Armed with delicate questions, driven by an outpouring of benevolence and the desire to enlighten future generations, Michèle Plomer went to meet outstanding women to invite them to speak to young girls.
Among these women are a majority of creators – poets, painters, directors -, including Joséphine Bacon, Paule Baillargeon, Marie-Claire Blais, Manon Barbeau, Marion Wagschal, Denise Desautels, Brigitte Haentjens, women from the community working with immigrant populations (Yasmina Chouakri and Marjorie Villefranche), the pediatrician-hematologist Yvette Bonny and the nun and director of the Paulines bookstore, Jeanne Lemire.
While Justine Latour drew their portrait, they all responded generously to Michèle Plomer’s questions. The result is a mosaic of shared experiences and points of view to allow the youngest to move forward while avoiding pitfalls. An exercise that crystallizes the path travelled, celebrates victories and names the battles to be fought.
“We have come a long way because we have learned to speak up. We speak more, and because we speak more, we speak better, with an aplomb that for the most part we did not have, and we speak better about what concerns us and concerns the world”, notes the poet Denise Desautels with relevance. .
How lucky to hear these remarkable women express themselves with the intelligence of the heart that characterizes them! We reconnect with the words of Marie-Claire Blais and with her exceptional lucidity. She recommends that young girls live with passion, with autonomy, and to make choices that are their own. How good, enlightening and liberating to read Nicole Brossard about the anger that drives her; Brigitte Haentjens on desire and sexuality; Yasmina Chouakri and Marjorie Villefranche evoke the notion of privilege and the challenge for young immigrant women to combine the values of their countries of origin and the urgency of integrating into their host country; the painter Marion Wagschal tackling the delicate issue of financial insecurity; bookseller and feminist nun Jeanne Lemire on female leadership. All the important topics are there: taking your place, resisting feelings of guilt, listening to yourself and making yourself heard, motherhood, power, religion, courage, rivalry… Each one gives valuable advice to young girls. .
Since the book is addressed to them, it would have been interesting to present them in more detail the work and the trajectories of these admirable women. The “question-answer” form has something repetitive when it spans more than 300 pages… We would have liked Michèle Plomer’s magnificent pen to be able to deploy more, perhaps in the exercise of denser portraits or in epistolary form?
As you read, you come to think that it would have been enriching to open the discussion to other generations, to see what young girls can also teach those who preceded them. But let’s not spoil our pleasure! To our daughters is an ardent book, which does good and which elevates us.