'down the Plains' is a continuation of examining what does it mean to be Franco-American and growing up in Maine. 'down the Plains' takes the reader on the literary journey in a geography and landscape of the liminal generation that carries the language and culture toward a modern expression. Praise for the first installment of the memoirs from Annie Proulx speaks to the richness of the stories.
"Rhea Cote Robbins' Wednesday's Child is beautiful stuff, a defiant and poignant memoir that transcends the personal. It is an important book not only for its immediate content, for the experience of life within its covers, but because it gives us a glimpse of the almost unmined Golconda of literary source material in Franco-American lives."--E. Annie Proulx
'down the Plains' extends the mining for gold and shares the wealth with its readers.
Other praise: Wednesday's Child is a dark, dream-like meditation on fragility and survival, of the body from cancer and of the Franco-American community from its inheritance of paroissial piety, social marginality, and relentless poverty. If your roots are in that community, there is much to recognize and confirm; if not, there is much to learn and remember. --Clark Blaise
Against the more familiar observations of the small-town lifer and the urban refugee, Rhea Cote Robbins' syncopations stood out, at once unique and connected to a vibrant and hardscrabble culture. This is a sensuous recollection made urgent by a pending medical diagnosis, and the result is an energetic, poignant, and revelatory memoir. ...Wednesday's Child is astir in every sentence.--Sven Birkerts
About the Author: Rhea Côté Robbins was brought up bilingually in a Franco-American neighborhood in Waterville, Maine known as 'down the Plains.' Her maman came from Wallagrass, a town in the northern part of the state and her father was from Waterville. Tracing the family tree back, on both sides of her parents, she found that in Québec their people settled in close proximity to each other, and on a further search into their origins in France, she discovered that in the 1600s they lived within ten miles or less of each other. At least three of the branches of the original settlers came over on the same boat to New France. She has spent many years researching the origins and visiting the hometowns of these people in Canada and France. Her lifeline has an instant international perspective and connection. Côté Robbins was the winner of the Maine Chapbook Award for her work of creative nonfiction entitled, Wednesday's Child. The book, taught in university courses, is in its fourth printing. She also edited a book of translations of Franco-American women writers who were writing in the early part of this century, titled, Canuck and Other Stories. She is currently working on a third installment of the memoirs titled, If These Walls Could Talk. She has work included in two anthologies Voyages: A Maine Franco-American and Acadian Reader published by Tillbury House and French Connections: A Gathering of Franco-American Poets published by Louisiana Literature Press. She has written extensively for many other publications as well as editing a bilingual, socio-cultural journal and 'ezine. She lives on the Penobscot River in Maine.
