although one of his nieces, Berthe Brunet-Dufresne, has taken it upon herself to rehabilitate her uncle.^{[citation needed]}

Duplessis has not been without his defenders. Conrad Black's 1977 encomium, Duplessis, painted a sympathetic portrait of the man as a transitional figure towards modernism, and the victim of partisan attack and personal malady (Black revealed, for instance, that Duplessis suffered from hypospadias).^[3]

Duplessis's legacy has remained under attack throughout the decades from all sides. The leftist Quebec nationalists disliked both his social conservatism and anti-separatist tendencies, the Liberals disliked his era as a period of successful patronage-oriented traditional conservatism and family values, and the conservatives among the Quebec Anglophones have disliked the privileges given to the church and the lack of freedoms for other churches (Protestant etc.).^{[citation needed]}

The myth of the "black years" of Duplessis and Duplessis's legacy has thus emerged as a result of intellectual opposition by all major Quebec political currents to Catholic church-oriented traditionalist patterns of development, with dominant intellectual streaks combining elements of this dislike. Aside from occasional defenders of his anti-Communist and socially conservative views ^[4][5] (like Conrad Black), the only defenders of Duplessis regime today come from traditionalist conservatives (paleoconservatives in North American definition) who view his regime as an essential reaffirmation of traditional values, and as assertion by democratic means of the basics of church and family life with low social spending and suppression of labour unions.^{[citation needed]}

The Duplessis regime thus claimed to have prevented "subversion" without the massive use of force and police repression that characterized the dictatorial policies of the Franco regime in Spain (which Duplessis supported).^{[citation needed]}

See also[link]

• Politics of Quebec
• Prime Minister nicknaming in Quebec
• Timeline of Quebec history
• Padlock Law

References[link]

External links[link]

• Biography of Maurice Duplessis
• "Biography" (in French). Dictionnaire des parlementaires du Québec de 1792 à nos jours. National Assembly of Quebec. http://www.assnat.qc.ca/en/deputes/duplessis-maurice-le-noblet-3057/index.html. 
• May 22 1999 Article On Duplessis
• CBC Digital Archives - Maurice Duplessis

Reference works[link]

• Conrad Black, Duplessis, ISBN 0-7710-1530-5, McClelland & Stewart, Toronto, 1977.
• Jacques Rouillard, Le syndicalisme Québécois, Boreal, Montreal, 2004
• CSN-CSQ, Histoire du mouvement ouvrier au Quebec, 2001
• Jones, R. (1983). Duplessis and the union nationale administration. Ottawa: Canadian Historical Association.
• Laporte, P. (1960). The true face of duplessis. Montreal: Harvest House Limited.
• Paulin, M. (2002). Maurice duplessis: Powerbroker, politician. Montreal: XYZ Publishing.

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Maurice Duplessis

*The Union Nationale was founded as an alliance in 1935 with Duplessis as leader. In 1936 the UN formally became a unitary political party with the Quebec Conservative Party dissolving into it.

v t e Premiers of Quebec Chauveau Ouimet de Boucherville de Lotbinière Chapleau Mousseau Ross Taillon Mercier de Boucherville Taillon Flynn Marchand Parent Gouin Taschereau Godbout Duplessis Godbout Duplessis Sauvé Barrette Lesage D. Johnson Bertrand Bourassa Lévesque P. Johnson Bourassa D. Johnson, Jr. Parizeau Bouchard Landry Charest Book:Premiers of Quebec Category:Premiers of Quebec Portal: Quebec

Denys Arcand
Arcand at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival
Born	(1941-06-25) June 25, 1941 (age 71) Deschambault, Quebec, Canada
Occupation	Film director, screenwriter, film producer
Years active	1962 - present
Spouse	Denise Robert (?-present)
Awards	Genie Award for Best Direction 1986 The Decline of the American Empire 1989 Jesus of Montreal 2003 The Barbarian Invasions Genie Award for Best Original Screenplay 1986 The Decline of the American Empire 1989 Jesus of Montreal 2003 The Barbarian Invasions

Georges-Henri Denys Arcand, CC CQ (French pronunciation: [dəni aʁkɑ̃]; born June 25, 1941) is a Canadian film director, screenwriter and producer. He has won an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film in 2004 for The Barbarian Invasions. He has also been nominated three further times, including two in the Best Foreign Film category for The Decline of the American Empire in 1987 and Jesus of Montreal in 1990, becoming the only French-Canadian director in history to receive this amount of nominations and, subsequently, winning the award. Also for The Barbarian Invasions, he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay, losing to Sofia Coppola for Lost in Translation. Denys Arcand has directed three of the five Canadian movies to ever receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Film. During his three decades career, he became the most renowned and accomplished Quebec's director, winning many awards from the Cannes Film Festival and many other prestigious awards. He won three César Awards in 2004 for The Barbarian Invasions, including Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Film.

Early life[link]

Arcand was born in Deschambault, Quebec, Canada. He grew up in a devoutly Roman Catholic home in a village about 40 km southwest of Quebec City. He attended Jesuit school for nine years. Entering his teen years, the family moved to Montreal and although he dreamed about being a professional tennis player, while studying for a Masters Degree in history at the Université de Montréal he became involved in film making that gave him a new sense of direction. During his university days, he and several friends would drive 600 km to New York City every few months to take in European films playing there that were not available in Quebec.

Career[link]

In 1963, he joined the National Film Board of Canada where he produced several award-winning documentaries in his native French language. A social activist, he made a feature-length documentary in 1970 titled On est au coton (We work in Cotton) that showed the exploitation of textile workers. The film caused an uproar that resulted in it not being distributed publicly for several years. Arcand received such publicity that it gave his fledgling career a great boost. He also worked on some television series, notably Duplessis, a historical work he wrote (but did not direct) about Premier Maurice Duplessis.

During the early part of the 1970s Arcand produced a number of feature films that received critical acclaim. Arcand returned to directing documentaries and did no work for television. In 1982, his documentary, Le confort et l'indifférence won the Best Film prize from the Quebec Film Critics' Association. In 1986 he wrote and directed what was until then the highest grossing film in Quebec (and Canadian) history, The Decline of the American Empire (Le Déclin de l'empire américain). At the Canadian Genie Awards, it captured best film, best director, and best writer of an original screenplay. It also won the "International Critics Prize" at the Cannes Film Festival and became the first Canadian feature film nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Three years later Arcand repeated this award-garnering performance with his widely acclaimed 1989 film Jésus de Montréal (Jesus of Montreal) winning the same three Genie awards, plus the "Jury Prize" at Cannes. The movie earned him a second Academy Award nomination, becoming the first Canadian director to accomplish this achievement.

Arcand produced and directed his first English language film in 1993, titled Love and Human Remains, and did so again in 2000, with the film, Stardom, which opened the Toronto International Film Festival. He then spent two years writing the script for what many claim is his finest piece of cinematic writing to date, The Barbarian Invasions (Les invasions barbares). Released in 2003, the film won Arcand the Best Screenplay Award at the Cannes Film Festival, was nominated for a Golden Globe Award as Best Foreign Language Film and won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. In addition, Denys Arcand was nominated for an Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay.

The Barbarian Invasions won France's 2004 César Award for Best Picture and Best Director plus the César Award for Best Original Screenplay.

Arcand's film Days of Darkness (L'âge des ténèbres) was chosen to close the 2007 Cannes Film Festival.^[1] The press opening was subdued, as opposed to receiving a standing ovation as with The Barbarian Invasions and the subsequent reviews were mixed.^[2]

Awards[link]

In 1988, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Companion in 2005.^[3] In 1990 the Government of France awarded him the Legion of Honour. He finally earned from his home province one of its highest distinctions, the title of Knight of the National Order of Quebec, in 1990.^[4] In February 2004, the government of France named Denys Arcand a Commander of L'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, that nation's highest cultural honour. In 2004 Arcand was also inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame.^[5] He is a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts.^[6]

Personal life[link]

Married a second time, neither Arcand nor Denise Robert, his producer/wife, have had children. He was 55 years old when they adopted an orphaned baby girl from China named Mingxia. His brother Bernard Arcand (1945–2009) was a Professor of anthropology. His youngest brother Gabriel Arcand (b. 1949) is a noted Canadian actor. Denys Arcand is a lapsed Catholic.

Filmography[link]

Film[link]

• A l'est d'Eaton (Short film Co-Directed with Stéphane Venne, 1959)
• Seul ou avec d'autres (Co-Directed with Denis Héroux and Stéphane Venne, 1962)
• La maudite galette (1972)
• Réjeanne Padovani (1973)
• Gina (1975)
• Empire, Inc. (TV mini-series episodes 2,5,6, 1983) (Episodes 1,3,4 directed by Douglas Jackson)
• Le crime d'Ovide Plouffe (1984)
• Le déclin de l'empire américain (1986)
• Jésus de Montréal (1989)
• Les lettres de la religieuse portugaise (TV movie, 1991)
• Vue d'ailleurs (TV episode of Montréal vu par..., 1992)
• Love and Human Remains (1993)
• Joyeux Calvaire (1996)
• Stardom (2000)
• Les invasions barbares (2003)
• L'âge des ténèbres (2007)

Documentaries[link]

• Champlain (Short film, 1964)
• Québec 1603 - Samuel de Champlain (Short film, 1964)
• Les Montréalistes (Short film, 1965)
• Montréal, un jour d'été (Short film, 1965)
• La route de l'Ouest (Short film, 1965)
• Volleyball (Short film, 1966)
• Parcs atlantiques (Short film, 1967)
• On est au coton (1970)
• Québec : Duplessis et après... (1972)
• La lutte des travailleurs d'hôpitaux (Short film, 1976)
• Le confort et l'indifférence (1982)

Further reading[link]

• Michel Coulombe, Denys Arcand. La vraie nature du cinéaste, (entretiens), Montréal: Boréal 1993
• André Loiselle, Brian McIllroy (éd.), Auteur/Provocateur. The Films of Denys Arcand, Westport: Praeger 1995

References[link]

External links[link]

• Denys Arcand at the Internet Movie Database
• Denys Arcand at the Canadian Film Encyclopedia

v t e César Award for Best Director 1976 Bertrand Tavernier 1977 Joseph Losey 1978 Alain Resnais 1979 Christian de Chalonge 1980 Roman Polanski 1981 François Truffaut 1982 Jean-Jacques Annaud 1983 Andrzej Wajda 1984 Ettore Scola 1985 Claude Zidi 1986 Michel Deville 1987 Alain Cavalier 1988 Louis Malle 1989 Jean-Jacques Annaud 1990 Bertrand Blier 1991 Jean-Paul Rappeneau 1992 Alain Corneau 1993 Claude Sautet 1994 Alain Resnais 1995 André Téchiné 1996 Claude Sautet 1997 Patrice Leconte / Bertrand Tavernier 1998 Luc Besson 1999 Patrice Chéreau 2000 Tonie Marshall 2001 Dominik Moll 2002 Jean-Pierre Jeunet 2003 Roman Polanski 2004 Denys Arcand 2005 Abdellatif Kechiche 2006 Jacques Audiard 2007 Guillaume Canet 2008 Abdellatif Kechiche 2009 Jean-François Richet 2010 Jacques Audiard 2011 Roman Polanski 2012 Michel Hazanavicius

Persondata
Name	Arcand, Denys
Alternative names
Short description	Film director
Date of birth	June 25, 1941
Place of birth	Deschambault, Quebec  Canada
Date of death
Place of death

René Lévesque^[1] (French pronunciation: [ʁəne levɛk]; August 24, 1922 – November 1, 1987) was a reporter, a minister of the government of Quebec, (1960–1966), the founder of the Parti Québécois political party and the 23rd Premier of Quebec (November 25, 1976 – October 3, 1985). He was the first Quebec political leader since Confederation to attempt, through a referendum, to negotiate political separation for Quebec.

Early life[link]

The eldest of four children, Lévesque was born in the Hotel Dieu Hospital in Campbellton, New Brunswick and raised 133 km away in New Carlisle, Quebec, in the Gaspé peninsula, by his parents, Diane (née Dionne) and Dominic Lévesque, a lawyer.^[2] Lévesque attended the Séminaire de Gaspé and the Saint-Charles-Garnier College in Quebec City, both of which were run by the Jesuits. He studied for a law degree at Université Laval in Quebec City, but left the university in 1943 without having completed the degree.

War correspondent[link]

During WWII with the U.S. Office of War Information

He worked as an announcer and news writer at the radio station CHNC in New Carlisle, as a substitute announcer for CHRC during 1941 and 1942, and then at CBV in Quebec City.

During 1944–1945, he served as a liaison officer and war correspondent for the U.S. Army in Europe. He reported from London while it was under regular bombardment by the Luftwaffe, and advanced with the Allied troops as they pushed back the German army through France and Germany. Throughout the war, he made regular journalistic reports on the airwaves and in print. He was with the first unit of Americans to reach Dachau concentration camp, and was profoundly moved by what he witnessed.

In 1947, he married Louise L'Heureux, with whom he would have two sons and a daughter. Lévesque worked as a reporter for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's French Language section in the international service. He again served as a war correspondent for CBC in the Korean War in 1952. After that, he was offered a career in journalism in the United States, but decided to stay in Quebec.

Public figure[link]

Lévesque interviews Lester B. Pearson in Moscow for Radio-Canada in 1955

From 1956 to 1959, Lévesque became famous in Quebec for hosting a weekly television news program on Télévision de Radio-Canada (the French-language counterpart of the CBC) called Point de Mire.

Lévesque covered international events and major labour struggles between workers and corporations that dogged the Union Nationale government of premier Maurice Duplessis culminating with a massive strike in 1957 at the Gaspé Copper Mine in Murdochville. The Murdochville strike was a milestone for organized labour in Quebec as it resulted in changes to the province's labour laws.

While working for the public television network, he became personally involved in the broadcasters' strike which lasted 68 tumultuous days beginning in late 1958. Lévesque was actually arrested during a demonstration in 1959, along with union leader Jean Marchand and 24 other demonstrators.

Involvement in politics[link]

In 1960, Lévesque entered politics and was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Quebec in the 1960 election as a Liberal Party member in the riding of Montréal-Laurier. In the government of Jean Lesage, he served as Minister of Hydroelectric Resources and Public Works from 1960 to 1961, and Minister of Natural Resources from 1961 to 1965. While in office, he played an important role in the nationalisation of hydroelectric companies, greatly expanding Hydro-Québec, one of the reforms that was part of the Quiet Revolution.

From 1965 to 1966 he served as Minister of Family and Welfare. The Liberals lost the 1966 election to the Union Nationale but Lévesque retained his own seat of Laurier.

Parti Québécois leader[link]

On October 14, 1967, Lévesque left the Liberal Party after its members refused to discuss the idea of a sovereign Quebec during its convention. He remained as the independent representative of the Laurier riding until the 1970 election. After leaving the Liberal Party, he founded the Mouvement Souveraineté-Association, which later merged with another sovereigntist party, the Ralliement National of Gilles Grégoire, to create the Parti Québécois in 1968. He remained leader of the Parti Québécois from 1968 until his resignation in 1985.

After failing to win a seat in the National Assembly in the 1970 election and the 1973 election, he and his party swept the 1976 election. Lévesque won his own seat in the riding of Taillon. His party assumed power with 41.1 per cent of the popular vote and 71 seats out of 110; René Lévesque became Premier of Quebec ten days later.

The night of Lévesque's acceptance speech included one of his most famous quotations: "I never thought that I could be so proud to be Québécois."

On February 6, 1977, Lévesque's car fatally struck Edgar Trottier, a drunk homeless man who had been lying on the road. Police officers at the scene did not administer the breathalyzer test to Levesque, because they did not suspect that he was impaired.^[3] However, Levesque was later fined $25 for failing to wear his glasses while driving a car on the night in question. He immediately paid the fine.^[4] The incident gained extra notoriety when it was revealed that the female companion in the vehicle was not his wife, but a secretary named Corinne Côté. Lévesque’s marriage ended in divorce soon thereafter (the couple had already been estranged for some time), and in April 1979, he married Côté.

Lévesque's Act to govern the financing of political parties banned corporate donations and limited individual contributions to political parties to $3,000. This key legislation was meant to prevent wealthy citizens and organizations from having a disproportionate influence on the electoral process. A Referendum Act was passed to allow for a province-wide vote on issues presented in a referendum.

His Parti Québécois government also passed the Quebec Charter of the French Language (also known as "Bill 101"), whose goal was (and still is) to make French "the normal and everyday language of work, instruction, communication, commerce and business." In its first enactment, it reserved access to English-language public schools to children whose parents had attended English school in Quebec. All other children were required to attend French schools in order to encourage immigrants to integrate themselves into the majority French culture (Lévesque was more moderate on language than some of the PQ, including language minister, Camille Laurin. He would have resigned as leader rather than eliminate English public schools, as party extremists proposed).^[5]

Bill 101 also made it illegal for businesses to put up exterior commercial signs in a language other than French (unless the sign also contained a "larger" French translation) at a time when English dominated as a commercial and business language in Quebec (while more than 80% of the population was of French origin).

On May 20, 1980, the PQ held, as promised before the elections, the 1980 Quebec referendum on its sovereignty-association plan. The result of the vote was 40% in favour and 60% opposed (with 86% turnout). Lévesque conceded defeat in the referendum, but his concession speech called upon sovereigntists to persevere À la prochaine fois! (until next time).

Lévesque led the PQ to victory in the 1981 election, increasing the party's majority in the National Assembly and increasing its share of the popular vote from 41 to 49 per cent.

A major focus of his second mandate was the patriation of the Canadian constitution. Lévesque was criticized by some in Quebec who said he had been tricked by Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and the English-Canadian provincial premiers. To this day, no Quebec premier of any political side has endorsed the 1982 constitutional amendment.

The PQ government's response to the recession of the early 1980s angered labour union members, a core part of the constituency of the PQ and the sovereignty movement.

A split within the party over how much emphasis to put on sovereignty in the next election led to Lévesque's resignation as leader of the Parti Québécois on June 20, 1985, and as premier of Quebec on October 3. Lévesque had argued that the party should not make sovereignty the object of the 1985 election and instead opt for the "Beau risque" strategy of seeking an understanding with the federal government of Mulroney, which angered the strongest supporters of sovereignty within the party.

Lévesque, a constant smoker,^[6] was in his apartment on November 1, 1987 when he experienced chest pains; he died of a myocardial infarction that day at a hospital.^[7][8] A brief resurgence of separatist sentiment followed. Over 100,000 viewed his body lying in state in Montreal and Quebec City, over 10,000 went to his funeral in the latter city, and hundreds wept daily at his grave for months.^[9]

Lévesque was a recipient of the title Grand Officer of the French Legion of Honour. He was posthumously made a Grand Officer of the National Order of Quebec in 2008.

Legacy[link]

Lévesque sculpture in front of the Quebec Parliament Building

Despite a perceived weakening of his sovereigntist resolve in the last years of his government, he reaffirmed his belief to friends and, notably, to a crowd of Université Laval students months before his death, of the necessity of independence.

His state funeral and funeral procession was reportedly attended by 100,000 Québécois. During the carrying out of his coffin from the church, the crowd spontaneously began to applaud and sing Quebec's unofficial national anthem "Gens du pays", replacing the first verse with Mon cher René (My dear René), as is the custom when this song is adapted to celebrate one person. Two major boulevards now bear his name, one in Montreal and one in Quebec City. In Montreal, Édifice Hydro-Québec and Maison Radio-Canada are both located on René Lévesque Boulevard, fittingly as Lévesque once worked for Hydro-Québec and the CBC, respectively. On June 22, 2010, Hydro-Québec and the government of Quebec commemorated Lévesque's role in Quebec's Quiet Revolution and his tenure as premier by renaming the 1244-megawatt Manic-3 generating station in his honour.^[10]

On June 3, 1999, a monument in his honour was unveiled on boulevard René-Lévesque outside the Parliament Building in Quebec City. The statue is popular with tourists, who snuggle up to it, to have their pictures taken "avec René" (with René), despite repeated attempts by officials to keep people from touching the monument or getting too close to it. The statue had been the source of an improvised, comical and affectionately touching tribute to Lévesque. The fingers of his extended right hand are slightly parted, just enough so that tourists and the faithful could insert a cigarette, giving the statue an unusually realistic appearance.

This practice is less often seen now, however, as the statue was moved to New Carlisle and replaced by a similar, but bigger one. This change resulted from considerable controversy. Some believed that the life-sized statue was not appropriate for conveying his importance in the history of Quebec. Others noted that a trademark of Lévesque was his relatively small stature.

Lévesque today remains an important figure of the Quebec nationalist movement, and is considered sovereigntism's spiritual father. After his death, even people in disagreement with some of those convictions now generally recognise his importance to the history of Quebec. Many in Quebec regard him as the father of the modern Quebec nation. According to a study made in 2006 by Le Journal de Montréal and Léger Marketing, René Lévesque was considered by far, according to Québécois, the best premier to run the province over the last 50 years.^[11]

Of the things he left as his legacy, some of the most memorable and still robust are completing the nationalization of hydroelectricity through Hydro-Québec, the Quebec Charter of the French Language, the political party financing law, and the Parti Québécois itself. His government was the first in Canada to prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in the province's Charte des droits de la personne in 1977.^[12] He also continued the work of the Lesage government in improving social services, in which social needs were taken care of by the state, instead of the Catholic Church (as in the Duplessis era) or the individual. Lévesque is still regarded by many as a symbol of democracy and tolerance.

Personality[link]

He was a man capable of great tact and charm, but who could also be abrupt and choleric when defending beliefs, ideals, or morals essential to him, or when lack of respect was perceived, for example, when he was famously snubbed by François Mitterrand at their first meeting. He was also a proud Gaspésien (from the Gaspé peninsula), and had hints of the local accent.

Considered a major defender of Québécois, Lévesque was, before the 1960s, more interested in international affairs than Quebec matters. The popular image of Lévesque was his ever-present cigarette and his small physical stature, as well as his unique comb over that earned him the nickname of Ti-Poil, literally, "Lil' Hair", but more accurately translated as "Baldy". Lévesque was a passionate and emotional public speaker. Those close to Lévesque have described him as having difficulty expressing his emotions in private, saying that he was more comfortable in front of a crowd of thousands than with one person.

While many Quebec intellectuals are inspired by French philosophy and high culture, Lévesque favoured the United States of America. While in London during the Second World War, his admiration for Britons grew when he witnessed their courage in the face of the German bombardments. He was a faithful reader of the New York Times, and took his vacations in New England every year. He also stated that, if there had to be one role model for him, it would be U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Lévesque was disappointed with the cold response by the American economic elite to his first speech in New York City as Premier of Quebec, in which he compared Quebec's march towards sovereignty to the American Revolution. His first speech in France was, however, more successful, leading him to a better appreciation of the French intelligentsia and of French culture.

Lévesque in media[link]

Lévesque was notably portrayed in the television series René Lévesque. In 2006, an additional television miniseries, René Lévesque, was aired on the CBC. He was also portrayed in an episode of Kevin Spencer, a Canadian cartoon show. In it, his ghost attempted a camaraderie with Kevin because of their similarities in political beliefs, as well as the fact that the title character, like René's ghost, claims to smoke "five packs a day".

A song by Les Cowboys Fringants named Lettre à Lévesque on the album La Grand-Messe was dedicated to him. They have also mentioned the street bearing his name in the song called La Manifestation.

He was the co-subject along with Pierre Trudeau in the Donald Brittain-directed documentary mini-series The Champions.

Bibliography[link]

• Option Québec (1968)
• La passion du Québec (1978)
• Oui (1980)
• Attendez que je me rappelle (1986) (although the title means 'Wait for me to remember'; the title of the English-language version was Memoirs)^[13]

See also[link]

• List of Gaspésiens
• List of premiers of Quebec
• List of Quebec general elections
• Politician nicknaming in Quebec
• Politics of Quebec
• Quebec sovereignty movement
• Separatism

Further reading[link]

• Paulin, Marguerite (2004). René Lévesque: Charismatic Leader, XYZ Publishing, 176 pages ISBN 1-894852-13-3 (translated by Jonathan Kaplansky)
• Fennario, David (2003). The Death of René Lévesque, Talonbooks, March 10, 72 pages ISBN 0-88922-480-3
• Fraser, Graham (2002). PQ: René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois in Power, Montreal, McGill-Queen's University Press; 2nd edition, 434 pages ISBN 0-7735-2310-3
• Fournier, Claude (1995). René Lévesque: Portrait of a Man Alone, McClelland & Stewart, April 15, 272 pages ISBN 0-7710-3216-1
• Lévesque, René (1986). René Lévesque Memoirs, McClelland & Stewart (translated by Philip Stratford)
• Fraser, Graham (1984). PQ: René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois in Power, Montreal, Libre Expression
• Lévesque, René (1979). My Québec, Methuen, 191 pages, ISBN 0-458-93980-3
• Provencher, Jean and Ellis, David (1977). René Lévesque: Portrait of a Québécois, Paperjacks, ISBN 0-7701-0020-1
• Lévesque, René (1977). Quotations from René Lévesque, Éditions Héritage, 105 pages ISBN 0-7773-3942-0
• Dupont, Pierre (1977). How Levesque Won, Lorimer, 136 pages ISBN 0-88862-130-2 (translated by Sheila Fischman)
• Lévesque, René (1968). An Option for Quebec, McClelland and Stewart, 128 pages
• Desbarats, Peter (1976). Rene: a Canadian in search of a country, McClelland and Stewart, 223 pages ISBN 0-7710-2691-9
• "René Lévesque's Separatist Fight", in the CBC Archives Web site
• Lévesque, René. "For an Independent Quebec", in Foreign Affairs, July, 1976) [1]

Elections as party leader[link]

• He lost the 1970 election and 1973 election, and won the 1976 election and 1981 election, and resigned in 1985.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: René Lévesque

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: René Lévesque

• "Biography" (in French). Dictionnaire des parlementaires du Québec de 1792 à nos jours. National Assembly of Quebec. http://www.assnat.qc.ca/en/deputes/levesque-rene-4219/index.html. 
• Radio-Canada dossier on the constitution saga (in French)
• CBC Digital Archives: René Lévesque's Separatist Fight

Videos[link]

• CBC Digital Archives: René Lévesque's Separatist Fight (in English)
• CBC Digital Archives: Charting the Future: Canada's New Constitution (in English)
• Radio-Canada video archive on René Lévesque and the PQ (in French)
• Radio-Canada video archive on the 1980 referendum (in French)