A peculiar war is raging in Quebec s largest city: one talks about linguistic battles being
fought daily in the streets of Montreal where Anglophones are concentrated in the otherwise
predominantly French-speaking province. The language dichotomy lies at the heart of Montreal s
cultural history and reflects a relationship fraught with tensions between Canada s so-called
Founding Nations. Following a history of francophone conquest defeat and reconquest the two
linguistic communities have at last reached a more harmonious modus vivendi at the turn of the
twenty-first century. Writers have always engaged in and contributed to the debate. But how
does contemporary literature broach English-French relations years after such pivotal events in
Québécois history as the Quiet Revolution the FLQ crisis the implementation of Bill 101 and
the two referenda on independence? Neil Bissoondath and Monique Proulx two authors presently
living and writing in Quebec have scrutinised interactions between Anglophones and
Francophones in present-day Montreal and translated cultural memory in their works of narrative
fiction. Reading Montreal literature as a contact zone where Self and Other meet and grapple
with each other Stefanie Rudig s study shows how the clashes with l Autre leave each side
modified usually for the better. In Bissoondath s novel Doing the Heart Good the protagonist
and first-person narrator Alistair Mackenzie takes a retrospective look at his life during
which the monolingual Anglophone has frequently been forced to deal with Francophones. Proulx
also places her characters in situations in which they encounter alterity and alienation in her
short story collection Les Aurores montréales. In addition to the anglophone or francophone
Other Proulx depicts migrants in her short narratives and how they participate in Montreal s
linguistic duality. Though neither of the two texts is overtly didactic both Proulx and
Bissoondath suggest ways to overcome all remnants of the historically conditioned
English-French antagonism and promote an effectively multilingual and pluriethnic Quebec
society that thrives on difference. This edition also includes a ten-page summary in French.
