THE MAN WHO
PLANTED TREES
Extract 1
About forty years ago, I was taking a long
trip on foot over mountain heights quite
unknown to tourists. All around was barren and
colourless land. Nothing grew there but wild lavender.
After five hours' walking I had still not found
water. All about me was the same dryness, the same
coarse grasses. I thought I saw in the distance a small
black silhouette. It was a shepherd. Thirty sheep were
lying about him on the baking earth. He gave me a
10 drink and took me to his cottage on the plain.
5
I felt peace in the presence of this man. I asked
if I might rest here for a day. He found it quite
natural or, to be more exact, he gave me the
impression that nothing could surprise him. I didn't
15 actually need to rest, but I was interested and wished
to know more about him.
The shepherd puts a large sack of acorns onto the table. He
inspects each acorn and carefully chooses one hundred
perfect ones before going to bed. The writer is curious. The
next day when he goes out with the shepherd into the hills,
he discovers what the acorns are for.
T.66b Extract 2
I noticed that he carried for a stick an iron rod as
thick as my thumb and about a metre and a half
long. He began thrusting his iron rod into the
earth, making a hole in which he planted an acorn;
then he refilled the hole. He was planting oak trees. 5
I
After the midday meal he resumed his planting.
I must have been fairly insistent in my
suppose
questioning, for he answered me. For three years he
had been planting trees in this wilderness. He had
planted one hundred thousand. Of the 10
hundred thousand, twenty thousand had
sprouted. Of the twenty thousand he still
expected to lose half. There remained
ten thousand oak trees to grow where
nothing had
grown before.
15
That was when I began to wonder
about the age of this man. He was
obviously over fifty. Fifty-five he
told me. His name was Elzéard
Bouffier. I told him that in thirty 20
years his ten thousand oaks would be
magnificent. He answered that if
God granted him life, in another
thirty years he would have planted
so many more that these ten 25
thousand would be like a drop of
water in the ocean.
The next day we parted.For the next five years the writer is a soldier and fights in
World War I. The war ends in 1918 and his thoughts turn
again to the tree-planter in the mountains. He returns to
look for him.
T.66c Extract 3
I had seen too many men die during those five years
not to imagine easily that Elzéard Bouffier was
dead, especially since, at twenty, one regards men of
fifty as old men with nothing left to do but die. He
5 was not dead. As a matter of fact, he was extremely
well. He had changed jobs. He had got rid of the
sheep because they threatened his young trees. For,
he told me, the war had disturbed him not at all. He
had imperturbably continued to plant.
old and taller than
The oaks were then ten years
both of us. It was an impressive spectacle. I was
literally speechless, and as he did not talk, we spent
the whole day walking in silence through his
forest. It measured eleven kilometres in length and
15 three kilometres at its greatest width. When you
remembered that all this had come from the hands
and the soul of this one man, you understood that
ways other than
men could be as effective as God in
destruction.
The writer returns for a final visit in 1945 after World
War II. Elzéard is still alive. The writer is amazed at what
he sees. Not only is there the forest, but many villages have
been rebuilt, and by 1953 more than ten thousand people in
the area owe their happiness to Elzéard Bouffier.
T.66d Extract 4
The bus put me down in Vergons. In 1913 this village
of ten or twelve houses had three inhabitants. All
about them nettles were feeding upon the remains of
abandoned houses. Now everything had changed.
5 Even the air. Instead of the harsh dry winds, a gentle
breeze was blowing, laden with scents. A sound like
water came from the mountains: it was the wind in
the forest. Most amazing of all, I heard the actual
sound of water falling into a pool. I saw a fountain
10 had been built. Ruins had been cleared away, and five
houses restored. Now there were twenty-eight
inhabitants, four of them young married couples. It
was now a village where one would like to live.
When I think that one man was able to cause
15 this land of Canaan to grow from wasteland, I am
convinced that in spite of everything,
humanity is good.
Elzéard Bouffier died peacefully
in his sleep in 1947.       Based on the text answer these questions:1)Giono wrote the story in 1953. In which year does the
actual story begin?
2 The story takes place in France. Which part of France
do you think it is? Why? What is the countryside like?
3)Why do you think the writer is interested in the
shepherd? What do you think he likes about his
lifestyle?
4)How old do you think the writer was at the time of
the story? A boy in his teens? In his twenties? Middle-
aged? Older? Why?
5 How old will Elzéard be in thirty years time? What
year will it be?
6 What do you think Elzéard's ambition is? What is his
vision of the future?
7 Why did the writer think that Elzéard might have
died?
8 How had the war affected Elzéard?
9 Why is the writer speechless?
10 What thoughts about human behaviour does he haw
in the last sentence?
11 What has happened in the writer's life that could have
made him pessimistic?
Is he in fact pessimistic about the world? Give a
reason for your answer.
12 How is it that so many people owe their happiness to
one man? What are the results of his tree-planting?
13 How old is Elzéard when he dies? Why is it so
important that he had a long life?