Dominique Fortier

Canadian novelist and translator

Au péril de la mer (2015)
Les villes de papier (2018)

Notable awardsGovernor General's Award for French-language fiction (2016)

Dominique Fortier (born 1972) is a Canadian novelist and translator from Quebec, who won the Governor General's Award for French-language fiction at the 2016 Governor General's Awards for her novel Au péril de la mer.^[1]

A graduate of McGill University, she published her debut novel Du bon usage des étoiles in 2008. That book was a shortlisted Governor General's Award finalist at the 2009 Governor General's Awards,^[2] and its English translation by Sheila Fischman, On the Proper Use of Stars, was a finalist for the Governor General's Award for French to English translation at the 2010 Governor General's Awards. Her second novel Les Larmes de Saint-Laurent was published in 2010, and its English translation by Fischman, Wonder, was a finalist for the translation award at the 2014 Governor General's Awards.

In 2014, Fortier and Nicolas Dickner published Révolutions, a collaborative project for which they each wrote a short piece each day for a year based on a word chosen from the French Republican Calendar.^[3]

Fortier is also a three-time nominee for the Governor General's Award for English to French translation, garnering two nominations at the 2006 Governor General's Awards for her translations of Mark Abley's Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages and David Suzuki and Wayne Grady's Tree: A Life Story,^[4] and at the 2012 Governor General's Awards for her translation of Margaret Laurence's The Prophet's Camel Bell.^[5]

In 2020 she received the Prix Renaudot essay for Les villes de papier^[6].

Works

Du bon usage des étoiles, 2008 (On the Proper Use of Stars, McClelland & Stewart, 2009)
Les Larmes de saint Laurent, 2010 (Wonder, McClelland & Stewart, 2014)
La porte du ciel, 2011
Révolutions, co-published with Nicolas Dickner, 2014
Au péril de la mer, 2015 (The Island of Books, Coach House Books, 2015)
Les villes de papier : une vie d'Emily Dickinson, 2018 (Paper Houses, Coach House Books, 2019)
Pour mémoire : petits miracles et cailloux blancs, co-published with Rafaële Germain, 2019
Les ombres blanches, 2022 (Pale Shadows, Coach House Books, 2024)
Quand viendra l'aube, 2022

Awards and honors

2011: Prix Gens de mer du Festival Étonnants voyageurs (for Du bon usage des étoiles)
2016: Governor General's Award for French-language fiction (for Au péril de la mer)
2018: Prix de traduction de la fondation Cole (for Hôtel Lonely Hearts)
2019: Prix littéraire des lycéens AIEQ (for Les villes de papier)
2020: Prix Renaudot (Essay) (for Les villes de papier)
2023: Prix Malesherbes, le Libraire du roi (for Les ombres blanches)

References

^ "Dominique Fortier reçoit le prix du Gouverneur général". La Presse, October 25, 2016.
^ "Who's in the running for this year's big awards". Montreal Gazette, November 14, 2009.
^ "Un mot, un jour". Le Devoir, September 20, 2014.
^ "Local authors up for Governor General's Awards". Edmonton Journal, October 17, 2006.
^ "Prix littéraires du Gouverneur général: les finalistes ont été annoncés". Voir, October 3, 2012.
^ "Dominique Fortier becomes the first Quebecer to win the prestigious Renaudot Prize". Retrieved 2021-02-23.