This document provides an overview and introduction to the novel "The Diviners" by Margaret Laurence. It discusses the setting of the novel, which includes small towns modeled after places formerly inhabited by First Nations tribes. It also summarizes some of the main characters, including Morag Gunn, the protagonist, her daughter Pique, and her former lover Jules. The introduction establishes that analysis of these elements in the novel can provide insights into the portrayal and life of First Nations peoples in Canada in the mid-20th century.

1. Iuliia Shirinkina
American University in Bulgaria
“The Diviners” by Margaret Laurence – overview
Abstract
The twentieth century is marked by an increased interest to the culture of First Nations. Scholars
and researchers derive information about indigenous peoples from journals and works of
literature written in different periods of time in the past as well as the contemporary pieces. The
longer forms of writing such as novels also incorporate the information about First Nations and
convey it through descriptions of characters and events. One of the most significant works that
reveals the life of these peoples both in earlier centuries and mid-1950’s is The Diviners written
by Margaret Laurence in 1974. This novel is considered a valuable source of information about
tribes that lived in Ontario region. The mentions of the peoples are in its characters who decent
from those peoples; the setting where the story takes place had been inhabited by the tribes and
kept their traits; the information about historical events is presented through the characters’
communication.

2. Introduction
First Nations are populations of people who inhabited the territory of modern Canada. Historians
specializing in early Canadian culture agreed to divide the Nations into six regions
corresponding to the areas where the populations were located.1
The culture of these peoples emerged centuries ago and during the time of its being it flourished
into a culture with a strong system of spiritual beliefs, rituals and celebrations, arts and crafts,
cuisine, and many more. Despite the tribes living in regions of Canada that varied in climate and
terrain, the culture of those peoples shared common features in performing arts and a system of
spiritual beliefs.2
The smalls groups of indigenous peoples are still found in Canada; they live in reservations still
follow their cultural traditions within their communities.3 Since the beginning of the 20th century,
the interest to their culture and traditions has risen, and they gladly share their culture with the
reservations visitors.4
Moreover, the life and culture are widely featured in works of Canadian writers. They would
often choose First Nations’ villages as settings for their stories, enrich the writings with rich
descriptions of the rituals and celebrations as well as the daily routine of the indigenous peoples,
and base their protagonists on their personalities. The historical events that had taken place at
those moments were also incorporated in some stories.5
This thesis will explore the portrayal of the First Nations in the literature of the 20th century
based on the novel “The Diviners” by Margaret Laurence published in 1974. The novel is a good
fit for this type of analysis and it will give a strong support to this research for several reasons.
First and foremost, the protagonist of the novel, Morag Gunn, was born and raised in Manawaka,
a small town inhabited by the indigenous peoples.6 Throughout the novel, she reveals a story of
her childhood spent in that area and being exposed to the local traditions and customs. Moreover,
the vivid personalities of the supporting characters, rich descriptions of natural environments and
1 Government of Canada; Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, "First Nations in Canada," Government of
Canada; Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada, May 02, 2017, accessed February 28, 2018, https://www.aadnc-
aandc.gc.ca/eng/1307460755710/1307460872523.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.
4 W.H. New, "Literature in English," The Canadian Encyclopedia, accessed February 28, 2018,
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/literature-in-english/.
5 Ibid.
6 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).

3. house interiors, and events the people are engaged in helping to portray the life of the Canadian
tribes.
This research of “The Diviners” needs to be conducted when looking for information and later
analyzing the portrayal of First Nations in the contemporary literature. It is widely known that
the way the indigenous people were described in literature depended on a time a particular work
was written in.7 This phenomenon occurs due to people having different attitudes to the tribes in
different periods of time. The novel is written in the middle of the 20th century, and its events are
taking place at the same time, thus this piece of writing is a great source of information about
tribes’ live and culture nowadays. The analysis of this novel will give the amount of information
sufficient for both learnings about the culture of First Nations and the change that occurred in
their presentation in literature.
The research is aimed to answer the following questions:
 What is the life of First Nations tribes look like in the middle of the 20th century?
 How did their culture change or not change throughout the past centuries?
This question will be considered answered when the distinctive features of the daily life and
special occasions will be identified and compared with the tribes’ life conditions several
centuries ago.
 Are the peoples portrayed in a positive or a negative light?
 What is the author’s personal attitude to its characters?
 What is the motivation behind the characters’ actions in the novel? How does the cultural
environment affect it?
This thesis is divided into chapters, each of them aiming to explore each aspect of the novel and
reveal the representation of The First Nations in this piece.
Chapter 1, About the book, will give a general information about The Diviners, such as the story
of its publication, an idea behind the novel, and its connection to other works of Manawaka
series written by Laurence. The plot of the novel loosely resembles the author’s personal life and
7 W.H. New, "Literature in English," The Canadian Encyclopedia, accessed February 28, 2018,
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/literature-in-english/.

4. her connection with the indigenous culture.8 This is why the detailed explanation of this
connection will be used as a firsthand experience with the tribes.
Then the work will follow with the detailed descriptions and analyses of the protagonists and
supporting characters of the story (Characters). The character research will be based on their
mentions in the novel and articles in the peer-reviewed literature journals. The analysis will
include the following characters:
Morag Gunn – the protagonist of the story. She is a successful writer in her mid-forties living in
a rural area in Eastern Ontario.9 The story is told in series of flashbacks scattered in the book.
The storyline might appear to be random at the first sight; however, Morag’s memories
combined with the events taking place with her at the moment allow the readers to learn about
her life since early childhood. As mentioned before, this character has been exposed to the
culture of First Nations since birth. This is why the descriptions of tribes’ culture, daily routine,
and attitudes toward them will be drawn from the descriptions of events she was a part of.
Jules (Skinner) Tonnerre – the first love of Morag who later became a father of her daughter.10
He is Metis; this detail indicates that he was a part of the indigenous people community and was
widely exposed to Canadian culture. Jules is a singer; he writes and performs his songs across
Canada. The songs resemble the country music style, which is popular in that part of the world.
Pique Gunn Tonnerre – a daughter of Morag and Jules; she was raised in the prairies but never
fully accepted that environment.11 The novel starts with a fact that she left Morag and probably
went to Manawaka. Her return to the culture she was raised in will give detailed insights into
what the life there was like.
Christie Logan – the town scavenger of Manitoba, a small town of Manawaka area, who
accepted Morag to his family after the death of her parents.12 The daily routine of this character
does not feature the culture of First Nations and he is not a member of any tribe. However,
despite that he is not engaged in the cultural activities of the indigenous peoples, the reader can
still extract information about their environment because Christie lives there.
8 James King, The life of Margaret Laurence (Toronto: CNIB, 2000).
9 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid.
12 Ibid.

5. The Setting and Events of the novel will be explored in Chapter 3. This part will feature the
environments where the peoples of First Nations lived and events that were either routine or
extraordinary. The chapter will also include the story map of the novel and the explanation of
their flow, or their placement in the book if not placed in chronological order. Moreover, the part
will explore and study in depth the folklore stories shared among characters because these have a
historical background, thus are significant for this research.
Language style part will be dedicated to the descriptions of nature and settings where characters
act, the appearances of people, and events happening in the novel. Besides an in-depth literary
analysis valuable for the overall understanding of The Diviners, this part of the thesis will
provide the biggest insight into the First Nations culture. The novel is rich in vivid descriptions
and written in a sophisticated language, which will support the exploration and understanding of
these people’s traditions and customs.13 Laurence’s attention to details when introducing new
characters and their surroundings sparks interest to the future plot development.
The concluding part of the thesis will outline the topics Laurence discussed in her novel. As the
topic of interest of this research is Canadian culture, the biggest emphasis will be made on how
characters and relevant descriptions of settings and events reflect on that topic. Using the
information gathered and processed in the previous parts of this work, the conclusions about the
reflection of First Nations in the novel will be made. The part will also briefly mention the topics
of writing and inspiration, relationships of mothers and daughters, and domesticity, which are no
less important for understanding the novel.
The research will be conducted by studying The Diviners and using the extracts from the novel
to support statements about the portrayal of First Nations in this book. Thus, each statement of
the thesis will be supported by a relevant quote from the text. All the sections mentioned in the
previous part of the Introduction will be developed simultaneously because this will allow the
process of the novel analysis and hypotheses justification more precise. Furthermore, the
additional sources such as books, journal articles, and web pages will be quoted when supporting
a judgment of a fact that could be interpreted differently. The use of the additional sources will
give a depth to the research, give stronger support to the judgments made, and provide an
elaboration necessary when talking about a culture of indigenous people.
13 Sara Maitland, Afterword, in The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).

6. About the book
The first publication of The Diviners dates back to 1974.14 The first edition of the book was
published by McClelland and Stewart, a Canadian publishing company. The Diviners is the last
book of Laurence’s The Manawaka Cycle consisting of four more novels, The Stone Angel, A
Jest of God, The Fire-Dwellers, and A Bird in the House.15 The novel is considered a classic of
Canadian literature. However, it was excluded from schools’ study programs for being
considered profane and containing explicit descriptions. Despite the disapproval of Christian
groups for the mentioned reasons, the book is now widely supported by the Freedom to Read
Foundation (FTRF), an American anti-censorship organization (1969) (https://ftrf.site-ym.com/).
The novel also holds a title of winner of Governor General's Award for English language fiction
for a book written in English; the award was received in 1974.
The book features Morag Gunn, an independent writer, who was raised in Manawaka, a small
town in Manitoba. The protagonist has complicated relationships with her daughter Pique, who is
in a process of finding her true self, and her lover Jules Tonnerre, Pique’s father. Morag is
striving to reach the balance between being independent and keeping with her loved ones.
The novel is presented in series of flashbacks, from which a reader learns about Morag’s
childhood and early years in Manawaka, a life with her husband in Toronto, switching locations
after her daughter was born, and later moving to a rural farm in Ontario. The story is also
enriched with folklore stories shared by the characters; these tales give a historical background to
events that took place in that area centuries before and involving the indigenous peoples.
The Diviners is a strong combination of a story with complicated characters and true to life
events and information about First Nations and their history and culture. This is the reason why
is a good choice not only for the storyline and characters’ analysis, but also for studying the
culture of First Nations, both in the past and the modern times. The information about lives of
these peoples is elaborated through characters’ setting and interactions.
14 Sara Maitland, Afterword, in The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
15

7. Setting
The novel features Morag living in different locations throughout the story. Several of them,
excluding the urban Toronto, closely resemble the lands that were previously taken by the tribes
of First Nations.
Morag was born in the mid-1920’s and lived in a “two-storey, a square box of a house” with her
parents, Colon and Louisa Gunn.16 The house the family lived in and a farm was built by
Morag’s grandfather, Alasdair Gunn, who moved to this place “when probably nothing was here
except buffalo grass and Indians.”17 She stayed with her parents until they had died when she
was about six years old.
Morag spent her early years in a small town of Manawaka. It is a fictional town in Manitoba, a
Canadian province, that Laurence used as a setting in her writings. The image of the town is
based on and resembles Neepawa, a hometown of the writer.18 Morag lives on Hill Street, that
led to “Wachakwa river […], glossy brown, shallow, narrow, more a creek than a river.”19 The
place still kept the dwellings of the indigenous peoples, “the shaks and shanties at the North end
of Manawaka.”20 The people who lived there at the described moment were “remittance men and
their dragged families,” “drunks,” and “people perpetually in relief.”21 Morag’s house was
similar to the other ones in town, “a square two-storey wooden box” with a “front porch floored
with splintered steady boards.”22 A reason why a town is poor is that the events are taking place
during The Depression, when “there aren’t any jobs or hardly any, or like that.”23
However, despite the striking poverty in some parts of the town, there were places where people
can buy more expensive goods; ones of those are Parson’s Bakery, from which Prin used to get
jelly donuts and Simlov’s Ladies’ Wear, where Morag worked her first job on Saturdays as a
shop assistant.
16 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
17 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
18 "Neepawa embraces Margaret Laurence; Neighbours come to terms with author's work," Guelph Mercury, June
30, 2007, June 30, 2007, accessed March 4, 2018.
19 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
20 Ibid.
21 Ibid.
22 Ibid.
23 Ibid.

8. The reader learns about the childhood place of Morag from her flashbacks. However, in the main
storyline, the protagonist lives on a rural farm in Ontario. Her house resembles a place where she
lived as a child. It is a large farmhouse located next to a river.
The places where Morag lived throughout the story are vivid and bright. This effect is achieved
with detailed descriptions of setting with insights to nature, the appearance of towns, and people.
To add an atmosphere of the place once inhabited by the whole Indian tribes but at that moment
just several families living there, Laurence gave the locations the names that resemble the
language of the tribes.
Characters
The Diviners is considered to be a literary masterpiece because of its non-cliché characters who
have strong personalities and act like real people would do.
Morag Gunn – the novel’s main protagonist. The description of her appearance is provided at
the beginning of the novel. It is important to notice that as the story is told in flashbacks, this is a
description of her appearance at the recent moment.
A tall woman, although not bizzarly though. Heavier than once, but not what you would
call fat. Tanned, slightly leathery face. Admittedly strong and rather sharp features.
Eyebrows which met in the middle and which she had ceased to pluck, thinking what the
hell. Dark brown eyes, somewhat concealed (good) by heavy-framed glasses. Long dead-
straight hair, once black as tar, now quite evenly grey.24
Morag is an independent writer and a mother. At the beginning of the novel, she is 47 years old,
living alone in the on a rural farm in Ontario and working on one of her novels.25 Her circle
consists of Royland, the diviner, as she calls him; and a family of A-Okay, Maude, and their son
Tom, who she met through mutual friends in Toronto. Now, her mind is taken over her daughter
suddenly leaving home and traveling around Canada and returning back with a new man several
days later. Despite that the events in the novel happen within several days, all the information
about Morag’s life is present.
The reader learns about her past from the flashbacks, which are introduced first as captions to
photos she is going through and later Memorybank Movies, which also include episodes from her
24 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
25 David Staines, Margaret Laurence: Critical reflections (University of Ottawa Press, 2001).

9. life. The first information emerges from the photos Morag is going through while waiting for the
call or any information from Pique.26
[Revisiting photos, from which captions we learn about her past, family, a place where she lived.
Her parents died of polio when she was 6 or 7 years old. Photo 1, sepia, tells about childhood
house and appearance of the parents. She is standing in front of a wide farm gate (lived on a
farm?). About the home: “It is a safe place. Nothing can happen there.”
Morag was not a talkative child when she was a child. The novel often mentions her being
curious about things but hardly ever asking what they were, or why they were called in a certain
way, or why some events would occur. When at the blacksmith’s, she was fascinated by the
sparks of fire that come out when iron is hit with a hammer. “How does it happen? She wants to
ask, but won’t. Christie would think she was dumb. She isn’t the dumb one. Christie is.”]
Jules (Skinner) Tonnerre – A Metis man, the first lover of Morag who eventually becomes a
father of her daughter, Pique. He is a singer who travels and performs in Canada. They went to
the same school in Manawaka, however, he dropped out from the last grade to go to the army.
Morag encountered him several times throughout the novel, and despite knowing him since
childhood and later having a child with him, their relationship did not become stable.
Jules is a valuable character in term of discovering the indigenous people’s culture. While
visiting Morag during his days off in the army, he shared folklore stories that well reflected the
actual historical events that took place in the area the characters lived.
Pique Gunn Tonnerre – the daughter of Morag and Jules. The novel starts with Morag trying to
accept Pique’s sudden departure from home.27 At this moment, Pique is 18. The girl is noted for
a path of self-discovery throughout the novel. She left a note saying that “I can look after myself.
I am going west” and also that she is going alone being confident in finding herself and a life she
wants to have. She returns home with her new man, Dan, after several days of being away.
Brooke Skelton – a professor who she met while in college and later husband of Morag. The
couple moved to Toronto where they spent about ten years before their divorce. Having a strong
personality, Brooke made a significant impact on Morag’s personality and emotional state.
However, he did not share any information about the life and culture of the First Nations, thus,
will not be significant for this research.
26 David Staines, Margaret Laurence: Critical reflections (University of Ottawa Press, 2001).
27 Ibid.

10. Christie Logan – Morag’s adoptive father. He first appears in the story when Morag is sent to
Logans family in Manawaka after her parents’ death. Despite the third person narrative, the
stream of consciousness provides Morag’s genuine thoughts when meeting Christie:
The skinny man looks funny, too. Sort of crooked in his arms or legs, or like that. He has
a funny lump in his throat and it wobbles up and down when he talks.28
The next description is brought when she develops a more mature perception of people. “Christie
[…] looks peculiar. His head sort of comes forwards when he walks, like he is in a hurry, but he
isn’t ever in a hurry.” Besides the appearance, there is a feature that speaks about his character:
His teeth are bad and one is missing at the front but he never tries to hide it by putting his
hand over or smiling with his mouth closed, oh no, not him.29
Christie is a scavenger, and this job had a strong influence on his life. He developed a philosophy
that things people throw away reflect who they are and collecting garbage is not a shameful job.
Christie told Morag plenty of stories when she was young. He made up some characters who
were supposed to be historic figures to entertain her; however, the events she told her about have
a resemblance to what was taking place with First Nations centuries before.
Bibliography
Government of Canada; Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada. "First Nations in Canada."
Government of Canada; Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada. May 02, 2017.
Accessed February 28, 2018. https://www.aadnc-
aandc.gc.ca/eng/1307460755710/1307460872523.
King, James. The life of Margaret Laurence. Toronto: CNIB, 2000.
Laurence, Margaret. The Diviners. McClelland & Stewart, 1974.
Maitland, Sara. Afterword. In The Diviners, 384-94. McClelland & Stewart, 1974.
"Neepawa embraces Margaret Laurence; Neighbours come to terms with author's work." Guelph
Mercury, June 30, 2007. June 30, 2007. Accessed March 4, 2018.
New, W.H. "Literature in English." The Canadian Encyclopedia. Accessed February 28, 2018.
http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/literature-in-english/.
Staines, David. Margaret Laurence : Critical reflections. University of Ottawa Press, 2001.
28 Margaret Laurence, The Diviners (McClelland & Stewart, 1974).
29 Ibid.