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Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel
Sanaaq is an intimate story of an Inuit family negotiating the changes brought into their community by the coming of the qallunaat, the white people, in the mid-nineteenth century. Composed in 48 episodes, it recounts the daily life of Sanaaq, a strong and outspoken young widow, her daughter Qumaq, and their small semi-nomadic community in northern Quebec. Here they live their lives hunting seal, repairing their kayak, and gathering mussels under blue sea ice before the tide comes in. These are ordinary extraordinary lives: marriages are made and unmade, children are born and named, violence appears in the form of a fearful husband or a hungry polar bear. Here the spirit world is alive and relations with non-humans are never taken lightly. And under it all, the growing intrusion of the qallunaat and the battle for souls between the Catholic and Anglican missionaries threatens to forever change the way of life of Sanaaq and her young family.
About the translation:
In the early 1950s, Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk was asked by a priest working in Kangiqsujuaq in northern Quebec to write down some Inuttitut phrases to assist him in the study of the language. At the age of twenty-two, Nappaaluk began writing but did not stop at mere phrases. She invented a group of characters and events and, over the next twenty years, wrote the first Inuit novel, simultaneously reinventing the novel form.
Due in part to the perseverance of French anthropologist Bernard Saladin d’Anglure, Sanaaq was first published in syllabic Inuttitut in 1987. His French translation appeared in 2002. This English translation now brings this cornerstone of Inuit literature to Anglophone readers and scholars.
About the translation:
In the early 1950s, Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk was asked by a priest working in Kangiqsujuaq in northern Quebec to write down some Inuttitut phrases to assist him in the study of the language. At the age of twenty-two, Nappaaluk began writing but did not stop at mere phrases. She invented a group of characters and events and, over the next twenty years, wrote the first Inuit novel, simultaneously reinventing the novel form.
Due in part to the perseverance of French anthropologist Bernard Saladin d’Anglure, Sanaaq was first published in syllabic Inuttitut in 1987. His French translation appeared in 2002. This English translation now brings this cornerstone of Inuit literature to Anglophone readers and scholars.
248 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1987
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2733 people want to read
About the author
Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk
3 books27 followersMitiarjuk Nappaaluk (1931 – 2007) was an educator and author based in the northern Quebec territory of Nunavik.
Dedicated to preserving Inuit culture, Nappaaluk authored over twenty books, including Sanaaq, the first novel written in syllabics. Among her many accomplishments, Nappaaluk also compiled an Inuttitut encyclopedia of Inuit traditional knowledge, translated the Catholic prayer book into Inuttitut, and helped to develop curriculum materials for the Kativik School Board.
In 1999, Nappaaluk received the National Aboriginal Achievement Award in the Heritage and Spirituality category. In 2000, she was awarded an honorary doctorate from McGill University and in 2004 was appointed to the Order of Canada.
Dedicated to preserving Inuit culture, Nappaaluk authored over twenty books, including Sanaaq, the first novel written in syllabics. Among her many accomplishments, Nappaaluk also compiled an Inuttitut encyclopedia of Inuit traditional knowledge, translated the Catholic prayer book into Inuttitut, and helped to develop curriculum materials for the Kativik School Board.
In 1999, Nappaaluk received the National Aboriginal Achievement Award in the Heritage and Spirituality category. In 2000, she was awarded an honorary doctorate from McGill University and in 2004 was appointed to the Order of Canada.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 108 reviews
March 11, 2015
Quebec is such a vast province. Far north of my home in Montreal lies Nunavik, the northernmost region of Quebec, where fourteen Inuit communities are strung out along the coast. The lives of the Inuit of Northern Quebec have changed radically over the past century. When Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk was born in 1931, the Inuit had a primarily nomadic lifestyle intimately tied to the seasons and to the hunt. By the late 1960's, when Mitiarjuk was completing her manuscript, the Inuit had been settled into villages with pre-fabricated houses. The immense changes brought about by sustained contact with Qallunaat (white people, though a more direct translation is "big eyebrows") are touched upon in the novel: the introduction of government pensions, the prolonged disruptions caused by medical evacuations to the south, religious conversion, and the question of interracial sexual relations. On a larger scale, Mitiarjuk offers us candid glimpses into a culture that can be immensely difficult for an outsider to penetrate.
As a document, Sanaaq is utterly unique. Written over a span of decades, then transliterated and twice-translated over an equally long period, it is a stunning repository of linguistic and anthropological knowledge. While Mitiarjuk never attended school, she was taught short-form syllabics by a missionary eager to learn Inuktitut. Her writing reflects this preoccupation with language, introducing myriad terms used in various day-to-day activities. Sanaaq is composed of 48 episodic chapters that follow the lives of Sanaaq and her community, and is generally considered a novel. It is, therefore, the first novel written in Inuktitut syllabics, and written by someone who did not know any alphabet and had never read a novel before, no less.
Mitiarjuk's writing style is straightforward and dynamic, steeped in the present and studded with dialogue. This concern with the here and now is doubtless tied to the unforgiving landscape of Northern Quebec, where tragedy is woven into the fabric of life. The importance of kinship ties are reinforced by the use of numerous words that do not exist in English. Here are but a few examples:
nuakuluk: kinship term used by a woman for her sister's child
Aikuluk: reciprocal kinship term, used by in-laws of the opposite sex and the same generation, e.g., the wife of a man's brother or the sister of a man's wife
arnaliaq: term used by a midwife for a daughter that she has helped deliver, literally "the female that she has made"
Other aspects of the Inuit belief system can likewise be gleaned from the vocabulary alone. I'll leave them here for you to chew on...
qunujaq: ominous prophetic dream
tuurngaq: term for a shaman's helping spirit. Used as a name for the devil by some of the first missionaries.
nuliarsaq: invisible female love, succubus - the episode where this term was introduced was particularly fascinating.
I really hadn't intended to turn this review into an annotated glossary but... bear with me, please! Just a few more and I'll stop, I promise.
Iikikii!: exclamation to express feeling of damp cold (dry cold is called ikkii)
puttajiaq: seriously wounded or dead marine mammal, whose body is floating on the water's surface
Qumaq: persons's name, literally "white-coloured intestinal worm" found in seals, humans, and fishes - yes, that's like calling your child Tapeworm.
It is difficult for me to fathom just how much life in Nunavik has changed over such a short period of time. It was also jarring for me to read how quickly any new idea introduced by the Qallunaat was accepted. I don't know how much of this positivity reflects the general feeling at the time, Mitiarjuk's own attitudes, or a consideration for the audience she was writing for (missionaries at first, then anthropologists). But I cannot reflect on this period without fast-forwarding to 2015, when an overwhelming number Inuit in Nunavik live against a backdrop of unimaginable poverty and violence. I am not here to judge which poverty is worse, the spectre of starvation haunting hunters in a lean winter or the overcrowded house where incest rubs shoulders with substance abuse. These are generalizations, yes, but they are also a reality, and one that seems so far removed from the simple scenes depicted by Mitiarjuk, where a bad day means you just knocked over the pail of mussels you spent all morning collecting under the sea ice. At least Sanaaq and her family weren't forcibly "relocated" to the High Arctic, as was the fate of some families in the 1950s, or simply "lost" after being sent to sanatoriums down south. I sense that I'm going off on a tangent here, but it is such a little-talked about corner of our recent history with such lasting repercussions that I wish Mitiarjuk had kept writing Sanaaq for another fifty years.
If you do seek this novel out, I have a few recommendations for you. Read it curled up by a window with snowflakes drifting by, with the otherworldly sound of traditional throat-singing in the background, sipping on some Labrador tea, and take it slowly, a few episodes at a time. It was my recipe and it worked.
As a document, Sanaaq is utterly unique. Written over a span of decades, then transliterated and twice-translated over an equally long period, it is a stunning repository of linguistic and anthropological knowledge. While Mitiarjuk never attended school, she was taught short-form syllabics by a missionary eager to learn Inuktitut. Her writing reflects this preoccupation with language, introducing myriad terms used in various day-to-day activities. Sanaaq is composed of 48 episodic chapters that follow the lives of Sanaaq and her community, and is generally considered a novel. It is, therefore, the first novel written in Inuktitut syllabics, and written by someone who did not know any alphabet and had never read a novel before, no less.
Mitiarjuk's writing style is straightforward and dynamic, steeped in the present and studded with dialogue. This concern with the here and now is doubtless tied to the unforgiving landscape of Northern Quebec, where tragedy is woven into the fabric of life. The importance of kinship ties are reinforced by the use of numerous words that do not exist in English. Here are but a few examples:
nuakuluk: kinship term used by a woman for her sister's child
Aikuluk: reciprocal kinship term, used by in-laws of the opposite sex and the same generation, e.g., the wife of a man's brother or the sister of a man's wife
arnaliaq: term used by a midwife for a daughter that she has helped deliver, literally "the female that she has made"
Other aspects of the Inuit belief system can likewise be gleaned from the vocabulary alone. I'll leave them here for you to chew on...
qunujaq: ominous prophetic dream
tuurngaq: term for a shaman's helping spirit. Used as a name for the devil by some of the first missionaries.
nuliarsaq: invisible female love, succubus - the episode where this term was introduced was particularly fascinating.
I really hadn't intended to turn this review into an annotated glossary but... bear with me, please! Just a few more and I'll stop, I promise.
Iikikii!: exclamation to express feeling of damp cold (dry cold is called ikkii)
puttajiaq: seriously wounded or dead marine mammal, whose body is floating on the water's surface
Qumaq: persons's name, literally "white-coloured intestinal worm" found in seals, humans, and fishes - yes, that's like calling your child Tapeworm.
It is difficult for me to fathom just how much life in Nunavik has changed over such a short period of time. It was also jarring for me to read how quickly any new idea introduced by the Qallunaat was accepted. I don't know how much of this positivity reflects the general feeling at the time, Mitiarjuk's own attitudes, or a consideration for the audience she was writing for (missionaries at first, then anthropologists). But I cannot reflect on this period without fast-forwarding to 2015, when an overwhelming number Inuit in Nunavik live against a backdrop of unimaginable poverty and violence. I am not here to judge which poverty is worse, the spectre of starvation haunting hunters in a lean winter or the overcrowded house where incest rubs shoulders with substance abuse. These are generalizations, yes, but they are also a reality, and one that seems so far removed from the simple scenes depicted by Mitiarjuk, where a bad day means you just knocked over the pail of mussels you spent all morning collecting under the sea ice. At least Sanaaq and her family weren't forcibly "relocated" to the High Arctic, as was the fate of some families in the 1950s, or simply "lost" after being sent to sanatoriums down south. I sense that I'm going off on a tangent here, but it is such a little-talked about corner of our recent history with such lasting repercussions that I wish Mitiarjuk had kept writing Sanaaq for another fifty years.
If you do seek this novel out, I have a few recommendations for you. Read it curled up by a window with snowflakes drifting by, with the otherworldly sound of traditional throat-singing in the background, sipping on some Labrador tea, and take it slowly, a few episodes at a time. It was my recipe and it worked.
April 13, 2023
This was fascinating, especially with the narrator being Inuit herself, I loved her pronunciation. I only wish I had a physical copy with me so I'd know how to spell the names and things mentioned in this book. Someday though.
September 30, 2024
Bernard Saladin d’Anglure was the original translator of Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk's Inuktitut text (into French), and that yes, Peter Frost has in fact rendered D'Anglure's 2002 translation into English (and not as such Nappaaluk's syllabics), which therefore makes Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel basically a translation of a translation (a bit textually annoying and frustrating for me, to be sure, but it is what it is, although I do hope to also read Bernard Saladin D'Anglure's French translation in the near future). And d'Anglure astutely and correctly points out in his introduction, in his foreword for Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel (and of course also translated into English by Peter Frost) that Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is as far as a traditional novel goes very much atypical with regard to in particular writing style, with regard to structure and form.
Penned by Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk in Inuktitut from the 1950s to when first published in syllabic script in the 1980s, Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is often, is generally referred to as being the first Inuit novel (and even the English language book title seems to claim this), although and much more accurately, Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is actually more a series of related vignettes, is basically what I would consider a bunch of external description episodes detailing Inuit life and how contact with missionaries, Canadian government officials/bureaucrats and the like have changed the traditional ways of the Inuit (negatively and sometimes also positively), with many of the characteristics a "typical" novel actually being pretty much totally absent in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel, since there is almost no character and plot development, but instead a very all encompassingly huge amount of description and that the cast of encountered characters in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is in fact quite large as well (but no, one never really gets to really textually meet and to become acquainted with these characters on a deep and intimate, personal level in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel, as Nappaluk seems to mostly use them as textual placeholders so to speak to describe Inuit life, Inuit language and how oh so very many traditions, how culture changed when the Inuit were evangelised by Catholics and Anglicans, when the Canadian Arctic was colonised and discovered by generally of European background people from the Canadian South).
However, even though Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel thus cannot be (and equally should not be) read like a conventional novel, I have still found Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel absolutely fascinating, very much educational, enlightening, and basically fiction reading very much like non fiction and from the point of view of the Inuit, in other words entirely OwnVoices (but of course filtered through both Bernard Saladin d’Anglure and David Frost, but this being totally unavoidable, as I do not know Inuktitut syllabics). And indeed, Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk both skilfully and feelingly textually evokes in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel the many difficulties of existence in Quebec's far North and also shows (and as already alluded to above) the Canadian government and the Catholic and Anglican churches beginning to have an ever increasing impact on Inuit life, not to mention that I equally do massively appreciate how Nappaluk's featured episodes in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel combine and decently balance humour and sadness, that life in the Canadian Arctic is presented and featured in all its colours, both positively and negatively, with death being a part of daily life, food dependant on availability, hunting success and often scarce, often lacking, and the weather, at times being simply and utterly abominable, a truly wonderful and educational reading experience for me, but that I do recommend Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel with the necessary caveat and strong suggestion to not AT ALL expect this book to be a traditional (and Western) novel, to approach Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel for what it is, a detailed tableau with intensely descriptive episodic gems of Inuit life, culture and the unavoidable shadow of change.
Oh and just to also say in conclusion that while Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is of course NOT a book specifically penned for younger readers (and that yes, death, illness and poverty are textually and also rather frequently portrayed and described by Mitiarjuk Nappaluk and her translators), in my opinion, Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel would definitely work well for young adult readers and is in my opinion totally and completely suitable for interested readers from about the age of thirteen or fourteen onwards, that Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel would also be a wonderful (OwnVoices) reading and discussion resource for junior or senior high classroom units on the Inuit and the Canadian Arctic (and especially since there are still way way too many non OwnVoices texts being used in classroom setting, so that Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel could definitely mitigate this shortcoming a bit).
Penned by Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk in Inuktitut from the 1950s to when first published in syllabic script in the 1980s, Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is often, is generally referred to as being the first Inuit novel (and even the English language book title seems to claim this), although and much more accurately, Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is actually more a series of related vignettes, is basically what I would consider a bunch of external description episodes detailing Inuit life and how contact with missionaries, Canadian government officials/bureaucrats and the like have changed the traditional ways of the Inuit (negatively and sometimes also positively), with many of the characteristics a "typical" novel actually being pretty much totally absent in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel, since there is almost no character and plot development, but instead a very all encompassingly huge amount of description and that the cast of encountered characters in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is in fact quite large as well (but no, one never really gets to really textually meet and to become acquainted with these characters on a deep and intimate, personal level in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel, as Nappaluk seems to mostly use them as textual placeholders so to speak to describe Inuit life, Inuit language and how oh so very many traditions, how culture changed when the Inuit were evangelised by Catholics and Anglicans, when the Canadian Arctic was colonised and discovered by generally of European background people from the Canadian South).
However, even though Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel thus cannot be (and equally should not be) read like a conventional novel, I have still found Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel absolutely fascinating, very much educational, enlightening, and basically fiction reading very much like non fiction and from the point of view of the Inuit, in other words entirely OwnVoices (but of course filtered through both Bernard Saladin d’Anglure and David Frost, but this being totally unavoidable, as I do not know Inuktitut syllabics). And indeed, Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk both skilfully and feelingly textually evokes in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel the many difficulties of existence in Quebec's far North and also shows (and as already alluded to above) the Canadian government and the Catholic and Anglican churches beginning to have an ever increasing impact on Inuit life, not to mention that I equally do massively appreciate how Nappaluk's featured episodes in Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel combine and decently balance humour and sadness, that life in the Canadian Arctic is presented and featured in all its colours, both positively and negatively, with death being a part of daily life, food dependant on availability, hunting success and often scarce, often lacking, and the weather, at times being simply and utterly abominable, a truly wonderful and educational reading experience for me, but that I do recommend Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel with the necessary caveat and strong suggestion to not AT ALL expect this book to be a traditional (and Western) novel, to approach Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel for what it is, a detailed tableau with intensely descriptive episodic gems of Inuit life, culture and the unavoidable shadow of change.
Oh and just to also say in conclusion that while Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel is of course NOT a book specifically penned for younger readers (and that yes, death, illness and poverty are textually and also rather frequently portrayed and described by Mitiarjuk Nappaluk and her translators), in my opinion, Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel would definitely work well for young adult readers and is in my opinion totally and completely suitable for interested readers from about the age of thirteen or fourteen onwards, that Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel would also be a wonderful (OwnVoices) reading and discussion resource for junior or senior high classroom units on the Inuit and the Canadian Arctic (and especially since there are still way way too many non OwnVoices texts being used in classroom setting, so that Sanaaq: An Inuit Novel could definitely mitigate this shortcoming a bit).
Want to read
January 26, 2016Jennifer D says: "just wanted to mention this book to you...because of its context in the history of the novel. the introduction is fascinating and talks about the process of getting the inuit oral tradition transcribed... then understood and translated."
Jennifer is right, I'm super into this. Thank you friend!
Jennifer is right, I'm super into this. Thank you friend!
January 27, 2016
i am having a hard time rating this book. its importance to the literary canon makes it a 5-star, necessary work. but i felt like there were oddities within the translation, and these kept pulling me out of the book. and, not that it is worth quibbling over, i would not necessarily label this as 'a novel'. it felt much more like each chapter was a vignette, as nappaaluk offers various scenes and activities of inuit life. so it did feel more like reading connected short stories.
a bit of background: in high school i was very fortunate to be able to spend time in a small inuit community on victoria island. though my timing and location are quite different from those of nappaaluk's book, much felt so familiar to me and was quite relatable -- the cadence of the language, the importance of family units, the normal day-to-day of life and existence in a challenging environment, community working together, caring for one another. sanaaq created some wonderful reminiscences for me while i read. one difference though, which i would like to note, concerns
and yet i come back to the translations...inuktitut, to french, to english. the foreword to this edition offers a terrific overview of the process, effort and time; the undertaking was no small feat. but something is sitting oddly for me, and keeps me wondering if the authenticity from nappaaluk has been truly conveyed in appropriate english language (if that even exists?), or altered a little bit to be digested by southern readers? (and to be clear: this is not an issue throughout the book. there is the inclusion of a lot of inuit words, with a list of translations at the back. but every now and then a word or phrase would be used and i would think whatever was originally expressed had been anglicized, and meaning or feeling was lost.)
so i am going to sit on 3½ -stars for now... i did quite like the read, but maybe i just need to process it further, or even read it again?
a bit of background: in high school i was very fortunate to be able to spend time in a small inuit community on victoria island. though my timing and location are quite different from those of nappaaluk's book, much felt so familiar to me and was quite relatable -- the cadence of the language, the importance of family units, the normal day-to-day of life and existence in a challenging environment, community working together, caring for one another. sanaaq created some wonderful reminiscences for me while i read. one difference though, which i would like to note, concerns
and yet i come back to the translations...inuktitut, to french, to english. the foreword to this edition offers a terrific overview of the process, effort and time; the undertaking was no small feat. but something is sitting oddly for me, and keeps me wondering if the authenticity from nappaaluk has been truly conveyed in appropriate english language (if that even exists?), or altered a little bit to be digested by southern readers? (and to be clear: this is not an issue throughout the book. there is the inclusion of a lot of inuit words, with a list of translations at the back. but every now and then a word or phrase would be used and i would think whatever was originally expressed had been anglicized, and meaning or feeling was lost.)
so i am going to sit on 3½ -stars for now... i did quite like the read, but maybe i just need to process it further, or even read it again?
November 24, 2020
Fascinating!!
November 22, 2025
Not sure exactly what to rate this. On the one hand, it's a fascinating document (written over 20 years) on the day to day life of an Inuit community, presenting one of the first contact moments with 'big brows' (white people, lol, love it), whose presence becomes more and more oppressive over the years, in bad ways (Catholicism - I would call it bad, even if the writer did convert themself -, resource dwindling, the presence of cops) and possibly good ways, maybe??? Honestly it's tough for me to call anything positive about that, even hospitals could be and still are hostile.
On the other hand, the behind-the-scenes of this novel are almost as fascinating: Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk is described as a two-spirit person (the afterword uses the pronoun 'she', but also describes them as two-spirit, so I will use the more neutral 'they'), very genderqueer in their passions (for gender norms at the time): hunting and writing, for example. This book was written in syllabic Inuttitut and then translated into French and English. I listened to the English translation. It also started out as a way to offer up as much vocabulary as possible to the missionaries that Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk worked with (and I'm quite conflicted about those missionaries).
I loved the emphasis on women characters in this, much more defined than the men. There was some moralizing in the tone which I did not really click with and felt kind of sad because of the colonial elements. It's definitely unfair for me to have expectations of more commentary on that. I still found the tension between tradition and colonialism to be effective. And I absolutely loved the narration of the audiobook, from an Inuit narrator with a lovely voice and cadence and pronunciation of all the onomatopoeia and character names.
On the other hand, the behind-the-scenes of this novel are almost as fascinating: Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk is described as a two-spirit person (the afterword uses the pronoun 'she', but also describes them as two-spirit, so I will use the more neutral 'they'), very genderqueer in their passions (for gender norms at the time): hunting and writing, for example. This book was written in syllabic Inuttitut and then translated into French and English. I listened to the English translation. It also started out as a way to offer up as much vocabulary as possible to the missionaries that Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk worked with (and I'm quite conflicted about those missionaries).
I loved the emphasis on women characters in this, much more defined than the men. There was some moralizing in the tone which I did not really click with and felt kind of sad because of the colonial elements. It's definitely unfair for me to have expectations of more commentary on that. I still found the tension between tradition and colonialism to be effective. And I absolutely loved the narration of the audiobook, from an Inuit narrator with a lovely voice and cadence and pronunciation of all the onomatopoeia and character names.
March 24, 2014
This novel is not a novel in our literary structural sense but a beautiful insight into the Inuit culture and way of life that although part of this northern nation is perhaps the least understood. The episodes laid out are simple in language structure but complex in story. The reader is immersed into the intimate nomadic lives of the Inuit families as they deal with the daily and seasonal struggles of survival, nature and the encroaching southern white people. There are customs and attitudes that are difficult to appreciate in our present day urban life styles however I felt there was an underlying desire to reach out across the divide and bind the stories to the universal mosaic of ordinary lives dealing with life, its challenges and its spiritual world. Through the eyes of Sanaaq, a strong and outspoken Inuit widow we are told tales of danger, survival, loss and birth. The stories are primarily told with a lightness and transparency but also at times with a complexity that confounds our sense of societal understanding. Sanaaq and her young family represent the heart and soul of the Canadian narrative, their history forged and still shapes our story. I highly recommend this book for many reasons, enjoyment, historical relevance, structure, and the sense that our lives are intertwined with the story tellers of our past. Pull up to a flame, feel the cold of the snow hut and share a tea with Sanaaq.
June 28, 2020
Wow, I really enjoyed this book! Sanaaq is a fascinating glimpse into the culture and traditional way of life of the Inuit. Written in Inuktitut by a woman who had never read a novel before, Sanaaq is in turns surprising and refreshing in its structure and tone. I found its construction to really aid in my immersion and understanding of Inuit perspectives; the novel’s depiction of children, elders, death, animals, and food were particularly thought-provoking. Really neat read.
July 21, 2019
Huh, how to rate and review this one? It is tedious to read, coming across as something akin to Dick and Jane for grown-ups written by someone who had way too much coffee to drink while writing it.
I know at this point, I am supposed to say 'but it has great cultural value and is an important ethnography' but I am doubtful of the former and in firm disagreement with the latter.
If this book were really a wonderful ethnography, then I as a reader am now supposed to believe that Inuit people are shallow, silly, thoughtless, and not too bright. I mean really there were repeated scenes where:
>someone did something wrong with the fuel/lantern/cooking fire and the tent or igloo got filled with smoke to the point that no one could breathe
>people went gathering food (mussels, clams, etc.) and someone got a large catch while someone else through a foolish error either got no catch or lost the catch that they had made (pretty much what happened EVERY time people went to gather food this way)
>someone (the same someone twice) got caught in the towlines of the dog sled and dragged across the tundra
>someone went hunting or got meat from their cache, no one paid attention to the unprotected meat and somehow everyone was surprised (yet again) that the dogs got into the meat (again pretty much EVERY time someone had meat from the hunt or the catch
Also, I am still having trouble getting past the scene where a wild animal tried to make off with a toddler and the aunt who was carrying the toddler was not relieved that the toddler was safe, nor upset about what might have happened but angry that the toddler tore the aunt's skirt while holding on to prevent being carried away. Really?!?!? That was one of the most callus scenes that I have read in a very long time.
Another callus scene was the one where a number of adults in their shelter (at least two-three adults) allowed a different toddler to go play at the lake with no supervision, feeling secure in the knowledge that telling the toddler not to fall in would stop him from doing so. Of course, he did fall in and almost drown... because you know, the adults preferred to socialize inside where they were comfortable to outside where they could keep an eye on the toddler, or even, you know, tell the toddler he too had to stay inside. Who does that?!?!
If people were saying that this type of depiction of my culture represented what we were about I would be offended. I know few Inuit people, but my understanding is that this is actually a vibrant, creative culture and people, whose ingenuity and thoughtfulness towards their communities have helped them survive for centuries (if not eons) in some of the harshest conditions on the planet. This deception of them as silly and shallow is insulting.
I would even have more sympathy if these problems were solely the fault of Bernard Saladin d'Anglure, the guy who used the text to earn his PhD. According to his introduction, Nappaaluk never wrote this text as a novel in the first place. However according to the same introduction, she participated in the conversion of the text from her syllabic script of what seems to be a random train of her thoughts into what they are now calling a novel. And, she seems to have known that this text was also being used as an ethnogoraphy, at least by d'Anglure, and at least according to d'Anglure... so, I don't know.
Overall, however, I had to rate the book by what it is rather than what it is supposed to be. And what is it is a tiresome read with repetitive sentences, and repetitive scenes, populated by silly, shallow people. There were parts of it that were OK, but just OK, and not enough for me to bring my rating up to three stars. I am glad I can return this one to the library.
I know at this point, I am supposed to say 'but it has great cultural value and is an important ethnography' but I am doubtful of the former and in firm disagreement with the latter.
If this book were really a wonderful ethnography, then I as a reader am now supposed to believe that Inuit people are shallow, silly, thoughtless, and not too bright. I mean really there were repeated scenes where:
>someone did something wrong with the fuel/lantern/cooking fire and the tent or igloo got filled with smoke to the point that no one could breathe
>people went gathering food (mussels, clams, etc.) and someone got a large catch while someone else through a foolish error either got no catch or lost the catch that they had made (pretty much what happened EVERY time people went to gather food this way)
>someone (the same someone twice) got caught in the towlines of the dog sled and dragged across the tundra
>someone went hunting or got meat from their cache, no one paid attention to the unprotected meat and somehow everyone was surprised (yet again) that the dogs got into the meat (again pretty much EVERY time someone had meat from the hunt or the catch
Also, I am still having trouble getting past the scene where a wild animal tried to make off with a toddler and the aunt who was carrying the toddler was not relieved that the toddler was safe, nor upset about what might have happened but angry that the toddler tore the aunt's skirt while holding on to prevent being carried away. Really?!?!? That was one of the most callus scenes that I have read in a very long time.
Another callus scene was the one where a number of adults in their shelter (at least two-three adults) allowed a different toddler to go play at the lake with no supervision, feeling secure in the knowledge that telling the toddler not to fall in would stop him from doing so. Of course, he did fall in and almost drown... because you know, the adults preferred to socialize inside where they were comfortable to outside where they could keep an eye on the toddler, or even, you know, tell the toddler he too had to stay inside. Who does that?!?!
If people were saying that this type of depiction of my culture represented what we were about I would be offended. I know few Inuit people, but my understanding is that this is actually a vibrant, creative culture and people, whose ingenuity and thoughtfulness towards their communities have helped them survive for centuries (if not eons) in some of the harshest conditions on the planet. This deception of them as silly and shallow is insulting.
I would even have more sympathy if these problems were solely the fault of Bernard Saladin d'Anglure, the guy who used the text to earn his PhD. According to his introduction, Nappaaluk never wrote this text as a novel in the first place. However according to the same introduction, she participated in the conversion of the text from her syllabic script of what seems to be a random train of her thoughts into what they are now calling a novel. And, she seems to have known that this text was also being used as an ethnogoraphy, at least by d'Anglure, and at least according to d'Anglure... so, I don't know.
Overall, however, I had to rate the book by what it is rather than what it is supposed to be. And what is it is a tiresome read with repetitive sentences, and repetitive scenes, populated by silly, shallow people. There were parts of it that were OK, but just OK, and not enough for me to bring my rating up to three stars. I am glad I can return this one to the library.
March 3, 2022
A really remarkable novel that was both beautiful and terrifying, intimate in its tenderness and at times heartbreakingly violent, all in prose elegant in its simplicity but layered in such rich emotional complexity. I think this is some of the most beautiful environmental writing I’ve ever encountered — just such a breathtaking portrayal of a people living with and on their land, encountering everyday hardships and a growing colonial presence.
Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk was… non-binary(?) — I’m not sure if that’s the correct term. The epilogue in this book refers to her (that’s the pronoun used) as ‘third gender’ which I believe is the nomenclature of Bernard Saladin D'Anglure, the anthropologist (student of Claude Levi-Strauss) who worked on the first French translation of this text and spent many years living in Northern Quebec in Inuit communities (first as a doctoral student of Levi-Strauss).
The novel had its origins in Nappaaluk writing out sentences for a Catholic priest who was studying the dialect of Inuttitut, but she was such a prolific writer that these sentences turned into a novel and she continued to write many other things, which I hope will be translated in the future. Nappaaluk was an observant Catholic, but one who felt strongly about Inuit culture and spirituality (occupying a major part of this novel), frank in her sexuality, and wrote a novel here that centers the subjectivity and interests of women characters. I really enjoyed this a lot.
Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk was… non-binary(?) — I’m not sure if that’s the correct term. The epilogue in this book refers to her (that’s the pronoun used) as ‘third gender’ which I believe is the nomenclature of Bernard Saladin D'Anglure, the anthropologist (student of Claude Levi-Strauss) who worked on the first French translation of this text and spent many years living in Northern Quebec in Inuit communities (first as a doctoral student of Levi-Strauss).
The novel had its origins in Nappaaluk writing out sentences for a Catholic priest who was studying the dialect of Inuttitut, but she was such a prolific writer that these sentences turned into a novel and she continued to write many other things, which I hope will be translated in the future. Nappaaluk was an observant Catholic, but one who felt strongly about Inuit culture and spirituality (occupying a major part of this novel), frank in her sexuality, and wrote a novel here that centers the subjectivity and interests of women characters. I really enjoyed this a lot.
February 22, 2022
Both the novel itself and the background of its creation are pretty interesting from an ethnographic and linguistic perspective, but Sanaaq is not exactly a barnburner for readers who AREN'T into that kind of thing...if you don't enjoy the repetition of stories about fishing and hunting kills, eating blubber, eyeballs and boiled meat from those kills, repairing and putting clothes on a rack to dry, and exclaiming "filthy dogs!" about sled dogs I'd advise you to steer well clear. If all that stuff sounds fascinating and you DO decide to soldier on, however, I definitely recommend listening to it if possible in order to get a truer sense of the vocabulary and language of this Iniut group.
April 6, 2020
The first novel written in Inuktitut syllabics offers a valuable depiction of day to day life in Nunavik. It is set in the 1950s, but the characters in this novel are still incredibly self-reliant while living off the land and are only beginning to come into contact with the qalunaat (settlers). The novel’s episodic structure allows us to experience many moments from Sanaaq’s life, from major life milestones to minor daily routines. Perhaps there were more hunting trips described in detail that I cared to read about, but overall I’m glad I read this insightful and innovative Inuit text.
March 4, 2020
Brilliant! Relates a story of the Inuit before they settled in communities, a simple yet tough life -but so close to nature and the rhythm of the seasons.
You may also enjoy this humorous film by the NFB
https://www.nfb.ca/film/qallunaat_why...
You may also enjoy this humorous film by the NFB
https://www.nfb.ca/film/qallunaat_why...
March 24, 2020
“Jiimialuk! You must always remember that you are a hunter and that at all times you will face danger and live through unpleasant moments. You should act in such a way that your loved ones will never suffer from hunger and you should think more about them than about yourself. You should never sit still and do nothing when an opportunity comes to provide for their needs, ai!”
February 3, 2024
Written in sybillics, initially in response
to request for a Inuit language primer, Sanaaq is both unusual and engaging. At first, the narrative is fairly focused on the events of everyday life - lots of fishing, seal hunting, seabird hunting, sewing, cooking all while parenting, and navigating relationships. Nappaaluk also weaves historical events into the background - at a literal level this is anachronistic with the arrival of the first European ship, missionaries, trading posts and missions all crunched into a few years set decades too late - but somehow it works on an emotional level, giving the sense of change and dislocation which several generations experienced.
As the novel gathers steam, the characters move to center stage, especially the women and girls. Sanaaq possesses the supreme confidence of a woman who knows her own worth, her impatience and exasperation are those of a matriach who will haul everyone's arses out of the ice floe if needed. Her best friend Aquiarulaaq possesses a restlessness and curiousity that gets her into occasional trouble, but also pushes them into new places. Daughter Qumaq pushes all her boundaries but posesses a seriousness and capacity for self-reflection. The last part of the book also discusses more significant events including domestic violence, the pain of separation for medical treatment, and the birth of children with mixed parentage.
to request for a Inuit language primer, Sanaaq is both unusual and engaging. At first, the narrative is fairly focused on the events of everyday life - lots of fishing, seal hunting, seabird hunting, sewing, cooking all while parenting, and navigating relationships. Nappaaluk also weaves historical events into the background - at a literal level this is anachronistic with the arrival of the first European ship, missionaries, trading posts and missions all crunched into a few years set decades too late - but somehow it works on an emotional level, giving the sense of change and dislocation which several generations experienced.
As the novel gathers steam, the characters move to center stage, especially the women and girls. Sanaaq possesses the supreme confidence of a woman who knows her own worth, her impatience and exasperation are those of a matriach who will haul everyone's arses out of the ice floe if needed. Her best friend Aquiarulaaq possesses a restlessness and curiousity that gets her into occasional trouble, but also pushes them into new places. Daughter Qumaq pushes all her boundaries but posesses a seriousness and capacity for self-reflection. The last part of the book also discusses more significant events including domestic violence, the pain of separation for medical treatment, and the birth of children with mixed parentage.
April 2, 2015
This is a different type of novel. The plot of the novel is life, and the point of the novel is illustrating the life of a people as opposed to simply a life of person. The title character, Sanaaq, is a widowed mother who, along with her family, deals with everyday life and changing circumstances. It is not a “first people met the white man” novel though religion and modern society do play a role towards the end of the book.
Because of this it is a rather good book. It is a look at culture by a person who lives in that culture and wants to educate about that culture. But it is not education in terms of lecture and now that I think of it, relating seems to be a better word than educate. Regardless, the novel is done in such a way that the characters seem they can – well – walk off the kindle screen in my case.
There is one problem with the Kindle edition. It would be easier for the reader if the words were linked to the glossary.
February 5, 2019
This is an episodic novel that follows and an Inuit family through time. This book was written in Inuktitut, then translated to French, then English. The clunky translations made it difficult to get through, and I felt the dialogue and “train of thought” parts of the book made the characters non-relatable. While an interesting look into the daily life of the Inuit, this book was not my favourite.
Read
September 21, 2018Je ne l'ai pas fini, alors je ne le noterai pas. C'était un peu comme une découverte de l'univers inuït. Comme une exploration sociologique. Je vais le finir quand j'aurai le temps, parce qu'il paraît que le style de l'autrice se peaufine avec le temps. Et aussi parce que c'est super dépaysant! C'est comme un voyage dans le temps et dans l'espace!
March 16, 2014
In reading the English translation, I couldn't help but think that the original must have had a more flowing quality. As ethnography, I found it to be a fascinating read. I greatly enjoyed the descriptions of kayaks and their use in hunting.
July 3, 2024
I wanted to like this book, but the way of telling is not my cup of tea. A stain on a shirt gets the same amount of narration as a nearly fatal accident or an adoption of a child which wants to stay with their family.
But it’s a great book if you’re into dog abuse…
But it’s a great book if you’re into dog abuse…
May 26, 2024
The first time for me to read a book set in Canada and it's written from the perspective of an Inuit woman from the northern Quebec region (Nunavik). This book is quite different from anything I've read before. It chronicles the life of Sanaaq, a mother who lives together with a few close family members and how they live as Inuits. Sanaaq lives together with her second husband, their son, her daughter from her first husband, her sister and her husband's sister and mother live nearby too. This book came about when the author Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk conversed with Catholic missionaries. They wanted to not only improve their language skills but also understand the lives of the Inuits better. So Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk told them these stories, which were noted down in short chapters and are a reflection of the oral tradition story-telling of the Inuits. According to Wikipedia, it took the Catholic missionaries almost twenty years to compile this book together. What stood out the most to me was how hunting, fishing, looking for food and keeping the food away from the dogs, dominated the lives of the Inuits because this is about survival. They don't have time for unnecessary drama and so this close-knit community needs to get things done and cooperate with each other so that they can build igloos, share food, survive unexpected storms and make sure the children grow up. However, a little drama does exist in the form of heartbreak, domestic violence, lies and jealousy. Towards the end of the book, I was quite captivated by the story of Sanaaq's sister, who had a baby with a white man and wants the baby to be converted to Christianity. Sanaaq's sister's Inuit fiancee Maatiusi is shocked by this and develops an unhealthy coping mechanism in regards to this reality. A fantasy-like succubus takes over his thoughts and he becomes useless to his community because he constantly lost and depressed. Only when he finally managed to talk about this with Sanaaq's husband Qalinga was Maatiusi finally able to break free. I found this interesting because I think nowadays in urban spaces we also use "fantasies" in social media and whatnot to escape from stress and problems we don't want to face. Other than that, the Inuits also differentiate between different types of snow and have a wide vocabulary for the insides of the animals that they hunt. I read this on my kindle which made it tricky to look up the unknowns words in the glossary. Overall, this was a very unique reading experience and it was nice getting a glimpse into the life of Sanaaq.
June 8, 2024
I thought at first I would not rate this at all as it seemed disrespectful. That first thought of not rating illuminates the difficulties when approaching this work. It cannot be read as a typical novel. A reader who approaches it with the expectation that they will be reading a standard novel, structured with a beginning, middle and end, are going to be disappointed, as many reviews on here show. The book was written over many years, and the author did not reread her work once it was finished. As she writes about the daily life of the Inuit, there are repetitions, especially with the dogs, who were apparently wily and poorly behaved in general. But it is a wonderful glimpse into a culture from a woman who was living it and inventing in her own way, without the benefit of a formal education, the first Inuit novel. In it’s own way, it articulates very well the setting and the people of the community she is writing about. Also the firsts for medical care, unwelcome hospital stays, domestic abuse, pensions, religions, and homes being built while also sharing aspects unique to her culture. I found it fascinating. Listening on audio made it a pleasure as there is a beautiful rhythm to the language. Glad I finally got to it though I had meant to read it in the winter time which would be the best in an ideal world. But Libby be hard to coordinate such lofty goals as seasonal reading. You get it when you get it.
July 1, 2022
Slice of life stories from an Inuit family. Listen in audio for proper pronunciation.
July 21, 2023
They say, write what you know – but sometimes what we know is beyond the ken of most. Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk’s marvellous Sanaaq is a wonderful, compelling, unexpected tale of life in the far north of what is now Quebec, it seems in the early to mid-20th century; timing is hard to be definite about – but then my sense of calendrical timing is not Nappaaluk’s calendar. At the centre of the novel is Sanaaq, a young Inuk (singular of Inuit) woman with a young child (Qumaq) who lives with her younger sister somewhere around what I take to be James Bay.
It’s an engaging story where nothing much happens, except everyday life. They hunt and fish, collect roots, other vegetables, and berries, and they life, love, mourn, and as best they can manage their relations with traders and missionaries. Along the way, Sanaaq takes a husband (we never find out what happened to her daughter’s father), her sister has a baby, one of their community is drowned, there is an urgent rush to hospital; but for the most part it’s a blend of daily life – building a kayak, ice fishing, maintaining an ice house (igloo) through the winter, drinking tea (there’s a lot of drinking tea), and repairing shoes and other clothing. That is to say, it is all very domestic – yet along the way we get close to Sanaaq’s community, we learn their quirks and foibles, idiosyncrasies, crankiness, and more. I came out of it feeling as if I’d met an extended group, knew them, and enjoyed their company – not that I’d want to spend too much time – there’s much too much blubber eating for my constitution.
The events take place over a few years – it is hard to be sure how many, but enough for Qumaq to grow from a young fully dependent child to at least a slightly older one taking on independent fishing and gathering tasks, for the Qallunaat, the newly arrived white people, to become established in the region as traders and missionaries, and for the Inuit to begin to actively engage with the state: there’s housing and pensions. It’s a clear insight into a way of life we seldom see, and unusually for literature of this form, woman centric.
What’s all the more astounding, and outlined in the introduction by Quebequois anthropologist Bernard Saladin d’Anglure, is the background to the book. First, it is the first novel written in Inuttitut syllabics – the written form of the Inuit languages. Second, it was written by a woman unable to read or write in the Roman (or any other form of) alphabet, who had never attended school, and who had never read a novel. Arguably, this book invents the Inuit novel. Third, although never having been to school, about 45 years after this novel was finished Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk earned a PhD in education. She died, aged 76, in 2007)
d’Anglure provides background, of a community he worked in were a young woman (Nappaaluk) – the eldest of a family of daughters so who took on the public functions of a son, providing for the family – had been asked by missionaries to write some Inuit phrases, that grew into this episodic, 48 chapter novel as she invented characters and wove together their stories. Part of the reason for the writing was to teach the missionaries the local language, so the text is peppered with synonyms, is in places elegantly poetic, in others rhythmically repetitive (with the synonyms) – all of which adds to the beauty of the text.
Nappaaluk’s changing relationship with the missionaries also seems to be a feature of the novel, as she depicts a shifting relationship with settler religion, but also becomes more explicit about issues such as domestic abuse and the effects of men going away to work in the cash economy. She’s also clearly aware of community stories and pasts, building an insightful sense of pre-Qallunaat life, even if the sense of time and historical distance is not as we might expect to see in more temporally conventional novels.
The other aspect of the book’s genesis that adds its richness is the sequence to publication – from written in Inuittut in the 1950s to French to English in the early 2000s, yet with an extensive use of Inuit terms especially for species fish, animal parts, and a wide range of plant life. There is also quite and extensive use of Inuittut idiom, greetings, and kinship terminology, often because none of these terms translate clearly or directly into other languages – and there is an extensive glossary.
It’s a gorgeous, engaging, gentle novel that begins and ends in a world Sanaaq and her community have some ability to influence, or at least manage, but that is constantly changing, mainly in a recognisable way (the Qallunaat haven’t yet become too intrusive) – and there’s as much she wrote yet to be published as there was for the text that made this novel. I’m looking forward to more of Sannaaq’s world.
It’s an engaging story where nothing much happens, except everyday life. They hunt and fish, collect roots, other vegetables, and berries, and they life, love, mourn, and as best they can manage their relations with traders and missionaries. Along the way, Sanaaq takes a husband (we never find out what happened to her daughter’s father), her sister has a baby, one of their community is drowned, there is an urgent rush to hospital; but for the most part it’s a blend of daily life – building a kayak, ice fishing, maintaining an ice house (igloo) through the winter, drinking tea (there’s a lot of drinking tea), and repairing shoes and other clothing. That is to say, it is all very domestic – yet along the way we get close to Sanaaq’s community, we learn their quirks and foibles, idiosyncrasies, crankiness, and more. I came out of it feeling as if I’d met an extended group, knew them, and enjoyed their company – not that I’d want to spend too much time – there’s much too much blubber eating for my constitution.
The events take place over a few years – it is hard to be sure how many, but enough for Qumaq to grow from a young fully dependent child to at least a slightly older one taking on independent fishing and gathering tasks, for the Qallunaat, the newly arrived white people, to become established in the region as traders and missionaries, and for the Inuit to begin to actively engage with the state: there’s housing and pensions. It’s a clear insight into a way of life we seldom see, and unusually for literature of this form, woman centric.
What’s all the more astounding, and outlined in the introduction by Quebequois anthropologist Bernard Saladin d’Anglure, is the background to the book. First, it is the first novel written in Inuttitut syllabics – the written form of the Inuit languages. Second, it was written by a woman unable to read or write in the Roman (or any other form of) alphabet, who had never attended school, and who had never read a novel. Arguably, this book invents the Inuit novel. Third, although never having been to school, about 45 years after this novel was finished Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk earned a PhD in education. She died, aged 76, in 2007)
d’Anglure provides background, of a community he worked in were a young woman (Nappaaluk) – the eldest of a family of daughters so who took on the public functions of a son, providing for the family – had been asked by missionaries to write some Inuit phrases, that grew into this episodic, 48 chapter novel as she invented characters and wove together their stories. Part of the reason for the writing was to teach the missionaries the local language, so the text is peppered with synonyms, is in places elegantly poetic, in others rhythmically repetitive (with the synonyms) – all of which adds to the beauty of the text.
Nappaaluk’s changing relationship with the missionaries also seems to be a feature of the novel, as she depicts a shifting relationship with settler religion, but also becomes more explicit about issues such as domestic abuse and the effects of men going away to work in the cash economy. She’s also clearly aware of community stories and pasts, building an insightful sense of pre-Qallunaat life, even if the sense of time and historical distance is not as we might expect to see in more temporally conventional novels.
The other aspect of the book’s genesis that adds its richness is the sequence to publication – from written in Inuittut in the 1950s to French to English in the early 2000s, yet with an extensive use of Inuit terms especially for species fish, animal parts, and a wide range of plant life. There is also quite and extensive use of Inuittut idiom, greetings, and kinship terminology, often because none of these terms translate clearly or directly into other languages – and there is an extensive glossary.
It’s a gorgeous, engaging, gentle novel that begins and ends in a world Sanaaq and her community have some ability to influence, or at least manage, but that is constantly changing, mainly in a recognisable way (the Qallunaat haven’t yet become too intrusive) – and there’s as much she wrote yet to be published as there was for the text that made this novel. I’m looking forward to more of Sannaaq’s world.
June 10, 2012
Ce livre, écrit par une femme inuit raconte la vie quotidienne. Les chasses, la tente, l'igloo, les amis... Deux choses me frappent. Premièrement, contrairement à ce qu'on entend et voit d'habitude, les inuits ne sont pas nécessairement des experts en chasse et pêche. Ils ne tirent pas bien et souvent manquent leur proie plusieurs fois, ils épuisent leur munition à force de mal tirer, ils se noient en pêchant, ils jettent des restants aux chiens quand ils sont attachés au traîneau prêts à partir, les chiens se jettent sur la nourriture et empêtrent les cordes, etc. Bref, ils font beaucoup d'erreurs qui me semblent évitables avec leur expérience. Deuxièmement, le style de ce livre est très "linéaire" dans son écriture - on dit: "ils ne peuvent faire telle chose. Maintenant ils ont réussi." C'est comme si tout est un peu en accéléré - on lit sans qu'il y ait de pose pour reprendre sa respiration.
Je trouve que la traduction est un peu bizarre. Le style me semble trop sophistiqué pour la façon dont le texte est écrit.
Je trouve que la traduction est un peu bizarre. Le style me semble trop sophistiqué pour la façon dont le texte est écrit.
September 18, 2017
A record of difficult, but simple lives led in the Canadian Arctic. Much of the book laments the simple-mindedness of the Inuit characters who populate the author's world. They risk their lives to hunt and fish, yet often (read unbelievably often) leave the food out in the open where dogs, birds or other animals make off with the bounty. They make foolish choices which result in death or serious disease. They trust strangers and routinely ignore the good advice of their own companions.
If you have no knowledge of the northern indigenous peoples, this will be a good start, but certainly neither the last word nor an exhaustive study.
If you have no knowledge of the northern indigenous peoples, this will be a good start, but certainly neither the last word nor an exhaustive study.
Read
October 13, 2018Slices-of-life novel. Slow and deliberate. Fascinating. The first novel ever written in Inuktitut (between the 1950s and 1980s), published in French (2002), and further translated from French into English and published (2014). Not even remotely a polemic, but when read from here, saturated -- in its contents and in how the circumstances of its production are described in the Foreword -- with themes of survival in a colonial world. Worth a read.
July 21, 2018
Not really a novel in the traditional sense but a set of very short stories. The book gave good insights into the lives of Inuit people.
September 30, 2017
Saanaq, by Inuk author Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk, has been called the first 'Canadian Inuit novel.' Written over a period of two decades, first in Inuktitut syllabics (published in transliteration in 1984) and later translated into French (published in 2002) and English (2014), it was commissioned by Catholic missionaries working in Nunavut, who wanted to improve their ability to communicate with the indigenous peoples living in the region. What they asked for was a simple phrasebook. What Nappaluk began writing was an episodic novel that, in telling stories about the Inuit people and their lives, served not only as a reading primer but a record of indigenous life in Nunavut and the arrival of Europeans in the area, from the rarely-heard perspective of an indigenous woman.
it is written very simply, in prose that reminds me very much of the storytelling style I've encountered in some other works by indigenous people (some of the short stories of Thomas King cone to mind), and it's a series of short pieces detailing bith the daiky activities and special events of a small, interconnected community of Inuit. The connecting thread is the relationships of all the characters to Saanaq, a young widow who, at the beginning of the novel, lives with her younger unmarried sister and daughter. The time period is somewhere in the middle of the 20th century - the community knows of Europeans, but they have not yet been significantly affected by their arrival in the North, and still live as their ancestors did.
The story behind the novel's creation took many twists and turns. As anthropologist Bernard Saladin d’Anglure - then a post-graduate student working with Claude Levi-Strauss - says in his Introduction,
"... the novel took almost twenty years to write, for several reasons. The first part covered a little over half of the final manuscript. It stopped at the beginning of episode 24 (The Legend of Lumaajuq) because the author had to leave for a long stay at a hospital in the South and then because Father Lechat [the priest who had originally asked Napaaluk to write the phrasebook - bibliogramma] had been transferred to Kuujjuaq (Fort Chimo). Father Joseph Méeus, O.M.I., took over supervision of her work and about forty new pages were written, i.e., episodes 25 to 37. The novel continued to remain unfinished with her return to hospital and the transfer of Father Méeus to another village. Mitiarjuk stopped writing for several years.
I met Father Lechat in January 1956 during my first stay in Arctic Quebec. He welcomed me to Kuujjuaq, offering the hospitality of his mission, and told me about the novel Sanaaq. In his hands was the first part, written in pencil with almost nothing crossed out or added. It had been transliterated into Roman letters, with the author’s help, before he had left Kangirsujuaq, and had also been partially translated. But the spelling of the Inuit language had not yet been standardized and the imprecision of syllabic writing, the lack of punctuation, and the distance from the author made the job impossible for him to pursue. He read me some of the translation and my interest was aroused right away. It was not until 1961 that I finally met Mitiarjuk, during anthropological fieldwork at Kangirsujuaq. I convinced her to start writing again. The next year Father Lechat gave me his manuscript of Sanaaq so that I could work on it with Mitiarjuk."
It was through d'Anglure's ongoing assistance and contacts (and access to academic funding) that the book saw publication. (He used the experience of working with Napaaluk as the basis for his Ph.D dissertation.)
I was struck, in reading this, by the strong sense of community among the families whose stories are included in the novel. They support each other, feed each other, join in hunting and gathering firewood and other resources for each other. Napaaluk describes a life that is semi-nomadic - the community changes their camp's location several times - and focused on subsistence. Food is not just for nourishment, it plays an important social function - when people come to visit each other, they are offered 'arrival meals' as welcome to the new community, and 'going-away meals' when leaving, as recognition of the effort and use of energy in travelling in a difficult landscape. And when someone has been successful in hunting or fishing, it's often the signal for a community feast, with everyone invited to share in the meat from the kill. There are several occasions where hunters and fishers give part of their catch to the elders of the community, because they are not always able to find food for themselves.
In one chapter, in which several elders share legends, there is an exchange which I found unintentionally ironic, and deeply saddening. One if the young hunters, whose parents are dead, is instructed by an elder on how to identify animals that are healthy and thus safe to kill and eat. The young hunter and the elder talk about the role of elders in preserving the knowledge of the people:
"Thank you! I won’t forget any of what you’ve told me and which I didn’t know before. I need to be taught. Those who aren’t elders are less knowledgeable than those who are. Without elders the Inuit are nothing, for there is much knowledge that the elders alone possess!"
"My knowledge comes not from me but from my ancestors. It seems to be mine but, in fact, it comes to me from people who preceded me. I pass it on to all of you, to all of your descendants and all of your kinfolk!"
In the earlier parts of the story, there is little indication of the existence of white Europeans, beyond the use by hunters of guns. As the novel progresses, contacts with Europeans (called the Qallunaat by Sanaaq's people, literally meaning 'big eyebrows) become more frequently mentioned, until finally, the story records the arrival of Catholic missionaries and the first conversions among Sanaaq's community. In reading these passages, it's impossible to forget that Nappaaluk was herself a convert, who wrote the majority of her novel at the request of, and in consultation with, the Catholic priests who had cone to live in her community.
Later in the story, white 'Inuit agents' arrive, and establish an outpost near the area where Sanaaq's community makes their camp. Sanaaq's second husband accepts a contract job of several month's duration working for the Qallunaat at another place. The Inuit agents establish a system of cash payments to the elderly and to families with children, and later there are regular visits to the outpost from a community health nurse. There is now a store where Sanaaq and her relatives can purchase food, cloth, and other goods. The intervention of the Qallunaat is also of significance to the story when first Sanaaq's young son almost drowns, and later, when Sanaaq experiences a violent battering from her husband which leaves her severely injured. The Qallunaat offer to fly her son out to a hospital if he does not recover - which he does - and then does fly Sanaaq to a hospital for treatment of her injuries. Her husband, meanwhile, is cautioned not to beat her again or he will go to jail.
Personal interactions - even sexual relationships - between Inuit and Qallunaat become part of the story of Sanaaq's community. In the later chapters - those written after Nappaaluk had begun to work with d'Anglure rather than the Catholic priests for whom she had begun her work - there are indications of the beginnings of patterns of abuse of the Inuit by Qallunaat sent into the north, although it's uncertain what Nappaaluk felt about the incidents she included.
In Sannaq, Nappaaluk has given us the gift of an account of traditional Inuit life, and of the beginnings of the relationship between Inuit and white settler-colonists in the North, from the viewpoint of an Inuk woman who witnessed the changes herself. It's a rare and precious gift, and I'm richer for having ben able to read it.
it is written very simply, in prose that reminds me very much of the storytelling style I've encountered in some other works by indigenous people (some of the short stories of Thomas King cone to mind), and it's a series of short pieces detailing bith the daiky activities and special events of a small, interconnected community of Inuit. The connecting thread is the relationships of all the characters to Saanaq, a young widow who, at the beginning of the novel, lives with her younger unmarried sister and daughter. The time period is somewhere in the middle of the 20th century - the community knows of Europeans, but they have not yet been significantly affected by their arrival in the North, and still live as their ancestors did.
The story behind the novel's creation took many twists and turns. As anthropologist Bernard Saladin d’Anglure - then a post-graduate student working with Claude Levi-Strauss - says in his Introduction,
"... the novel took almost twenty years to write, for several reasons. The first part covered a little over half of the final manuscript. It stopped at the beginning of episode 24 (The Legend of Lumaajuq) because the author had to leave for a long stay at a hospital in the South and then because Father Lechat [the priest who had originally asked Napaaluk to write the phrasebook - bibliogramma] had been transferred to Kuujjuaq (Fort Chimo). Father Joseph Méeus, O.M.I., took over supervision of her work and about forty new pages were written, i.e., episodes 25 to 37. The novel continued to remain unfinished with her return to hospital and the transfer of Father Méeus to another village. Mitiarjuk stopped writing for several years.
I met Father Lechat in January 1956 during my first stay in Arctic Quebec. He welcomed me to Kuujjuaq, offering the hospitality of his mission, and told me about the novel Sanaaq. In his hands was the first part, written in pencil with almost nothing crossed out or added. It had been transliterated into Roman letters, with the author’s help, before he had left Kangirsujuaq, and had also been partially translated. But the spelling of the Inuit language had not yet been standardized and the imprecision of syllabic writing, the lack of punctuation, and the distance from the author made the job impossible for him to pursue. He read me some of the translation and my interest was aroused right away. It was not until 1961 that I finally met Mitiarjuk, during anthropological fieldwork at Kangirsujuaq. I convinced her to start writing again. The next year Father Lechat gave me his manuscript of Sanaaq so that I could work on it with Mitiarjuk."
It was through d'Anglure's ongoing assistance and contacts (and access to academic funding) that the book saw publication. (He used the experience of working with Napaaluk as the basis for his Ph.D dissertation.)
I was struck, in reading this, by the strong sense of community among the families whose stories are included in the novel. They support each other, feed each other, join in hunting and gathering firewood and other resources for each other. Napaaluk describes a life that is semi-nomadic - the community changes their camp's location several times - and focused on subsistence. Food is not just for nourishment, it plays an important social function - when people come to visit each other, they are offered 'arrival meals' as welcome to the new community, and 'going-away meals' when leaving, as recognition of the effort and use of energy in travelling in a difficult landscape. And when someone has been successful in hunting or fishing, it's often the signal for a community feast, with everyone invited to share in the meat from the kill. There are several occasions where hunters and fishers give part of their catch to the elders of the community, because they are not always able to find food for themselves.
In one chapter, in which several elders share legends, there is an exchange which I found unintentionally ironic, and deeply saddening. One if the young hunters, whose parents are dead, is instructed by an elder on how to identify animals that are healthy and thus safe to kill and eat. The young hunter and the elder talk about the role of elders in preserving the knowledge of the people:
"Thank you! I won’t forget any of what you’ve told me and which I didn’t know before. I need to be taught. Those who aren’t elders are less knowledgeable than those who are. Without elders the Inuit are nothing, for there is much knowledge that the elders alone possess!"
"My knowledge comes not from me but from my ancestors. It seems to be mine but, in fact, it comes to me from people who preceded me. I pass it on to all of you, to all of your descendants and all of your kinfolk!"
In the earlier parts of the story, there is little indication of the existence of white Europeans, beyond the use by hunters of guns. As the novel progresses, contacts with Europeans (called the Qallunaat by Sanaaq's people, literally meaning 'big eyebrows) become more frequently mentioned, until finally, the story records the arrival of Catholic missionaries and the first conversions among Sanaaq's community. In reading these passages, it's impossible to forget that Nappaaluk was herself a convert, who wrote the majority of her novel at the request of, and in consultation with, the Catholic priests who had cone to live in her community.
Later in the story, white 'Inuit agents' arrive, and establish an outpost near the area where Sanaaq's community makes their camp. Sanaaq's second husband accepts a contract job of several month's duration working for the Qallunaat at another place. The Inuit agents establish a system of cash payments to the elderly and to families with children, and later there are regular visits to the outpost from a community health nurse. There is now a store where Sanaaq and her relatives can purchase food, cloth, and other goods. The intervention of the Qallunaat is also of significance to the story when first Sanaaq's young son almost drowns, and later, when Sanaaq experiences a violent battering from her husband which leaves her severely injured. The Qallunaat offer to fly her son out to a hospital if he does not recover - which he does - and then does fly Sanaaq to a hospital for treatment of her injuries. Her husband, meanwhile, is cautioned not to beat her again or he will go to jail.
Personal interactions - even sexual relationships - between Inuit and Qallunaat become part of the story of Sanaaq's community. In the later chapters - those written after Nappaaluk had begun to work with d'Anglure rather than the Catholic priests for whom she had begun her work - there are indications of the beginnings of patterns of abuse of the Inuit by Qallunaat sent into the north, although it's uncertain what Nappaaluk felt about the incidents she included.
In Sannaq, Nappaaluk has given us the gift of an account of traditional Inuit life, and of the beginnings of the relationship between Inuit and white settler-colonists in the North, from the viewpoint of an Inuk woman who witnessed the changes herself. It's a rare and precious gift, and I'm richer for having ben able to read it.
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