Entre ciel et mots

English

Entre ciel et mots:
La voix de Gabrielle

Let yourself be carried by the gentle, enveloping atmosphere of this floor and take it in like a whisper from Gabrielle. Here, every thought, every word, every image, every sound brings you a little closer to the woman behind the writer – from Gabrielle to herself.

Born in this house on rue Deschambault, Gabrielle Roy drew the first shades of her outlook on the world here. This is where her sensitivity, her voice, her thought took root. For their part, Les Productions Rivard, through three seasons and twenty-four episodes of the series Le monde de Gabrielle Roy, have managed to bring her literary and human legacy to life on screen.

Entre ciel et mots celebrates Gabrielle’s voice – that gentle, strong, lucid, feminine voice – which continues to resonate far beyond the borders of time and language.

Season 1
Episode 1

Petite misère

As a child, I already loved observing the world, and the world, from the lofty height of my ten years, was my family. From joy or worry, to enchantment or sorrow, I didn’t always understand what was happening within me or around me. Writing comes from far away. From very far away.

Season 1
Episode 2

Trip to Eaton's

There emanated from that unspoken solidarity, tied to our identity as Franco-Manitobans, a strength that would allow me to believe in my own destiny.

Season 1
Episode 2

Trip to Eaton's

When the time came to choose my path, I would tear myself away, though not without sadness, from this place where my father, like so many other expatriates, had tried to make it his home.

Season 1
Episode 4

Moving

In the end, I would leave Manitoba forever. Yet the farther I drifted away from the land of my childhood, the more deeply I felt the need to return to it, especially through the memories of my mother's stories.

Season 1
Episode 8

The Governor's Ball

In that moment, I understood that to discover the source of good and evil in the hearts of others, one must journey endlessly, ever further into the past.

Season 1
Episode 8

The Governor's Ball

My desire to explore human nature will forever be bound to that intimate need to know who I am, and where I come from.

Season 2
Episode 9

Death of the child

While I had candidly rejoiced at this new life unfolding before me, it was death, instead, that awaited me. In this way, my first experience as a teacher taught me a great lesson in fiction: the sweetest moments of existence pale in comparison to the harshness of life itself.

Season 2
Episode 12

The Cercle Molière

Today, it seems to me that the Théâtre du Cercle Molière —a theater company composed of amateurs who shared a deep love for this art form—had, at the very start of my life, opened a door. Momentarily onto the stage of the theater, and then onto the stage of life...

Season 2
Episode 13

A place to
call my own

It took long voyages and years of exile before I could finally inhabit a place of my own: the realm of writing.

Season 2
Episode 15

Mother's passing

Afterward, rarely have I been able to return fully, to see things and people otherwise than through words, once I had learned to use them as fragile bridges for exploration. Gradually, I became an observer of thoughts and people, and this passion, though sincere, slowly erodes the very lightness of spirit required to live.

Season 2
Episode 16

Last night at
Deschambault

This heart-wrenching memory of having abandonned her will haunt me for the rest of my life. My writing will become a long endeavor of redemption, a means of mending the past.

Season 3
Episode 17

Apprehensive

I had the feeling that it was to me alone, an apprehensive young woman with a longing heart, that Paris was surrendering. But suddenly, as I embraced the city in all its fullness, I understood why it had shaken me so deeply: because the city was whole, proud, self-assured, demanding, uncompromising, cruel, and provocative. Looking at that fiery sunset, so similar to those that set ablaze my beloved Prairies, Saint-Boniface, and my Deschambault Street, deep in my heart, I took the Parisian Oath: to always be authentic, in all my complexity, even if it meant to displease others.

Season 3
Episode 18

The medals

Ludmilla Pitoëff had changed my life, but not in the way I had imagined. Through her profound and unparalleled commitment, she taught me that to become an accomplished artist, I had to carry the act of creation to its very limits, despite total discomfort or even the deepest pain.

Season 3
Episode 19

A Friend in London

I had crossed the ocean to escape the confines of my origins and broaden my horizons, not to conform once again. This first act of emancipation made me realize that Europe, alone, would not bestow upon me the expansive life I had always longed for: it was a gift I owed to myself. Like Joan of Arc, I needed only to listen to my inner voices, those that had guided me thus far toward my own truth.

Season 3
Episode 21

Love and
treachery

I wonder if the fierce attraction that Stephen and I experienced, amidst all the misunderstandings and traps of life, is not one of the cruellest. Because of him, I have forever harbored a fear of what is called love. Never again will I love like that.

Season 3
Episode 22

Writing in
Upshire

The story that I began to write that morning bore no ressemblance to a personal journal and yet, in a way, it encompassed every aspect of one. It arose inside me from the plains and lakes of my native Manitoba, but above all, it came to me in the words of my French language. For someone like me, who had once thought of writing in English and had even tried it with some success, suddenly, there was no hesitation. The words that flowed from my pen were in the language of my people.

Season 3
Episode 24

Back home

The novels and success would come in time. From my Deschambault Street in Saint-Boniface, Manitoba, I had to journey all this way to become the writer I was destined to be.