Jersey
At the dawn of the 12th century, one of the most famous poets of the Channel Islands was born in Jersey, and undoubtedly one of the most lasting influences on world literary history. Although his name has gone through several spellings, Wace is generally attributed to him, and although his biography is incomplete, it is accepted that he spent most of his life on the mainland. A cleric and then a canon, he wrote Lives of saints (Marguerite is published by Honoré Champion), but it was with Le Roman de Brut (1155), 14,866 octosyllabic verses in Old French, that he achieved posterity. This chronicle of the history of the Breton kings, based on theHistoria regum Britanniae (1138) by the Welshman Geoffroy de Monmouth and inspired by oral tradition, was the first to mention the Round Table, a fact that undoubtedly influenced the later writings of Chrétien de Troyes. Wace's interest in the Dukes of Normandy continued in Le Roman de Rou, dedicated to Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry II of England. These texts, which have long since fallen into the public domain, can be consulted on the Internet, but are unfortunately hard to find in bookshops.
No less than five centuries later, a young man was born into a family of notables, who also left his island to study, but Jean Poingdestre preferred England, and eventually returned, fleeing the war, to take up the post of lieutenant-bailiff. He left behind a valuable study, Cæsarea or A discourse of the Island of Jersery, which reveals much about the folklore, geography and politics of the 17th century. In the following century, with the installation of a printing press on the island in 1783, Matthew Le Geyt (1777-1849) became the first person to have his verses printed, albeit as a rhyming advertisement for tobacco! He also left a few political poems, but it was perhaps his unfortunate habit of writing phonetically that led 19th-century writers to seek to standardize Jersey, a desire exacerbated by the growing number of local publications. For example, Jean Sullivan (1813-1899), a practicing notary, became editor of the Jersey Observer. His bibliography is vast, punctuated not only by serious articles, but also by poems he took to heart, writing in his own language. Two of his contemporaries followed a similar path: Philippe Langlois (1817-1884) and Robert Pipon Marett (1820-1884). The former was a doctor, member of parliament and judge, but also a writer under the pseudonym "Un Luorenchais", president of La Société Jèrriaise (founded in 1873), and linguist when he initiated Le Glossaire du Patois Jersiais with Asplet Le Gros (1840-1877), who also published a poetry review. The latter became a lawyer by profession, and founded the newspaper La Patrie par passion, where he published his verses in Jersiais, including the acclaimed Fille Malade. He also proposed a spelling reform based on French, and also held the post of bailiff. Last but not least, Jean Dorey (1831-1872), collector of local sayings and rhymes, and Philippe Le Sueur Mourant, George William de Carteret, Edward Le Brocq and Edwin John Luce contributed their pens and humor - if not their impertinence - to the many island newspapers.
Like most islands, Jersey resigned itself to the departure of some of its own, such as the playwright Frederick Lonsdale(King of Cadonia, Betty, On Approval, etc.), who ended his life in London, but despite the distance, the attachment remained deep, as demonstrated by George Francis Le Feuvre - known as George d'la Forge - who never stopped writing about the history and language of his native land, which he had left for Canada and then the United States. He returned after the Second World War, and since 1984 his body has rested in Jersey, where his precious legacy - twice awarded the Prix littéraire du Cotentin in 1974 and 1981 - lives on. This same love is embodied in the work of Frank Le Maistre, a linguist whose birth coincided, give or take 10 years, with the new century. His remarkable efforts to collect local vocabulary and expressions resulted in a Franco-Jersiais Dictionary in 1966, and did not penalize the quality of his plays and poems, which appeared in the Bulletîn d'Quart d'An de l'Assembliée d'Jèrriais, of which he was editor from 1952 to 1973. Jersiais is now spoken by only a tiny proportion of the population, although it is taught in schools on an optional basis, but it was in the 21st century, in 2012, at the honorable age of 90, that one of its most fervent emissaries, Amélia Perchard, known as Amélia Noël, passed away. Her theater, songs and verse are now part of our heritage.
Guernsey
The Guernsey language is no better off today, and even its teaching is threatened by the small number of speakers. Yet there have been legions of writers who have sought to defend it, and one of the best known - the precursor - is undoubtedly Georges Métivier, who was born in Saint-Pierre-Port, rue de la Fontaine, in January 1790, and died in 1881 on his island, which had in the meantime proclaimed him Poète national. In addition to his rhymes, he delivered translations of religious and philosophical texts, published a Franco-Norman dictionary in 1870 - the first work of its kind - and worked to standardize spelling, attracting emulators even on the continent. Although the collection of his memoirs unfortunately remained unfinished, he left an indelible mark on the memory of his fellow citizens, as some of his texts were set to music and still resonate today. It was also in song that Tam Lenfestey (1818-1885) entered the world of literature, notably with Le Chant des Fontaines and La Ribotresse. Then came Denys Corbet (1826-1909) and Thomas Alfred Grut (1852-1933), both poets. One was also a journalist for Le Baillage, where he signed his articles in Guernsey "Badlagoule" ("the chatterbox"), while the other wrote Guernsey translations of Philippe Le Sueur Mourant's works in Jersey. The second half of the century saw the birth of Thomas Henry Mahy, author of Dires et pensées du Courtil Poussin, and Marjorie Ozanne, who published in the Guernsey Evening Press from 1949 to 1965. Last but not least, the 19th century comes to a close with the first cry of Gerald Basil Edwards (1899-1976), who won the esteem of his peers only after his death, thanks to the determination of two friends who finally managed to find a publisher for a text now considered a major work, and hailed by, among others, the 1983 Nobel Prize for Literature, William Golding. The text is Sarnia, out of print with Points but certainly available on the second-hand market, a long novel with strong autobiographical overtones, featuring Ebenezer Le Page and, above all, the island of Guernsey, which he thoughtfully watched evolve until the 1960s. The islanders - even if they live in exile - are decidedly the guardians of the memory of a place and the keen observers of the changes that, despite their isolation, are taking place. Marie de Garis (1910-2010), a lexicographer who wrote a Dictiounnaire Angllais-Guernésiais, and James Marr (1918-2009), a historian who worked on the Channel Islands' past, are unlikely to contradict Gerald Basil Edwards on this point.
Visitors passing through
But the islands are also stopovers for mainlanders, who sometimes land here and set down their suitcases. It would be impossible to evoke the literature of the archipelago without mentioning the authors it has welcomed or inspired. François-René de Chateaubriand (1768-1848), the (future) great French writer, was not in the best of shape when he disembarked in Jersey, and some even said he was moribund after the wound inflicted on him at the Siege of Thionville (1792). The sea air undoubtedly invigorated him, but his exile was only just beginning, as he soon returned to London, where he published his first work, Essai sur les révolutions, in 1797. Another Romantic also found refuge in Jersey, but in no less difficult circumstances: it was following Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte's coup d'état, and the threats made against him, that Victor Hugo decided to flee France. After passing through Belgium and England, he arrived in Saint-Hélier on August 5, 1852, and would not leave the Channel Islands for another eighteen years. This long retreat was not in vain from a literary point of view, firstly because during this period he wrote and published some of his best-known works(Les Châtiments, Les Misérables, Les Contemplations, etc.), and secondly because island life provided the material for his novel Les Travailleurs de la mer, explicitly dedicated to Guernsey and its inhabitants. L'Archipel de la Manche, a veritable ode to the sea lasting just a few dozen pages, was to accompany Gilliatt's sad story. In 1938, when Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore - two photographers and poets from Nantes born Lucy Schwob (1894-1954) and Suzanne Malherbe (1892-1972) - settled at La Rocquaise in Jersey, the atmosphere was still more or less serene, but it was not to last.. The Channel Islands were to become the only British territory invaded by the German army during the Second World War, and the archipelago was to suffer more than mere occupation: four concentration camps were to be set up on Alderney. The two artists soon joined the Resistance, distributing leaflets under the name of "the nameless soldier". But their activities were discovered, and in July 1944 they were arrested and sentenced to death, narrowly escaping the terrible sentence. This tragic period has inspired - and continues to inspire - many writers, as exemplified by the worldwide bestseller The Potato Peelers' Literary Circle, published in the USA in 2008 by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows. To conclude on a happier note, let's mention Gerald Durrell. This British writer, born on the Indian mainland in 1925, has both moved people and made them laugh with his fictionalized autobiography(Trilogie de Corfou, published by La Table ronde). A great lover of nature, he founded Jersey Zoo in 1958, and it was on this beloved island that he passed away in 1995.
