Politics and Poetics: a Study of Nineteenth-Century Nationalist Verse in French Canada

In the mid-nineteenth century there was a unique rapport between French-Canadian verse and the rise of nationalism. The close tie between poetry and politics was a particularly salient feature in the poems and songs written from 1818 to 1838. This study is a discussion of what is commonly known as pièces de circonstance or French-Canadian verse that had a direct link to the French-Canadian Rebellion of 1837-38 and the political scene at that time. Since French Canadians had been stripped of certain political and economic rights, many patriotes sought to influence public opinion through persuasive circumstantial verse. (MF-D)