La Folle

Henrietta St. Bernard grows up in the 1960s, a member of a large family of French-speaking Canadian immigrants trying to survive in an English-speaking country. She is the only child born with the St. Bernard thumb—a pimple-like mass on her chin that finally goes away when she is three months old, leaving a brown spot on her chin from age three. From an early age, Henrietta experiences severe abuse from her parents and, to a lesser degree, her older siblings. They called her ugly and stupid, eventually settling on the nickname “La Folle”—the crazy girl. As she gets older, the abuse...


























































