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Un homme et son péché is a novel by Claude-Henri Grignon, published in 1933, and one of Quebec's best-known literary works.
The story takes place during the colonization of the North (the Laurentian region of Quebec) in the late 19th century (c. 1885-90), near Sainte-Adèle. A miserly, unscrupulous man, Séraphin Poudrier dominates the small community, exploiting the poor and making the inhabitants of the Sainte-Adèle parish tremble. His wife, the gentle, pious and courageous Donalda, is the only living thing he seems to truly love. When Donalda falls ill, Séraphin refuses to seek a doctor's care, fearing it will cost him too much. Upon his wife's death, Séraphin places her in a coffin too small for her and buries her in the Poudrier lot at the cemetery.
Such extreme avarice does not go unpunished. Ultimately, and dramatically, Séraphin is the author of his own demise.
Born in Sainte-Adèle, Québec, Claude-Henri Grignon (1894-1976) began studies at the Collège de St. Laurent, but left while still young, and was mainly self-taught. From 1916-1939, he worked as a journalist for various Montreal papers, but he disliked city life and returned to Ste-Adèle, where he resided until his death in 1976. For seven years, beginning in 1937, he wrote his Pamphlets de Valdombre (using the pseudonym Valdombre), in which he used sarcasm and humour to castigate his generation for its political and literary mediocrity. From 1937-1939, he was also chief editor of the liberal political weekly, En Avant.
Grignon was a member of the Ecole Littéraire de Montreal and the Royal Society of Canada. He won the Prix David in 1936 for Un homme et son péché (The Woman and the Miser), and received the decoration of the Order of Canada in 1972 for his contribution to Canadian literature.
Grignon’s involvement with his Laurentian community was not restricted to his writing. He was, at various times, mayor of Ste-Adèle, Superintendent of Schools, and Prefect for the County of Terrebonne.