the winter of the end of the white world

“La Lune de l’apre neige” (Moon of the Crusted Snow), by Waubgeshig Rice, translated from English (Canada) by Antoine Chainas, Les Arènes, 304 p., €19 (in bookshops on 1^er september).

Something is wrong, but what exactly? In this late autumn, in northern Ontario (Canada), Evan Whitesky is not worried. With the moose he has just killed, plus the geese and fish he has put aside, his family will be able to survive the winter without a problem. So, too bad if his cell phone no longer picks up and the television refuses to turn on for a few hours.

Only then, the breakdown drags on. No more network, no more electricity. Evan and the other Anishinabés of this Native American reserve suddenly cut off from the world try to organize themselves in the face of the cold, the coming storm, the emerging shortages. But, very quickly, the inhabitants panic, rob the supermarket. It doesn’t take a week for Evan’s dreams to turn into a nightmare, and for the community to count its first deaths. The rare news from outside mentions scenes of chaos in major cities. Would civilization collapse? It is then that a disturbing white man invites himself into the reserve.

Inhospitable lands

A harsh winter, Raymond Queneau would have put it mildly. “Onaabenii giiziz”, prefers to write Waubgeshig Rice. An Anishinaabe expression to evoke the peak of winter. It literally means “moon of harsh snow”, the title chosen for this translation intended for the French public, or “snow of broken moons”, that of the version published in June in Quebec (by Éditions Mémoire d’encrier). A cruel and violent season, vividly told by a man who has experienced its harshness. Originally from territories a little further south than those of the novel, Rice was inspired by the power failure that had paralyzed part of the United States and Ontario in August 2003, but also by the stories of the elders of his tribe.

This is what gives all its interest to this very gripping text, despite one or two drops in pace. Many apocalyptic novels have been written. This one focuses on indigenous people who are supposed to resist everything. In these inhospitable lands, “Survival had always been an essential part of their culture”, notes the author. The apocalypse ? “We lived it and relived it, without disappearing”, launches the dean of the community, two thirds of the way through the book. His world has already ended “the day the Pale Faces drove us from our bay”, then the one “where they chased us here, grabbed our children”.

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