Penguin Island

Penguin Island

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4
(1 Review)
Penguin Island by Anatole France

Published:

1908

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Penguin Island

By

4
(1 Review)
Morals, customs and laws are satirised within the context of the fictional land of Penguinia, where the animals were mistakenly baptised by the myopic Abbot Mael.

Book Excerpt

lt and water.

The islands of Morbihan were more numerous in those times than they are to-day. For since then many have been swallowed up by the sea. St. Mael evangelized sixty of them. Then in his granite trough he ascended the river Auray. And after sailing for three hours he landed before a Roman house. A thin column of smoke went up from the roof. The holy man crossed the threshold on which there was a mosaic representing a dog with its hind legs outstretched and its lips drawn back. He was welcomed by an old couple, Marcus Combabus and Valeria Moerens, who lived there on the products of their lands. There was a portico round the interior court the columns of which were painted red, half their height upwards from the base. A fountain made of shells stood against the wall and under the portico there rose an altar with a niche in which the master of the house had placed some little idols made of baked earth and whitened with whitewash. Some represented winged children, others Apollo or Mercury, and severa

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amittaizero
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France manages to craft an epic comedic tale tracing the rise and fall of a civilization that, in truth, could be any Western nation - but is most certainly the French Republic. Military, religion, politics and even burgeoning socialism are lambasted in this twisted little story that begins with a mistaken baptism and the fallible bureaucracy of Heaven.