| Mordecai Richler |
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EARLY YEARS AND TRAVEL The son of a scrapyard dealer, Richler was born and raised on St. Urbain Street on the Plateau in Montreal , Quebec , a neighbourhood he would later immortalize in his novels. He graduated from Baron Byng High School . Richler then enrolled in Sir George Williams College (now Concordia University ) to study English but dropped out before completing his degree. He moved to Paris , France at age nineteen, intent on following in the footsteps of a previous generation of literary exiles. Richler returned to Montreal in 1952, working briefly at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, then moved to London , England in 1954. Worrying "about being so long away from the roots of my discontent", he returned to Montreal in 1972, but continued to spend part of each year in London. ''THE APPRENTICESHIP OF DUDDY KRAVITZ'' Richler's career took off with the publication of his fourth novel ''The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz'' in 1959. The book featured a frequent Richler theme: Jewish life in the 1930s and 40s in the neighbourhood of Montreal east of Mount Royal Park on and about St. Urbain Street and The Main (Saint Lawrence Boulevard). Richler wrote poignantly of the neighbourhood and its people, chronicling the hardships and disabilities they faced as a Jewish minority.
The 1974 Movie Version was directed by Richler's friend Ted Kotcheff and starred Richard Dreyfuss in his first leading role. Richler and Lionel Chetwynd co-wrote the screenplay. RICHLER AS COMMENTATOR Throughout his career, Richler wrote acerbic journalistic commentary and delighted in the role of contrarian provocateur. He was an iconoclast with little tolerance for pretense or pomposity. In a characteristic putdown, Richler called Canadian film entrepreneurs "snivelling little greasers on the make." Richler contributed to '' The Atlantic Monthly '', '' Look '', and '' The New Yorker ''. In his later years, Richler was a newspaper columnist for '' The National Post '' and Montreal's '' The Gazette ''. He was often critical of Quebec and Canadian nationalism. Another favorite Richler target was the government-subsidized Canadian Literary movement of the 1970s and 80s. Late in life, the onetime Enfant Terrible seemed happy to settle into the role of curmudgeon. What never changed were Richler's caustic comments and disheveled appearance. He was more than willing to say the unsayable — though often in a weary mumble, with head bowed, hair askew and drink in hand. Richler was made a Companion of the Order Of Canada in 2001, just a few months before his death. It was an ironic finale that might have made a memorable scene in a Richler novel: a fierce critic of the Canadian establishment accepting the country's highest honour. PROPONENTS AND CRITICS Many critics distinguished between Richler the author and Richler the polemicist. Richler frequently said in interviews that his goal was to be an honest witness to his time and place, and to write at least one book that would be read after his death. His work was championed by journalists Robert Fulford and Peter Gzowski , among others. Admirers praised Richler for daring to tell uncomfortable truths, and he has been described in The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature as "one of the foremost writers of his generation".Laurence Ricou, "Mordecai Richler", The Oxford Companion to Literature, 2d ed., 1997 A 2004 oral biography by Michael Posner was entitled ''The Last Honest Man''. Detractors called Richler's satire heavy-handed and noted his propensity for recycling material, incorporating elements of his journalism into later novels.http://www.robertfulford.com/MordecaiRichler.html Some critics thought Richler more adept at sketching striking scenes than crafting coherent narratives. Richler's ambivalent relationship with Montreal's Jewish community was captured in ''Mordecai and Me'', a book by Joel Yanofsky published in 2003. Richler's most frequent conflicts were with the Jewish community,''Mordecai my pal.'', By: Rabinovitch, Jack. ''. '' New Criterion '', September 2001, Vol. 20 Issue 1, p123-128. Richler's long-running dispute with Quebec nationalists was fuelled by magazine articles he wrote in American publications between the late 1970s and mid 1990s. The articles criticized Quebec's language laws, and '' (0004-6795), Dec1977, Vol. 240 Issue 6, p34; In '', 1992 , retrieved September 22 , 2006 Neither the remainder of the text, nor the music, are related. Furthermore, the ''Cabaret'' song, never sung in Nazi Germany, was written in the 1960s by John Kander , a Jewish American lyricist and composer, not German fascists. "À partir d'aujourd'hui" was written by well-known songwriter Stéphane Venne when he was asked to compose a song for an advertisement of the Caisses Populaires Desjardins credit union. In ''Oh Canada! Oh Quebec!'', Richler acknowledges the error, blaming himself for having "cribbed" the information from an article by Irwin Cotler and Ruth Wisse for the Jewish American magazine '' Commentary ''."Faut arrêter de freaker" by Pierre Foglia, ''La Presse'', December 16 , 2000 Co-writer of the ''Commentary'' article Cotler eventually issued a written apology to Lévesque. Richler also apologized for the incident and called it an "embarrassing gaffe".Smith, Donald. ''D'une nation à l'autre: des deux solitudes à la cohabitation.'' Montreal: Éditions Alain Stanké, 1997. p. 56.'' His views were strongly criticized by some in Québec and to some degree among , '' Maclean's '', 13/8/2001, Vol. 114, Issue 33 Richler had always attacked nationalists, including English Canadians, Israelis and Zionist s. Some Quebecers acclaimed Richler for his courage and for attacking the orthodoxies of Quebec society,Khouri, Nadia. ''Qui a peur de Mordecai Richler.'' Montréal: Éditions Balzac, 1995 and he has been described as "the most prominent defender of the rights of Quebec's anglophones."Ricou, above The reaction to Richler's book itself raised concerns for some commentatorsKhouri, above, Scott et al., above, Delisle cited in Kraft, below about the persistence of antisemitism among sections of the Quebec population. He received death threats, including a threat to blow up the hospital in which he was staying, and letters with swastikas drawn on them;Noah Richler, "A Just Campaign", ''The New York Times'', October 7 , 2001 , p. AR4 a Francophone journalist yelled at one of his sons that "if your father was here, I'd make him relive the holocaust right now!", while an editorial cartoon in the French press compared him to Hitler.Michel Vastel, "Le cas Richler". '' L'actualité '', November 1 , 1996 , p.66 The criticism that he wrote his essay on Quebec for money was seen as evoking old stereotypes of Jews, and the demands made for leaders of the Jewish community to dissociate themselves from Richler were seen as indicating that Richler, although born in Quebec and for a time married to a French-Canadian, was "not part of the tribe" because he was anglo and Jewish.Frances Kraft, "Esther Delisle", The Canadian Jewish News, April 1 , 1993 , p. 6 Following in 1996 for ''The Seventh Circle'', and David Manicom in 1997 for ''Ice In Dark Water''.http://www.mala.bc.ca/~soules/english/awards.htm FAMILY LIFE Richler divorced Catherine Boudreault to marry his second wife, Florence. He adopted her son Daniel. The couple had five children, including:
Leah Rosenberg, Richler's mother, published an autobiography, ''The Errand Runner: Memoirs of a Rabbi's Daughter'' (1981), which discusses Mordecai's birth and upbringing. AWARDS AND RECOGNITION
BIBLIOGRAPHY Fiction
Fiction for children
Travel
Essays
Nonfiction
Anthologies
FILM SCRIPTS
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