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A Proper Acadian
In 1755, young Timothy is sent from Boston to live with his mother's relatives in Acadia. As the story unfolds, Timothy grows to love the beauty of the Acadian landscape and the close-knit, hardworking Acadian community. One June night, American soldiers — who had come under the guise of a fishing party — ransack the Acadians' houses for arms while their hosts lie sleeping. This treacherous event portends the disaster that follows later that summer: the Acadian deportation.
64 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1980
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June 21, 2021
Sorry, but even though I am and always have been interested in Les Acadiens (and especially in their horrid and undeserved mid 18th century expulsion and deportation by the British from what are now Canada’s Maritimes), I really have not been AT ALL textually impressed with Mary Alice Downie’s 1980 historical fiction chapter book A Proper Acadian (and which does also exist under the alternate title of A Song for Acadia, but I do not know if it is only the book title that is different or if there have also been textual changes) and I have truly so intensely disliked Downie’s presented text that I came extremely close to quitting in medias res and labelling A Proper Acadian as a book I did not and could not finish. Because yes indeed, even with its comparatively short length of only 64 pages, A Proper Acadian has been a truly terrible personal reading experience (and actually made only bearable by me skimming and gritting my teeth in frustration and annoyance).
For one and really quite infuriatingly, the sense of historic place in A Proper Acadian is in my opinion pretty horribly substandard, read majorly lacking and actually almost non existent. As really, with Mary Alice Downie trying to I guess keep her presented text simple enough for young and recently independent readers, one does not in my opinion ever feel as though one is actually reading a story specifically set in Boston and then later on in Acadia, but just in some anonymous areas located in the mid 18th century. Since no, in the beginning of A Proper Acadian, there are basically no longer descriptions presented by Mary Alice Downie that to and for me say “Boston” (except of course for the chapter heading which states that we are in Boston, 1754), and also, once Timothy is then sent to live with his deceased mother’s family in Acadia, the only significant sign of this, of Acadia, is in my opinion that the family is speaking French (pretty much textually so sparse on descriptive details so as to truly become extremely and utterly frustrating). And for two, I also rather think that A Proper Acadian contains some pretty major and problematic potential historical inaccuracies, such as for example, the soldiers pretending to be fishermen who harass and torment Timothy’s Acadian family being labelled by Mary Alice Downie as being Americans, when in 1754, these soldiers would certainly have been considered as British (since it is prior to 1776, prior to the American Revolution) and be following British orders.
And therefore, that there is really not at all a sense of acceptable and specific historic place to be encountered with regard to Mary Alice Downie’s printed words, both this and the often inaccurate and problematic historical facts presented, they really do made me quite majorly despise A Proper Acadian and to in fact even wish I had not read it (and actually to at times almost wish that I could be giving A Proper Acadian less than one star).
For one and really quite infuriatingly, the sense of historic place in A Proper Acadian is in my opinion pretty horribly substandard, read majorly lacking and actually almost non existent. As really, with Mary Alice Downie trying to I guess keep her presented text simple enough for young and recently independent readers, one does not in my opinion ever feel as though one is actually reading a story specifically set in Boston and then later on in Acadia, but just in some anonymous areas located in the mid 18th century. Since no, in the beginning of A Proper Acadian, there are basically no longer descriptions presented by Mary Alice Downie that to and for me say “Boston” (except of course for the chapter heading which states that we are in Boston, 1754), and also, once Timothy is then sent to live with his deceased mother’s family in Acadia, the only significant sign of this, of Acadia, is in my opinion that the family is speaking French (pretty much textually so sparse on descriptive details so as to truly become extremely and utterly frustrating). And for two, I also rather think that A Proper Acadian contains some pretty major and problematic potential historical inaccuracies, such as for example, the soldiers pretending to be fishermen who harass and torment Timothy’s Acadian family being labelled by Mary Alice Downie as being Americans, when in 1754, these soldiers would certainly have been considered as British (since it is prior to 1776, prior to the American Revolution) and be following British orders.
And therefore, that there is really not at all a sense of acceptable and specific historic place to be encountered with regard to Mary Alice Downie’s printed words, both this and the often inaccurate and problematic historical facts presented, they really do made me quite majorly despise A Proper Acadian and to in fact even wish I had not read it (and actually to at times almost wish that I could be giving A Proper Acadian less than one star).
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