Strangers Devour the Land

Strangers Devour the Land, by Boyce Richardson (Knopf, 342 pp., $12.50). I wasn’t prepared to like this book. It looked on the surface like simply another account of how inevitable progress interferes with the parochial interests of yet another group of ecologically minded people. But in fact, Richardson has told an absolutely spellbinding tale of how a whole civilization has been capriciously assaulted by the government of Quebec. He captures thoroughly the sensibilities of the Indians of whom he writes, as they once were and as they now are, and he leaves you with the sense that being able to hunt a moose in the middle of winter in northern Quebec takes as much intelligence and trained skill as understanding Kepler’s laws. Richardson describes the advancement of the Cree Indians’ cause by a persuasive Irish lawyer named O’Reilly, who represents them brilliantly and who in fact has induced the Quebec government to make an incredible settlement of $150 million. His main point, however, is the idiocy of obliterating a unique and intelligent culture. The book has a haunting quality to it and raises questions that stick with you, try as you might to shake them off.

MG

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Michael Gazzaniga

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Strangers Devour the Land, by Boyce Richardson (Knopf, 342 pp., $12.50). I wasn’t prepared to like this book. It looked on the surface like simply another account of how inevitable progress interferes with the parochial interests of yet another group of ecologically minded people. But in fact, Richardson has told an absolutely spellbinding tale of how a whole civilization has been capriciously assaulted by the government of Quebec. He captures thoroughly the sensibilities of the Indians of whom he writes, as they once were and as they now are, and he leaves you with the sense that being able to hunt a moose in the middle of winter in northern Quebec takes as much intelligence and trained skill as understanding Kepler’s laws. Richardson describes the advancement of the Cree Indians’ cause by a persuasive Irish lawyer named O’Reilly, who represents them brilliantly and who in fact has induced the Quebec government to make an incredible settlement of $150 million. His main point, however, is the idiocy of obliterating a unique and intelligent culture. The book has a haunting quality to it and raises questions that stick with you, try as you might to shake them off.