Mr. Speaker, on Saturday we lost a great literary figure, the novelist, journalist and director, André Langevin.
The difficult experience of losing his parents at a young age marked his work, and many of his characters were orphans. His most celebrated novel, translated as Dust Over the City, was adapted for the screen in 1968. In 1998, he received the highest literary award in Quebec, the prix Athanase-David, awarded by the Quebec government.
His work, which addresses serious issues still relevant today, marked a turning point in contemporary Quebec literature, shifting away from the popular tendency to write about the land towards existentialist themes rooted more in characters' psychology.
André Langevin's ultimate struggle was to promote the freedom of literature, which, in his view, constituted the only authentic memory of humankind.
May his work serve to keep that memory very much alive.