Micah True

The Jesuit “Relations”: A Biography, Edmonton, Alberta

The Jesuit Relations are regarded as a fundamental source of early Canadian history. Micah True’s book, The Jesuit “Relations”: A Biography, is a transformational study that profoundly redefines this body of writing, who produced it, and its meaning.

Whereas previous works treated the Relations primarily as a compendium of events, religious thought, or encounters between missionaries and Indigenous Peoples, True’s book goes beyond these established practices. It reconstructs the lives and intellectual worlds of the lesser-known authors of the Relations, traces the correspondence between the missionaries and their superiors, and reveals how editors shaped the texts and how readers received them over time.

Drawing on various historical texts, True invites readers to reflect on what writing itself meant in early modern New France. Indigenous Peoples, nuns, and secular workers, long marginalized in the historiography of this period, are brought to the forefront. His work sets a new standard for how scholars of all disciplines should approach the documentary archives of New France as well as how we document and interrogate the past.