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2.5 

Penguin Island

By Anatole France
Penguin Island by Anatole France digital book - Fable

Publisher Description

Penguin Island, published by Anatole France in 1908, is a comic novel that satirizes the history of France, from its prehistory to the author’s vision of a distant future.

After setting out on a storm-tossed voyage of evangelization, the myopic St. Maël finds himself on an island populated by penguins. Mistaking them to be humans, Maël baptizes them—touching off a dispute in Heaven and ushering the Penguin nation into history.

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8 Reviews

2.5
“I don't dispute Anatole France's capability or skill as a writer, as I've read him before. The Gods Will Have Blood is a masterpiece: it alludes to a specific, pivotal time in France which was the French revolution and beautifully illustrates, not only its zeitgeist, but also its effect on the populace. Robespierre is mirrored through a lesser-known Gamelin, who is also consumed by the Reign of Terror. France also capably wrote The Procurator of Judea which expatiates upon the achievements of Pilate who, ironically, forgets about Jesus Christ. Both are excellent. Penguin Island, on the other hand, is a satire. Unlike the two former novels, it attempts to tell the history of France through jest and jibe. In contrast to the familiarity featured in the Reign of Terror and the life of Jesus Christ, most people are unfamiliar with the finer nuances of French history. While I was familiar with the allusions to Charlemagne, and the burlesque counterpart of St. George and the Dragon, I had no idea regarding the specific characters France referred to in his lampoon of French history: while Napoleon was rather prominent in the novel as Trinco, I had no idea who Georges Boulanger or Georges Clemenceau were. Had I not looked the historical parallels up, the allusions would have totally gone over my head. The major issue I have with the novel is that it is esoteric AND anachronistic. Outside of the Dreyfus (Pyrot) affair, I was unfamiliar with the characters, although I do understand that France's thesis is that history is cyclical (anacyclosis), and he even refers to Polybius (p. 31) whom this concept was attributed to. His concluding chapter affirms this: through anarchy and social degradation, countries will destroy themselves. He alluded to mutually-assured destruction, but at least that has not happened yet. While I don't think the book is bad per se, it caters to a very specific group of readers who have immersed themselves in modern French history. Outside France's belief that history is recursive, this is simply not a good novel at all. I've had a few smirks over the course of the novel, but I think the time spent reading these almost 300 pages could have been better spent.”

About Anatole France

Anatole France (born François-Anatole Thibault, 16 April 1844 – 12 October 1924) was a French poet, journalist, and novelist with several best-sellers. Ironic and skeptical, he was considered in his day the ideal French man of letters. He was a member of the Académie française, and won the 1921 Nobel Prize in Literature "in recognition of his brilliant literary achievements, characterized as they are by a nobility of style, a profound human sympathy, grace, and a true Gallic temperament".

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