Ethel and the Terrorist (Prix France-Québec 1965) is the prophetic story of Paul, a young French Canadian terrorist, and Ethel, whom he loves. These two young people, from parochial backgrounds and impoverished districts of Montreal, are swept into the nationalist-terrorist revolt as activists advocating for Quebec independence.
As nationalism evolves from positive to pathological, bombs begin to fall and so do victims. Paul is a murderer, wanted by the law and feared by an increasingly opportunist 'Movement' because of his relationship with Ethel, who is Jewish.
They flee together to New York, with Paul increasingly questioning the motives and means of the 'Movement.' Ethel, who has been a victim of extreme nationalism elsewhere, is his conscience. She insists that there be no more killing.
While in hiding in New York, Paul and Ethel are pressured to leave the vengeful Movement; they must also avoid a deadly police trap. All the while, they continue to grow closer. The conventions of their mutually exclusive cultures fade before a common humanity and their need for one another. Still, will they choose to flee to Florida, or, together, face their Canadian destiny?

Claude Jasmin's profile page

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Claude Jasmin (1930-2021) who was born in Montreal in 1930 has been described as “a one-man orchestra.” Jasmin is a ceramicist by training – a graduate of the Ecole des Meubles (Ecole des Arts Appliqués); he has been an art teacher, critic for La Presse, and television set-designer for the C.B.C. He is now director of the literary and art pages of the Journal de Montréal. His television plays are well known and in 1963 his play Le veau d’or (The Golden Calf) won eight prizes at the Dominion Drama Festival. Ethel and the Terrorist, the only one of his five novels to be translated into English, has been well accepted by English readers. It was read in ten instalments on the C.B.C. network program, “Trans-Canada Matinee” shortly after its publication in 1965, and has since been widely adopted in college courses on Canadian literature. Of his dozen-odd plays, only two have been published, but he has to his credit also a collection of short stories, Les cœurs empaillés (Hearts of Straw), 1970, and a book in response to criticisms of his work, Jasmin uᴉɯsɐſ (1970). As Jean Ethier-Blais has said, “Jasmin comes as close as it is possible in French Canada to being a professional writer.” Gilles Marcotte put it this way: “He is a witness of a deeply felt need that the novel of French Canada be a living art form.”