Québec's Beauty in Stillness (Part 1): A Taste of History in Vieux-Québec
Wow...how long has it been since I last posted something on this blog? I believe my last post was back in 2017, and now it's 2021! That's four years - and, for many of us, almost an entire lifetime, given how much has changed since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
As for me, I've had a number of real-life, offline commitments that have wound up pushing this blog to the back of my mind. However, now that all of that has settled down and I'm coming to something of an actual regular routine, I think it's about time I returned to some more of my favourite "little big things".
The last time I was here, I had finished the first of what I anticipated would be several series on the theme of "Beauty in Stillness": a travelogue focused around all the places where I found some quiet introvert-friendly respite in the middle of the major touristy cities I've visited. That time, my focus was on Seoul; however, this time, I want to bring you all back to my own home country of Canada and give you all a glimpse of one of my personal favourite places to visit.
Welcome - or, should I say, Bienvenue - to Québec!
Now, I'm not a Québécois (I'm an Ontarian, which is about as close as you'll ever get to a complete polar opposite), but I have been fascinated with the province of Québec for years now. It's the locus of many of the history classes I had growing up, and still persists as one of the few places in Canada where you will actually find anything older than the Victorian era (as evidenced by these plaques on houses in Québec City that were built in 1754 and 1762, respectively).
Mind you, this does mean that two of Québec's most prominent cities - Montréal and Québec City - are among the most heavily-trafficked destinations in all of Canada when it comes to tourism. So, that begs the question: how on earth could I find "beauty in stillness" here?
Long story short: in its history. Suivez-moi, and I will show you.
(Disclaimer: This specific "Beauty in Stillness" series combines places and experiences from two separate trips to Montréal and Québec City that I took in October 2014 and August 2015. In other words: everything in this post predates the COVID-19 pandemic, and in no way do I condone traveling in violation of public health guidelines! Also, note that I have previously written about the 2014 trip in particular in an older blog I ran prior to this one, so any overlap is purely because of that and not because of any plagiarism.)
Vieux-Québec
Out of all the places I visited in Montréal and Québec City during these two trips in 2014 and 2015, I do think that Vieux-Québec is the one where seasonality will matter the most: there is a huge difference in crowds when you go in the off-season and the hot season. Case in point: while the two pictures I just posted were taken on the October 2014 trip, here are some from the August 2015 one.
Quite a different world, eh?
However, even in the height of the summer tourist season, there were still places where I managed to find quiet stillness. All I had to do was know where to look. For instance, the thing about Vieux-Québec is that it's filled will narrow streets and alleyways; stairways leading up and down the steep hill that had made this site so attractive for the French colonizers 400 years ago; and gates and pathways that seem to lead into another world.
Even in the more crowded parts, the historic architecture provides plenty of opportunities to stop, look, and reflect. When looking at the stone-walled houses, the sturdy painted doors, or the foundations of buildings and fortifications that have been lost to time, I couldn't help but wonder what life must have been like for the 17th-, 18th- and 19th-century inhabitants who had called this city home.
One final general tidbit I want to mention about Vieux-Québec in general is that, as a centuries-old fortified city, traces of its military past still remain for visitors to spot. The grey stone walls and fortifications do mean that Québec is a bit drab as far as historic cities go, but at the same time, it's one of the few places in North America where we can literally see why location mattered. Built on the cliffside at a point where the St. Lawrence River abruptly narrows from a vast estuary into a massive - but far more guardable - waterway, this city once stood over the only route Europeans could take into the vast Canadian landscape beyond.
No wonder wars were fought over this place.
(This cannonball in particular has a very interesting story behind it, which
Now, allow me to focus in particular on two relatively quiet locations I came across during these two trips to Québec. I visited them separately, almost a year apart, but I think they offer an interesting glimpse into the different ways we can access the history around us.
National Assembly of Québec
So, here's the first of these two locations I visited, on the trip from October 2014.
I didn't get a chance to go inside, nor would I necessarily have wanted to; this is the site of Québec's provincial government and that's not something I am all that invested in or knowledgeable about. However, what did happen was that, as my parents and I went from the place we'd parked the car towards the entrance to Vieux-Québec, the way that this building and its surroundings loomed out of the fog made it the perfect spot for some atmospheric photography.
And, even more importantly, because it was a weekday morning during the tourism off-season, we had the whole place to ourselves.
However, more than the architecture or the atmosphere, what really caught my eye was all the statuary. All along the building's façade, there were sculptures of a veritable who's-who of Québec's early colonial history.
I tried to find some sort of rhyme or reason to how they were placed, but ultimately failed: French, British, Canadian...everyone's all butted up against each other, never mind whether they actually met in real life or would have agreed with each other.
Well, except for two particular clusters.
So, in this grouping, from top to bottom, you have Samuel de Champlain, the historical founder of Québec; François de Laval, the first Roman Catholic Bishop of Québec; and the Comte de Frontenac, one of the most well-known and influential Governors from Québec's time as a French colony. Did they work together? No. But they do persist in popular imagination as some of the more influential players in our French colonial history.
So, who on earth did end up in the same space, with fates inextricably intertwined with each other? These two:
Allow me to present to you, mes amis, General James Wolfe and the Marquis de Montcalm: the respective commanders for the British and French forces during the Battle of the Plains of Abraham in 1759. If there's one date from Québec's history to remember, it would be this one, as this is the point when the British ousted the French in their fight for control over what could be called Canada. Not definitively - that would come with the peace treaty in 1763 - but it was the turning of the tide that led to Canada becoming a British colony, with all the colourful history that's happened since.
(I can also point out, in a brief side note, that 1759 is the year when Britain really started to prove itself as an imperial superpower - and considering what the British Empire became in the years following, that is no small feat.)
All of this, however, makes me wonder. See, I didn't think much of it back then in 2014, but now, in hindsight, I can't help but be struck by just how much of this is "great man history": i.e., telling history through the lens of major paradigm-shifting events and the influential leaders, heroes, and villains who made them happen. Now, "great man history" does have its place - but all the same, so much more of the bigger picture gets left behind by the wayside:
I can, for instance, talk about how the British victory came at a point when France was in the middle of a decades-long economic slump: one that made the French government prefer to keep its Caribbean colonies with their profitable sugar plantations over a far vaster territory, geographically-speaking. I can also talk about how the removal of the French from any major sphere of influence in this part of North America made previously-unnoticed tensions between the British government and their American colonists in the Thirteen Colonies finally float up to the surface, culminating in the American Revolution. I can even talk about how, for a colony that was so famously derided in Voltaire's Candide as "Quelques arpents de neige" ("a few acres of snow"), Canada turned out to be such an obvious high-income economy that no-one's laughing anymore. Above all else, I can talk about about how this dual French-English history planted the first seeds for what Canadian culture and society are today.
Maybe, if my elementary school history teachers had taught the Battle of the Plains of Abraham to me like this, I might actually have cared. Instead, the only memories I have are of my child's eyes glazing over and my child's mind going blank, wondering why on earth a single battle, during which both commanders were killed in action, was such a big deal. And now, the best I can do is to try to make up for it by educating myself - and passing on what I now know to all of you.
Château Saint-Louis (or, what's left of it)
I know what you're thinking: a Château? This?
Well, all that's left are the parts that would have been built underground and out of the public eye: the foundation, kitchens, storage rooms...the parts that servants might have seen, but no-one else. As for what happened to the rest, I'll just let you take a look:
See, the Château Saint-Louis was built where Québec's famous Château Frontenac hotel and Dufferin Terrace stand now. Once the seat for both the French and British governors, it was built and rebuilt, expanded and destroyed, several times over centuries until it finally burned down for the last time in 1834. What was left was then built over and left more-or-less undisturbed; now, it survives as a National Historic Site after it was re-excavated, along with elements of the fortress and outbuildings, about fifteen years ago.
I first noticed that something underground had been opened to the public on the trip in 2014, given that several skylights (above left) had been opened up in the Dufferin Terrace to allow passersby to peer down below. However, it wasn't until the August 2015 trip that I actually got a chance to go underground and see the place for myself (above right), and it was definitely one of the most interesting parts of the trip for me.
(A computer mockup of what the Château Saint-Louis looked like in its heyday: modest when compared to French châteaux of the same period, but that is to be expected in a colony.)
Considering that this is a conserved historical site - and one built underground at that - it should come as no surprise that, even with the skylights and artificial lighting, conditions for photography were less than ideal. Thus, unfortunately, a number of the photos I took wound up too dark, too blurry, or both.
However, what I could not photograph, I could at least experience, so allow me to set the scene for you like this: an elongated series of passageways and corridors connecting the different rooms (e.g. kitchens, ice room, storage rooms, etc.), all strung together in a line, reflecting the Château's original rectangular shape.
Also, possibly due to its arch-like structure, the cooking hearth, with its attached oven, was a particularly resilient survivor.
The most intriguing part for me, however, were the display cases showing everyday artefacts from the 17th through early 19th centuries: many of which were found disposed of in rubbish and latrine pits as they either broke or fell out of fashion.
So, how does this historical seat of Québec's government compare to the current one?
To be fair, both of these sites can arguably be a reflection of "great man history": in no way would the ruins or the artefacts of the Château Saint-Louis be a reflection of the lives of ordinary citizens. However, I think the difference lies in the perspective. Monuments remind us of faces, names and dates, but, just by virtue of having a public sculpture made of them, the people depicted like this will always be somewhat removed from reality. They stare down at us from their plinths and pedestals, their lives reduced to a highlight reel of key moments and soundbites that are then blown up into the stuff of legend.
And while I have no problem with that in matters of principle - there are many significant historical figures whose stories I find incredibly fascinating - I think it's sites like the Château Saint-Louis that do the best job reminding us that these heroes and villains from history were people. People with thoughts, feelings, and tempers; people who must have dealt with their fair share of small pleasures and petty annoyances.
Also, the fact that it's the hidden servants' parts of the Château that survived is also a reminder that these "great men" were never alone. Generals had their soldiers, governors had their citizens, and aristocrats had their staff. This teeming majority may not have been recorded in history, their names and faces now lost even to their own descendants, but without them, the great events of history would never have been possible.
What's Next?
Québec City's not the only place I visited whilst on these two trips: I also visited Montréal, and that's where I will be taking you next. There, we can see signs of the fur trade that served as Canada's first major industry; as well as a historical site that, while nowhere near as grand as the Château Saint-Louis was, is at least still standing.
Until then, à bientôt!
The above blog post is part of the ongoing series Beauty in Stillness, which looks at quiet locations in some of the world's busiest places. It is also a part of the ongoing series, Memorializing History, which focuses on the different ways history is remembered and discussed in the present day. To access a master list for this and other series, click here.
Image Credits
All photographs (c) Kitty Na
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