Paul à Québec, le génie des lieux comme patrimoine identitaire
Résumé
For almost fifteen years, the cartoonist from Quebec, Michel Rabagliati, has made his own life the fertile soil for Paul's adventures, his alter-ego. In 2009, the author won the Jury prize of the Festival of Angoulême with his album Paul in Quebec, which was translated in English with the title: The Song of Roland. This graphic novel recounts the final moments in the life of Roland Beaulieu, Paul’s father-in-law. It is an opportunity for Rabagliati to pay tribute to a "pure-blooded" Quebecker, born near the walls of the "Old capital", a self-made man shown as a role model. In the analysis of this album, we shall wonder about the way Rabagliati speaks of the Quebec identity. We shall question the representations of a spatiality conveyed by the album, the linguistic and cultural uses as the construction of an identity from the staged places in Rabagliati’s work. To what extent do these various elements of analysis allow us to speak of a Quebecker, a Canadian, or more broadly, a North American identity?