Canada Prize in the Humanities
A missionary’s 17th-century documentation of eastern North America – replete with illustrations of plants, birds, mammals, aboriginals, as well as unicorns and one-eyed monsters – has won its Concordia editor the prestigious 2013 Canada Prize.
François-Marc Gagnon, an affiliate faculty member of art history and the founding director of Concordia’s Gail and Stephen A. Jarislowsky Institute for Studies in Canadian Art, accepted the award “with great pleasure” March 23 in Ottawa.
The Codex Canadensis and the Writings of Louis Nicolas was selected as the best scholarly book of the year (English category) for the humanities. A distinguished jury appointed by the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences chose the French and English publication.
“In a masterful introduction and extensive notes, François-Marc Gagnon unravels the mysteries of the dating and authorship of the manuscripts, identifies the flora and fauna, and recreates Louis Nicolas’ mentality, still infused with late medieval ways of interpreting nature, yet open to surprising observation,” the jury stated.
Renowned social and cultural historian Natalie Zemon Davis, 2012 Canada Prize winner Susan R. Fisher, and the federation’s past president Noreen Golfman served as jurists.
They had similarly high praise for co-editors Réal Ouellet, for maintaining the “lively French prose … while making its spelling and archaic words accessible to the modern reader,” and Nancy Senior, for an English translation that “adds to the pleasures of the text.”
Gagnon became aware of Nicolas’ work shortly after joining the art history department at the Université de Montréal in 1976. The department head wanted Gagnon, the only Canadian in the faculty, to become the expert on Canadian art.
“I said no, being interested in modern art, but I became curious about how art started in Canada,” he says.
Gagnon shared Nicolas’ work with his students. “He was a character, never where he was supposed to be, always doing odd things, such as taming bears within the Jesuit courtyard in Sillery,” he says. “He planned to give the bears to the king of France, but couldn’t find a large enough box.”
The book is relevant to anyone interested in Canada’s wildlife in the 1600s or the customs of Algonquin and Iroquois communities. The unicorns and monsters depict the imaginations of explorers who both anticipated and feared the unknown as they ventured farther beyond their homeland.
Renowned ornithologist Stuart Houston persuaded Gagnon to prepare a bilingual text.
“Since joining Concordia 12 years ago, I’m conscious of the need to publish important works in both languages to close the gap between Canada’s two main cultures and make everyone aware of our past,” Gagnon says.
As an art historian, he was initially lured by the Codex illustrations. His research led to the connection with the Histoire Naturelle initialed M.L.N.P. The initials stand for Messire Louis Nicolas Prêtre.
“Nicolas wanted to publish under his name but his superiors refused his request,” Gagnon explains. “Furious, Nicolas left the Jesuits and became an ordinary priest in the south of France where he was born and my research loses track of him.”
Gagnon appreciates the Canada Prize, along with the 2012 John A. Macdonald Prize for scholarly research from the Historical Society of Canada.
“When I was encouraged to retire from another university at 65, I didn’t want to go fishing,” he says. “Concordia enabled me to do what has now been recognized as important work.”
Related links:
• Research fellow wins prize from the Historical Society of Canada - Faculty of Fine Arts
• The original Codex Canadensis at the Thomas Gilcrease Museum
• The Codex Canadensis, reviewed
• François-Marc Gagnon
• Réal Ouellet
• Nancy Senior and colleagues receive Canada Prize in the Humanities