Description
Book SynopsisWinner of the 1979 Governor General''s Award for fiction, Antonine Maillet''s virtuoso creation, The Tale of Don L''Orignal, is now back in print. Maillet''s tale begins one day, not so very long ago but back in the youth of the world, when a hay-covered island materialized off shore, an island populated by fleas who soon took human form. The leader of this uncouth crew of have-nots, Don l''Orignal, wore a moose-antler crown as his badge of office. At his right hand were his brave lieutenants: his son, Noume, and his general, Michel-Archange. The general''s wife, the doughty charwoman, spy, and rabble-rouser La Sagouine, had one finger in every pie and one raised to her neighbour, La Sainte. The Flea Islanders were constantly at odds with the almost as clever but far more civilized upper crust of the mainland village: the mayoress, the schoolteacher, the merchant, the banker. When they invaded and tried to steal a keg of molasses, the outcome of the mock-heroic battle was unclear, exce
