In Loudéac, they are releasing a children's book in Gallo and French

“The Wheelbarrow Thief” is the kind of story that lends itself well to a storyteller. That’s good, Michel Mauxion is the Gallo speaker. So in the fall of 2021, when he found himself in the evening eating chestnuts with Jérôme Lucas, a well-known publisher and memory smuggler in the Loudéac region, his little story of a wheelbarrow thief did not go unnoticed. “We each told each other our stories,” recalls Michel; I told mine, that of a child in the 70s between Plouguenast and Plessala who found a wheelbarrow and wanted to take it home, just to simplify life on the farm; Everyone liked it.” As a good editor, Jérôme Lucas then said to himself that there was material to write a little book and suggested that Michel Mauxion write the story. “When we come from the peasant world back home, we speak Gallo,” explains Jérôme Lucas. And there, it was the opportunity to write history in French but also in Gallo.

A young book of 16 pages with illustrations

In the spring of this year, a small team was set up around the project. We find Michel Mauxion for the editorial part, helped by Jérôme Lucas and André Le Coq, former retired Gallo teachers, who are there to refine the vocabulary of the Welsh version of “The Wheelbarrow Thief”. Juliette Lucas then acts as illustrator. “It’s quite a job since she did everything in painting before digitizing her drawings,” explains Jérôme Lucas. Six months later, the book is ready to be published in a children's book format of 16 pages, including six illustrations. In Gallo, the book is called “Le Volou d’bérouette”. “We added some phonetic keys for pronunciation in the Gallo version,” says André Le Coq.

Practical

The Wheelbarrow Thief published by Récits, 16 pages. Price: €5. In Gallo version and in French version. On sale at La Plume d'or and L'Histoire sans fin and at the cultural space in Loudéac.