Acquired in 2020 by the Reunion Departmental Library, this collection of short stories is a precious testimony on the society on Bourbon island during the years that preceded the abolition of slavery.
We have very little information concerning this work, only 50 examples of which were printed. The same can be said for its author. We know that he contributed to a newspaper in Laval, L’Echo de la Mayenne, and that he probably lived on Bourbon between 1840 and 1850: his name is listed in the 1847-48 census of slave owners in Saint-Benoit.
The publisher, whose preface indicates the confidential character of the publication, enriched the texts with intricate decorations. Even though the author expresses a number of prejudices in fashion at the time, the work has an additional precursory character in that some of its dialogues and accounts are written in Creole.
Composed of a frontispiece representing Bras-Canot, seven short stories essentially on the topic of fugitive slaves, as well as five letters in which the author gives an account of his wanderings through the island’s society and landscapes. The book presents a collection of previously unpublished literary texts and historical accounts, published a few years before the abolition of slavery, some of them appearing in the press in mainland France.
On 4th February 2021, Prosper Eve, university professor and member of the scientific committee of the Foundation for the memory of slavery, gave a public lecture based on the acquisition of the collection of short stories.
Du nouveau sur l’esclavage à l’île Bourbon ou Regard d’Auguste Logeais sur l’esclavage à l’île Bourbon au début des années 1840: A new light on slavery on Bourbon island or Auguste Logeais’ vision of slavery on Bourbon island in the early 1840s.
Retransmission of the lecture
