Régine Robin (born as Rivka Ajzersztejn; 10 December 1939 – 3 February 2021)
was a historian, novelist, translator and professor of sociology.
Her prolific fiction and non-fiction, primarily on the themes of identity and culture and on the sociological practice of literature, earned a number of awards, including the
Governor-General's Award in 1986. She was described by
Robert Saletti as "Montreal's grande dame of postmodernism".
Career
Régine Robin's published works include ''La Société française en 1789 : Semur-en-Auxois'' (1970); ''Le Cheval blanc de Lénine'' (1979); ''La Québécoite'' (1983), translated in 1989 as ''The Wanderer'' (
Martin and Beatrice Fischer Prize for Fiction); ''Le Réalisme socialiste: Une esthétique impossible'' (1987,
Governor-General's Award),
translated by Stanford University Press in 1992 as ''Socialist Realism: An Impossible Aesthetic''; ''Kafka'' (1989); ''L'immense fatigue des pierres'' (2001,
Grand Prix du Livre de la Ville de Montréal), a collection of stories; ''Berlin chantiers'' (2001, Grand Prix du livre de la Ville de Montréal); ''La mémoire saturée'' (2003); and ''Cybermigrances: Traversées fugitives'' (2004).
Régine Robin was born to Jewish-Polish parents in Paris. She held degrees from the Sorbonne in geography (1962) and history (1963) and doctorates from the Université de Dijon (1969) and the École des hautes études en sciences sociales de Paris (1989). She began her career as a history teacher in a Dijon lycée (1963–1967) and then lecturer at Université Paris X, but immigrated to Montreal in 1977.
She took up her post as a sociology professor at the
Université du Québec à Montreal in 1982,
and co-founded Montreal's Inter-University Centre for Discourse Analysis and Sociocriticism of Texts in 1990.
[
Régine Robin died in Montreal on 3 February 2021, aged 81.Régine Robin n’est plus]
Honours
* In 1988 she was admitted to the
Royal Society of Canada
The Royal Society of Canada (RSC; , SRC), also known as the Academies of Arts, Humanities, and Sciences of Canada (French: ''Académies des arts, des lettres et des sciences du Canada''), is the senior national, bilingual council of distinguishe ...
.
* In 1994 she was made a Chevalier of the
Ordre des Palmes Académiques
A suite, in Western classical music, is an ordered set of instrumental or orchestral/concert band pieces. It originated in the late 14th century as a pairing of dance tunes; and grew in scope so that by the early 17th century it comprised up to ...
(France).
* In 1994 she received the
Prix Jacques-Rousseau (
Acfas) for interdisciplinary contributions.
References
Further reading
* Akane Kawakami, ''Walking Underground: Two Francophone Flâneurs in Twenty-First-Century Tokyo'', in ''L'Esprit créateur'', Vol. 56, Number 3, Fall 2016,
Johns Hopkins University Press
Johns Hopkins University Press (also referred to as JHU Press or JHUP) is the publishing division of Johns Hopkins University. It was founded in 1878 and is the oldest continuously running university press in the United States. The press publi ...
, pp. 120–133.
* Review by Danielle Dumontet: ''Régine Robin, Nous autres, les autres: difficile pluralisme,'' at Les éditions du Boréal, Montréal 2011, in ''Zeitschrift für Kanada-Studien'', 2014, pp 200 – 20
online(in French)
* Andrea Schorsch: ''Grenzgänge, Grenzüberschreitungen, Auflösung von Grenzen. Kulturelle Identität im innerkanadischen Vergleich:
Mordecai Richler
Mordecai Richler (January 27, 1931 – July 3, 2001) was a Canadian writer. His best known works are ''The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (novel), The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz'' (1959) and ''Barney's Version (novel), Barney's Versi ...
und Régine Robin.'' Kovac, Hamburg 2005 (=Thesis
Universität Bonn
The University of Bonn, officially the Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (), is a public research university in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the () on 18 October 1818 by Frederick Will ...
, 2004) In German
* Caroline Désy, Véronique Fauvelle, Viviana Fridman, Pascale Maltais: ''Une oeuvre indisciplinaire. Mémoire, texte et identité chez Régine Robin.'' Presses
Université Laval
(; English: ''Laval University)'' is a public research university in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. The university traces its roots to the Séminaire de Québec, founded by François de Montmorency-Laval in 1663, making it the oldest institutio ...
, 2007
{{DEFAULTSORT:Robin, Regine
1939 births
2021 deaths
Jewish Canadian writers
University of Paris alumni
French emigrants to Canada
French people of Polish-Jewish descent
Canadian people of Polish-Jewish descent
Canadian women novelists
Governor General's Award–winning non-fiction writers
Academic staff of the Université du Québec à Montréal
Chevaliers of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques
Canadian novelists in French
Fellows of the Royal Society of Canada
Canadian women non-fiction writers
Novelists from Montreal