The Innocent Victim/L'Innocente Victime

The story of Marie, a young Québecoise farm woman, who leaves Canada in search of her missing soldier husband, Jean, with their young daughter. She supports herself in Lowell, MA and Manchester, NH as a housekeeper and the proprietor of a dress shop, but meets a tragic end. Marie and Jean¿s saga unfolds against the background of the French-Canadian migrations to the mill towns of New England (1840s-1930s) and the American Civil War (1861-1865). A recognized classic of Franco-American literature, L¿Innocente Victime was reprinted in the original French in 1980 with Title VII ESEA funds. Foreword, Preface, Introduction, Chapter Notes, and Bibliography are included with the translated text.

AdTlard Lambert, 1867û1946 Who was AdTlard Lambert? A simple man of humble origins, this ôlettrT illettrTö (ôunlettered man of lettersö)5 had become by the time of his death a published folklorist, respected in both Canada and the United States. Always remaining a man of the people, during the last years of his life he divided his time between running his grocery store cum gas station in Drummondville, QuTbec, and writing. In The Innocent Victim, penned for a popular readership when he felt death was near, he imbedded the values which transcend material success. ). Lambert was born on March 17, 1867, in St. Cuthbert, ComtT de Berthier, QuTbec, to Jean-Baptiste Lambert, a farmer, and his wife, LTocadie Rinfret. He was one of thirteen children. After losing their farm in St. Gabriel de Brandon in 1869, the Lamberts came to the United States in search of work (though like many such families, the Lamberts ultimately did not stay). AdTlard was no more than five years old when his family immigrated to Woonsocket, Rhode Island. They lived first in Albion, Rhode Island, and then in Putnam, Connecticut, remaining in the States for six years (1869û1875) the first time. Next, they returned to the farming life in Canada for two years (1875û1877). Following a crop failure, they crossed the border once again in 1877. This time, they settled in Fall River, where they remained until moving to QuTbec for the last time in 1884. After joining them in St. Cyrille, QuTbec, in 1887, Lambert worked on the family farm until his marriage to PhilomFne Vigneault in 1890. In the same year, the couple moved to Manchester, New Hampshire.Bibliophile and Door-to-Door Salesman, 1890û1921 Lambert's mottoùand the epigraph to his Journal d'un bibliophileùwas ôCollectionner, c'est contribuer a l'histoireö (ôTo collect is to contribute to historyö). These years reveal Lambert's growing determination to collect, preserve, and disseminate his findings. While doing so, he did not neglect to keep up with the local news, including the 1899 newspaper item which served as the inspiration for Marie's death. As he was noting with interest all that happened in Manchester, Lambert was busily collecting books. As a door-to-door salesman, he found many of his collection's most precious volumes in the Franco-American households he frequented. And by this time he had the true bibliophile's instinct for uncovering valuable books, journals, newspaper articles, and brochures.13 (The question arises whether there was any room in his home for his wife and five children, as there were books everywhere.) And these were not just any booksùmany of them were rarities not available elsewhere. By 1918, when he sold his library to the Association Canado-AmTricaine, his collection of books alone totaled 4,000 volumes. It also contained complete runs of French-Canadian periodicals.14 Yet Lambert did not devote all of his time to working, reading, and collecting. Keenly interested in Manchester's political life, he made two successful bids for public office.15 In 1917 Lambert also began his career as a writer and folklorist in earnest. In collaboration with Auguste Charbonnier, a MontrTal musician, he published sixteen songs in Le Passe-Temps, a journal of music (1917û1919). For Lambert, ever the collector, this is the start of yet another collection, of songs, stories, and games, most of them gathered from family members.Folklorist and Grocer, 1921û1935 In 1921, then fifty-four years old, Lambert took his family back to the Canada he had left thirty years before. When last in QuTbec, he'd found that working on his father's farm had left him no time for reading. And he knew from his family's experience that farm life was uncertain at best. Ever the practical man, he purchased a grocery store complete with gas pump and, busy as he was, he still found time to read and to publish. From 1923 to 1931 he was a regular contributor to the Journal of American Folklore. He was invited to become an officer of the QuTbec branch of the American Folklore Society.L'Innocente Victime and Lambert's Final Years, 1936û1946 Gustave Flaubert said of his Madame Bovary: ôMadame Bovary, c'est moi.ö (ôI am Madame Bovary.ö) Although Lambert never made such a statement, L'Innocente Victime incorporates the work of a lifetime. While L'Innocente Victime is undeniably a ôwhodunit,ö it is, at the same time, a roman a thFse. Franco-American historian Armand Chartier refers to it as ôa social novel with an axe to grind. . . . He called for a return to the ancestral land to revel in the quiet simplicity of its present and the glory of its past..."