Through the window of the Mile End croissant shop where Monique Proulx arranged to meet us, we almost have the impression of seeing certain characters fromTake away the nighthis new novel in which a Hasidic Jew leaves his community to be reborn in the world.
Go and live, or stay and die? This is the great heartbreak of Markus Kohen, endearing and fundamentally good character, who had made a short appearance in the writer’s previous novel, What’s left of me (2015). “This book written in a state of grace has completely clipped my wings. I felt like it might be my last, that I had touched everything that was important… I had set the bar too high for the next one and it kept me mute for two years . Until Markus’ voice, luminous and dignified, floats and imposes itself in its own way. The voice of a “character who enters the world at 20, with the intelligence and desires of that age. Foreign to codes and language, free but without landmarks, he saw drastic immigration. »
The quest of this protagonist-narrator, who has the candor of an old child, will be to invent himself from scratch. “From his old life, he has retained almost nothing, except the ability to sanctify the small gestures of everyday life and to maintain gratitude. What if he had come to give to others?
Markus is “devoured by a flame that pushes him to enlighten those who suffer from darkness”, to “take the night away from the desperate”, writes Monique Proulx. This sheds light on the beautiful mystery of the title, offered to the writer by chance, in a completely different context. “It’s a child’s word, that of a son who was afraid in the dark and asked his father to ‘take away the night’. I was not engaged in writing a book when I was told this anecdote, but I wrote it down… And it became the character’s line of conduct, his principle of life. »
Human ownership
The one to whom we owe the magnificent news ofMontreal aurorathe novel Invisible man at the windowthe so heady Champagne and several other great books, left her hometown (Quebec) at age 28 to settle in Montreal in Mile End, a neighborhood she has never left and knows like a mother’s face. If she has often staged the toponymy, this time it is more vague. “We feel that it’s Montreal, but nothing is named, a bit like in a tale or an allegory. I do not insist too much on the Hasidic context. »
Did the delicate question of cultural appropriation arise during the writing? “If I spoke about what is happening in the community, maybe I could be accused of doing so, but I tell the trajectory of someone who comes out of it and who comes into the world. Since my first book, I have been doing human appropriation. I’m talking about people who are not me, and who come from different backgrounds. The experiences of others challenge me and allow me to identify what is similar between us. »
Although it addresses difficult and painful states, Take away the night is a book full of light and which warms the heart, where it is a question of kindness, benevolence, trust, dignity, hope despite setbacks, non-judgment… Values that we all need, collectively, more than ever perhaps even, in this month of March warlike, chilly, blindingly white.
What is a good being? “Goodness is accessible to all those who agree to let go of the part of themselves that speaks loudly, the part that is full of ambition, desire, wanting, wanting to have. It’s not gnangnan kindness, it’s not softness: it’s the absence of ego. When you’re not the center of the universe and you’re not trying to bring everything back to you, when you finally drop the accessory, you become fatally good. »
We feel Monique Proulx very attached to her character, she confirms: “I had a hard time leaving Markus… He is inhabited by a kind of grandeur and communicates it to us. The last chapter, I stretched it over three months, I knew it was the end. »
Another feature that connects the writer to her creature: writing. Markus is a “writer”. As he learns a new language, he becomes intoxicated with words and abandons himself to his notebooks with their silky, almost miraculous pages. The writing of oneself as a revealer, to orchestrate one’s rebirth is central here, a bit like in The little girl who loved matches too much, of Gaétan Soucy, or as with Réjean Ducharme, the mentor of Monique Proulx, the one who gave her the first impetus to become a writer in her turn. “Ducharme showed me that the ledger can be within your reach, at your level. »
Does she write for the same reasons today as when she started out? “From the start, it was very clear to me that this would be my way of inserting myself into the world and taking my place. You settle where you are the world, and where the world becomes you. This is also called silence, a moment when everything is neutral and possible, everything is united, just before the particularities take shape. The beginning of a book is the most wonderful playground.”