Marcel Trudel
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Marcel Trudel (born May 29, 1917) is a Canadian historian and author.
Born in Saint-Narcisse-de-Champlain, north east of Trois-Rivières, Quebec, the son of Hermyle Trudel and Antoinette Cossette, he received a B.A. in 1941 and a M.A. in 1945 from Université Laval. He taught for two years at Harvard University, returning to Laval University to become professor of history at the newly founded Institute of History. Under pressure from the Roman Catholic Church, Laval demoted him in 1962 from his position as head of the History department. Beginning in 1963 he taught at Carleton University and, in 1965 began teaching at the University of Ottawa after the Ontario government took over the university from the Oblate Fathers. He retired in 1982.
Trudel's life's work has been the history of New France, in particular his monumental and authoritative Histoire de la Nouvelle-France published in ten volumes from 1963 to 1999. Trudel has meticulously reviewed the primary sources and criticized previous accounts in an effort to tell the colony's story without what he views as nationalist bias.
[edit] Selected works
- Le comptoir, 1604-1627, winner of the 1966 Governor General's Awards
- Mémoire d'un autre siècle, winner of the 1987 Governor General's Awards
- Memoirs of a Less Traveled Road: A Historian's Life, translated by Jane Brierley, winner of the 2003 Governor General's Awards
- Le Terrier du Saint-Laurent en 1674
- La Revolution Americaine 1775-1783: Pourquoi la France Refuse le Canada
[edit] Honours
- In 1964 he was awarded the J.B. Tyrrell Historical Medal by the Royal Society of Canada.
- In 1971 he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.
- In 2001 he was awarded the Prix Léon-Gérin.
- In 2004 he was made a Grand Officer of the National Order of Quebec.
