A great exploration of some of Montreal's literary terrain, which is certainly evocative. My parents are both former Montrealers, and while I don't think they regret leaving for an instant I can see how the city is very complex emotional territory for them and thousands of others who, like they and Leonard Cohen, left it.

But now how about a Salon literary guide to their adopted city, and Canada's undisputed literary capital Toronto? I would suggest starting with Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje, Rohinton Mistry, Shyam Selvadurai, Dionne Brand and of course David Bezmozgis himself, who despite his evocations of literary Montreal is a Torontonian today.

The ebb and flow of a city that never sleeps is Montreal's distinct characteristic.

A stop at Winneys on Ste-Catherine to start the day for a cold beer sitting on the terrace watching the most beautiful woman in the world pass by. A stroll through Old Montreal's streets in the afternoon with cafes and bistros; one cafe is so secluded that if your lucky enough to find it you will remember it for the rest of your life. Dinner in China Town with friends and good conversation and all the Sake you want. Then the night out begins at 8pm at a local jazz club so intimate you feel the music while your choice from the wine list satiates the palette. And just when you think you have seen it all you find yourself at a nightclub on rue Ste-Denis where all the beautiful people go dancing to the rhythm while a bottle of chilled champaign keeps you cool and in the spirit of the night groundswell.

Of all the people, places and things that come together to make up your night out in Montreal's antiquated and unique stage prepared just for you, you'll never ever repeat the same night twice.

And when your heart has sung its last note and the body calls for rest, then you'll be pleasantly surprised to find yourself 45 minutes later at a quaint bed and breakfast just north of this international city. There you'll find another world unlike anything you will find in a major north american city, where the mountains meet the streams and the cottonwood and pine trees breathe freshness into your self imposed exile; where the wind carries a message across the lake just for you.

Montreal

Cold, crystaline

Poutine

Beautiful black girls

Sweaty dancing

The river, the snow, the lights

J'aime Montreal!

Montreal

Cold, crystaline

Poutine

Beautiful black girls

Sweaty dancing

The river, the snow, the lights

J'aime Montreal!

I moved from Montreal to the sprawling suburbs of Washington DC in 1980, and I joke with a friend who came from Russia that same year that we share immigration stories. His is a replica of Bezmozgis or Shteyngart, a Russian Jew plunked down in the vacuous North American suburbs. But I felt just as alien, coming from Montreal into Reaganite America.

I remember the Montreal of my youth as smaller. Everyone knew everybody else, and they all lived in the same neighborhood, which in my case meant Jewish Cote St-Luc. I didn't even know a French speaker, nor do I remember visiting Quebec City or Toronto. It was insular, yes, but there was a closeness to the our community that we could never replicate in America. Friends and relatives would think nothing of showing up at my parents' door at 10 at night for a glass of wine and some gossip. My mother, a native New Yorker, loved the worldliness and culture of Montreal. She and my father were active in Montreal's still excellent Yiddish theater.

I took the bus to school alone starting in second grade on. We went to the Olympics in that hot, hot summer of 1976. And of course, we consumed much smoked meat.

Of course, I am leaving out the grim realities of Montreal in the Seventies. For me, French was something you learned in nursery school. It was watching "Different Strokes" and hearing Arnold say, "Qu'est -ce que tu dis, Willis?" I was not so aware back then of the rising Quebecois nationalism that splintered Montreal's unique polyglot society.

But is the Montreal of my childhood still even the Montreal of today? Living under George Bush, in an ever more yuppified New York, I think fondly back to my childhood in Montreal, even consider moving back with my own family. But I fear that my memories of Montreal -- stirred up once again by this article -- are simply that, memories.

and I want to live there for 300 more

i had to leave for a variety of reasons

but I never left

montreal stayed with me

i stayed with Montreal

no matter where I went

even from where I am

so far far away from anything Montreal

i'm still a Montrealer and

always will be

i'll be back

i hope

once you live in Montreal

you never go back

to anyplace else

with love from a prisoner of another world

to a beautiful, beautiful time

that imprisioned me

in places I never want to leave

...any anglophone who lives there has to put up with the fact that the french majority still holds an unspoken grudge against them. Montreal votes are what kept Quebec from winning the 1995 referendum (not counting the votes against separation that were discarded under suspicious circumstances at various polling stations).

I lived in Montreal for five years and I still have relatives who live in Quebec's eastern townships, and I miss the food and the architecture and the women, but I still prefer living in ugly ol' Toronto where I can go for weeks or even months without hearing the word 'referendum' and I can wave the Canadian flag on Canada Day without getting angry stares on the street. I might go back and visit once in a while, but I have no plans of moving back, not even for all the smoked meat sandwiches on rue St. Laurent.

Wonderfully bizarre, words of the church. Was so surprised when I found out that 'sti was hosti, the Host.

When I speak French with French people, they think I'm Canadian. I'm American--I'm so proud (:=).

B'en, voyons donc, please translate Attache ta tuque... On s'en va à caban' à suc', don't remember it