In 1888, when George Washington Cable, the New Orleans author who had gained fame through his Creole stories and novels, published three stories of Acadian Louisiana as a novel tided Bonaventure, the book was the product of a longstanding interest on Cable's part in Acadiana and its people. Yet the book also became a way in which Cable could step away briefly from the controversies in which he was involved regarding civil rights for African Americans--a cause he espoused in the face of bitter opposition from much of the white South. In a very real sense, Bonaventure, with its emphasis on roma...
