Translating a "French Robinson Crusoe" of the Americas: The Memoir of Dumont de Montigny

FAIN: RZ-50594-06

Newberry Library (Chicago, IL 60610-3305)
Carla Zecher (Project Director: November 2005 to November 2010)

Preparation of an annotated English translation of the memoir of Dumont de Montigny. (24 months)

The Newberry Library requests funding to support preparation of an English translation of the memoir of a French soldier, Dumont de Montigny, who settled in Louisiana during the first half of the 18th century. This memoir, preserved in a manuscript in the Newberry collections, is a remarkable mixture of a colonial report, an autobiography, a picaresque narrative, a natural history, and an ethnography. It stands out as a seminal work of French colonial Louisiana. The English translation will be a vital new source for scholars and others interested in the history of the first 100 years of colonial settlement in the greater Mississippi Valley, and it will allow the incorporation of this extraordinary text into the American literary heritage.

Associated Products

The Memoir of Lieutenant Dumont, 1715–1747: A Sojourner in the French Atlantic (Book)
Title: The Memoir of Lieutenant Dumont, 1715–1747: A Sojourner in the French Atlantic
Author: Jean-François-Benjamin Dumont de Montigny
Editor: Carla Zecher
Editor: Gordon M. Sayre
Abstract: In 1719, Jean-François-Benjamin Dumont de Montigny, son of a Paris lawyer, set sail for Louisiana with a commission as a lieutenant after a year in Quebec. During his peregrinations over the next eighteen years, Dumont came to challenge corrupt officials, found himself in jail, eked out a living as a colonial subsistence farmer, survived life-threatening storms and epidemics, encountered pirates, witnessed the 1719 battle for Pensacola, described the 1729 Natchez Uprising, and gave account of the 1739-1740 French expedition against the Chickasaws. Dumont's adventures, as recorded in his 1747 memoir conserved at the Newberry Library, underscore the complexity of the expanding French Atlantic world, offering a singular perspective on early colonialism in Louisiana. His life story also provides detailed descriptions and illustrations of the peoples and environment of the lower Mississippi valley. This English translation of the unabridged memoir features a new introduction, maps, and a biographical dictionary to enhance the text. Dumont emerges here as an important colonial voice and brings to vivid life the French Atlantic.
Year: 2012
Primary URL: http://www.worldcat.org/title/memoir-of-lieutenant-dumont-1715-1747-a-sojourner-in-the-french-atlantic/oclc/785863931&referer=brief_results
Primary URL Description: WorldCat listing
Secondary URL: http://www.uncpress.unc.edu/browse/book_detail?title_id=3076
Secondary URL Description: Publisher's listing
Access Model: Book
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Type: Translation
Type: Scholarly Edition
ISBN: 9780807837221
Translator: Gordon M. Sayre

---