Fiction, Drama and Music

Just as the literature on Louis Riel overshadows all aspects of the Northwest Campaign, so does fiction and drama about Riel overwhelm, in sheer amount at least, all the rest. The exception is Rudy Wiebe's award-winning The temptations of Big Bear, considered by many to be among the truly outstanding works of Canadian literature.

Coulter, John. - Riel : a play in two parts. - Hamilton, Ont. : Cromlech Press, 1972. - 142 p. - First published in Toronto : Ryerson Press, 1962.

Hou, Charles. - The retrial of Louis Riel. - Vancouver : Schools Legal Education Project, 1977. - 1 vol., various pagings.

• Designed for secondary school level.

Lavoie, Claude. - Louis Riel : texte dramatique précédé d'une présentation. Vanier, Ont. : Centre franco-ontarien de ressources pédagogiques, 1995. - 67 p.

• Designed for secondary school level.

• Full of flashbacks to the different periods in Riel's life, including the 1869-70 resistance at Red River.

Needler, G.H. - The Battleford column : the versified memories of a Queen's Own corporal in the Northwest Rebellion 1885. - Montreal : Provincial Pub., [1948]. - 92 p.

Somers, Harry, et al. - Louis Riel : music drama in three acts = Louis Riel : drame en musique en trois actes. - Canadian Opera Company Chorus, National Arts Centre Orchestra, Victor Feldbrill, Conductor. - 3 LP records, CMC 2485. Canadian Music Centre, 1975

• This opera was originally commissioned by the Floyd Chalmers Foundation and performed in Toronto in 1967. The original score is available, in reproduction, from the Canadian Music Centre. The records cited above are from the New York revival in 1975. Accompanying them are impressive bilingual notes. A Teachers' guide to Louis Riel, by Patricia Martin Shand was published by the Canadian Music Centre in 1985.

Walsh, Frederick G. - The trial of Louis Riel. - Fargo, N.D. : North Dakota Institute for Regional Studies, 1965. - 136 p.

* Wiebe, Rudy. - The temptations of Big Bear. - Toronto : McClelland and Stewart, 1973. - 415 p. - Also published in French under the title: Les tentations de Gros-Ours

Woodcock, George. - Gabriel Dumont and the Northwest Rebellion. - Toronto : Playwrights Co-op, 1976. - 32 p.

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