La Chasse-galerie: A Tale of Dissolute Workers

Extract

[...] La Chasse-galerie is a collection of tales published in 1900, whose eponymous tale is built around a legend. This legend tells the story of lumberjacks who want to see their companions on the evening of the New Year's Eve, but the only possibility to return in time to work the next day is to use the chasse-galerie, their canoe takes off into the air and they just have to not pronounce the name of God nor hit the church bell tower. [...]

[...] They aim to see their blondes on the evening of the New Year's Eve and return in time to work the next day. "We sail always like all the devils, passing over the villages, the forests, the rivers and leaving behind us like a trail of sparks": this sentence shows well the expedition that is theirs and the speed with which they go which is well rendered through the accumulation procedure: "the villages, the forêts, the rivières". The crosses of these men « The small streams make the big rivers, the small glasses finish emptying the big jugs." The author uses an analogy through a syntactic parallelism (figure of style) to describe the crosses of these workers who consume a lot of alcohol perhaps to better support their difficult life. [...]

[...] We find men of the people with their characteristic language. To this realism is mixed the fantastic aspect of an expedition on board a vessel that is out of the ordinary. The men in question are presented as impenitent drinkers whose morals are far from pious. Their true desire is to have a good time with their blondes by partying and dancing and they can't help but drink even though they know it's dangerous. They are especially frightened by religion and the superstitions that surround it. [...]