The Seats of the Mighty

Gilbert Parker

Jan 2015 · Early Canadian Literature Book 4 · Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press

About this ebook

From the pen of Gilbert Parker comes one of the most popular Canadian novels of the late nineteenth century. First published simultaneously in Canada and the United States in 1896, The Seats of the Mighty is set in Quebec City in 1759, against the backdrop of the conflict between the English and the French over the future of New France. Written and published after Parker's move to England, the novel attempts to romanticize French Canada without alienating his English and American readership. The novel’s enduring popularity led to a stage version in 1897 and a silent film in 1914.

About the author

Gilbert Parker (1862–1932) was born in Camden East, Canada West (Ontario). After his move to England in 1890, he began the two careers for which he is best known today: the British director of American propaganda during the Great War and the author of thirty popular novels, most of them historical romances, including The Seats of the Mighty (1896).

Andrea Cabajsky is an assistant professor at the Université de Moncton, where she teaches and does research in comparative literature, especially English- and French-Canadian Studies. She has published widely on the literary history of nationalism in romantic and Victorian Canadian and British literatures and is currently developing the curriculum for an approved new master’s program in comparative Canadian literature at the Université de Moncton.