Article

Literary Bibliography in French

Published Online February 7, 2006

Last Edited December 15, 2013

Bibliographies of Canadian LITERATURE IN FRENCH can be roughly divided into 2 groups: retrospective, which list printed items of an earlier period, and current, which record the publication of books and articles as they appear.

Literary Bibliography in French

Bibliographies of Canadian LITERATURE IN FRENCH can be roughly divided into 2 groups: retrospective, which list printed items of an earlier period, and current, which record the publication of books and articles as they appear. Québec books printed after the introduction of printing to central Canada (1764) and before 1820 are called incunabula (early printed works) and, because of their rarity, are usually described in detail by bibliographers. Québec incunabula are listed in 3 compilations: Marie Tremaine, Bibliography of Canadian Imprints, 1751-1800 (1952), John Hare and Jean-Pierre Wallot, Les Imprimés dans le Bas-Canada, 1801-1840 (only vol 1, 1801-1810, has been published, 1967), and Milada Vlach and Yolande Buono, Catalogue collectif des impressions québécoises, 1764-1820 (1984). Books of the later 19th and early 20th centuries are listed in the multivolume Bibliographie du Québec, 1821-1967 (1980-95, also available on CD-ROM ) and in Canadiana, 1867-1900 (on microfiche, 1981- ).

Retrospective Bibliographies

Among retrospective bibliographies limited to literary works, the most convenient are those contained in the Dictionnaire des oeuvres littéraires du Québec, 6 vols to date (1978- ). More exhaustive listings for the years 1760-1899 and 1974-84 have been published by René Dionne and Pierre Cantin (1988-94). Separate listings by John Hare for the novel, poetry, drama and essays are included in volumes 3-6 of the series "Archives des lettres canadiennes" (1961-). Specialized bibliographies exist for 19th-century short stories (Aurélien Boivin, Le Conte littéraire québécois au XIXe ..., 1975),19th-century novels (David M. Hayne and Marcel Tirol, Bibliographie critique du roman canadien-français, 1837-1900, 1968), travel narratives (John Hare, Les Canadiens français aux quatre coins du monde, 1964), newspapers (André Beaulieu and Jean Hamelin, La Presse québécoise des origines à nos jours, 10 vols to date (1973- ), and magazines (Catalogue de la Bibliothèque nationale du Québec: revues québécoises, 3 vols, 1981). Plays of both the 19th and 20th centuries are listed in Édouard-Gabriel Rinfret's Le Théâtre canadien d'expression française ... (4 vols, 1975-78) and studies of the theatre are recorded in Pierre Lavoie's Pour suivre le théâtre au Québec... (1985) .

Short Bibliographies

Short bibliographies for most Québec writers are provided in Réginald Hamel, John Hare and Paul Wyczynski's Dictionnaire des auteurs de langue française en Amérique du Nord (1989). More detailed references for authors are found in university theses devoted to them or in library science theses submitted to Québec universities. The former are indexed in Antoine Naaman's Répertoire de thèses littéraires canadiennes de 1921 à 1976 (1978) and in Canadian Theses/Thèses canadiennes (1952- ). The latter are listed in Jeanne Proulx's Bio-bibliographies canadiennes-françaises (1970) and in Bibliographie de bibliographies québécoises (1978; supplement 1980). A few authors have been the subject of book-length bibliographies; eg, Paul Wyczynski's Bibliographie descriptive et critique d'Émile Nelligan (1973) and Pierre Cantin's Jacques Ferron, polygraphe (1984).

For the current bibliography of Québec's greatly increased literary production since 1960, the basic reference is the official monthly Bibliographie du Québec (1968-), which lists all titles published in, or about, Québec. A comprehensive annual review of literary publications appeared for some years as Livres et Auteurs québécois (1969-82; formerly Livres et Auteurs canadiens, 1961-1968). A selective annual review continues to appear in the Letters in Canada issue of University of Toronto Quarterly (1937-).