Revealing Guernsey's ancient history in fact and fiction
Article
Article Title | Revealing Guernsey's ancient history in fact and fiction |
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ERA Journal ID | 36413 |
Article Category | Article |
Authors | |
Author | Goodall, Peter |
Journal Title | Shima: the international journal of research into island cultures |
Journal Citation | 10 (2), pp. 118-128 |
Number of Pages | 11 |
Year | 2016 |
Place of Publication | Sydney, Australia |
ISSN | 1834-6049 |
1834-6057 | |
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) | https://doi.org/10.21463/shima.10.2.12 |
Web Address (URL) | http://www.shimajournal.org/issues/v10n2/l.-Goodall-Shima-v10n2.pdf |
Abstract | In G. B. Edwards’ novel of 20th Century Guernsey life, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page (1981), Ebenezer becomes the unlikely custodian of an ‘ancient monument’ discovered on his land. The incident is treated, in the main, as a topic for comedy—a part of the novel’s satire of the many pretences and frauds of modern Guernsey—but the underlying issues should not be lightly put aside. ‘Les Fouaillages’, a megalithic site discovered in 1978, the year after Edwards’s death, on L’Ancresse Common, a short walk from the place where the fictional Ebenezer spent his whole life, is thought to be 6000 years old, and has a claim to be amongst the oldest built sites on the planet. There are many other ancient sites and monuments on this small island, as there are on the neighbouring Channel Island of Jersey. This article looks at the interconnected yet contrasting ways in which this extraordinary legacy on Guernsey has been revealed and described: the scholarly discourse of archaeology, the myth and legend of the popular imagination, and the literature of Guernsey’s poets and novelists. |
Keywords | Guernsey; Neolithic Age; megaliths; G. B. Edwards; Victor Hugo |
ANZSRC Field of Research 2020 | 470504. British and Irish literature |
430104. Archaeology of Europe, the Mediterranean and the Levant | |
470516. Literature in French | |
Byline Affiliations | School of Arts and Communication |
Institution of Origin | University of Southern Queensland |
https://research.usq.edu.au/item/q3xq3/revealing-guernsey-s-ancient-history-in-fact-and-fiction
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