The Book of Ebenezer le Page (73 page)

I'm glad Ebenezer, who dies alive, doesn't know.
[2]

31st July 1974

[2]
Mr Harry Tomlinson, an authority on the patois, asks me to point out that Edwards' account of the difference between the high and low parish dialects is misleading. The transposition of
r
in words and the replacement of soft French
ch
(as in
chercher
) by hard English
ch
(as in
church
) are universal on Guernsey. In fact the most striking difference lies in vowel-sounds, low parish being much nearer to standard French. JF.

The French patois of Guernsey is by no means without its own literature, past or present. Its first poet, Georges Métivier (1790–1881), can stand comparison with William Barnes of Dorset and should surely be more widely known. Métivier well symbolizes Guernsey's eternal dilemma, for his master (whose spirit he at times carried brilliantly into French) was Robert Burns. The English are baffled by his language; the French, by his alien mentality. However, a very determined contemporary effort is being made to see that this vigorous tongue of the Cotentin and Channel Islands does not drown under the tide of the standard one. Phrases in that latter are in general not glossed here. I must thank Mr Harry Tomlinson for his very considerable help in compiling this glossary.

baise mon tchou
: probably for
baise mon cul
, kiss my arse

boud'lo
: a puppet or effigy burnt at year's end (
bout de l'an
)

cauchie: chaussée
, causeway, jetty

chancre: cancre
, large edible crab

chétif
: stunted, puny

chonna: cela
, that.
Est-che comme chonna
, Is that how it is?

connétable
: in former times an honorary parish policeman

crapaud
: toad, a nickname for Jerseymen. Those of Sark were ‘crows'; of Guernsey, ‘donkeys'.

damme
: usually ‘cor damme', from
corpus domini mei
, Christ's body

dido
: a caper, a fuss

double
: obsolete Channel Island coin, eight to the penny

douit
: stream or water-course

douzaine
: parish council of twelve;
douzenier
, parish councillor

écrivain
: scrivener, notary public

fé: foi
, faith;
ma fé
, my word

fénion: fainéant
, lazy person

fiche le can: fiche le camp
, clear out, buzz off

fippennies
: perhaps fourpenny pieces, groats

gâche
: ‘a kind of bread in which yeast and fruit are used with flour, butter, milk and sugar kneaded together'

Grand Saracen
: a legendary Guernsey pirate

green-bed: jonquière
, a fern-littered couch used by farmers for their midday rest

Greffe
: the civil and land registry office of Guernsey

greffier
: registrar

grimerai: mais je te grimerai, donc
, I'll scratch your eyes out

G.U.B.
: the Green-house Utilisation Board, which supervised crop-growing during the German Occupation

j'sis fier
: I'm glad

jurat
: magistrate and member of the island electoral college

long-nose
: the garfish, highly esteemed on Guernsey

mais verre dja, donc
: that's very true, yes indeed

mais wai, mais nonnain
: of course

Mess
: monsieur

mitching
: playing truant or hookey

mommet
: a lifeless effigy

mon Dou
: my God

mon viow: mon vieux
, old man, old chap

Muratti
: the Muratti Vase, a Channel Island football cup

museau
: literally ‘snout', in slang face or mug

orfi
: another word for the garfish

ormer
: the sea-ear, an abalone-like shellfish unique to the islands

par il lo: par là
, that way

pied-du-cauche: pied de chausse
, stocking-foot for hiding money

planchette
: fortune-telling board

Pool
: the deep-water part of St Peterport harbour

pourchay
: pig

purain: purin
, liquid manure

royne: reine
, queen, also a kind of frog

Russel
: the Little and the Great Russel are respectively the channels between Guernsey and Herm, and Herm and Sark

scoop
: a sun-bonnet with a projecting brim over the face

spawls
: stone chips or splinters

States: les états de délibération
, the Guernsey parliament

té: toi
, familiar form of you

terpid: trépied
, trivet or gridiron over an open fire

vergée
: land measurement, just over one third of an acre

verre: vrai
, true

vier: vieux
, old

volresse
: female thief;
tu fichu petite volresse
, you wretched little thief

vraic
: wrack, seaweed used both as manure and as fuel. The island's previous staple industry of stone-quarrying began to give way to the present one of producing early vegetables and flowers in the 1880s. Guernsey soil is not naturally fertile, thence the importance of vraicing, collecting shoreline seaweed. Ancient and complex laws still govern right of vraic.

wharro
: a greeting, from ‘what ho'

THIS IS A NEW YORK REVIEW BOOK

PUBLISHED BY THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS

435 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014

www.nyrb.com

Copyright © 1981 by Edward P. de G. Chaney

Introduction copyright © 1981 by J. R. Fowles Ltd.

All rights reserved.

Cover image: R.B. Kitaj, Blake's God, Courtesy of the artist and Marlborough Fine Art, London

Cover design: Katy Homans

The Library of Congress has cataloged the earlier printing as follows:

Edwards, G. B. (Gerald Basil), 1899–1976.

  The book of Ebenezer le Page / by G. B. Edwards ; introduction by John Fowles.

     p. cm. — (New York Review Books classics)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-59017-233-9 (alk. paper)

  ISBN-10: 1-59017-233-7 (alk. paper)

  1. Guernsey (Channel Islands)—Fiction. I. Title.

PR6055.D87B6 2007

823'.914—dc22

2007010956

eISBN: 978-1-59017-611-5
v1.0

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