The Man Who Planted Trees (French title L'homme qui plantait des arbres), also known as "The Story of Elzéard Bouffier"; "The Most Extraordinary Character I Ever Met"; and "The Man who Planted Hope and Reaped Happiness" is an allegorical tale by French author Jean Giono.

It tells the story of one shepherd's long and successful singlehanded effort to re-forest a desolate valley in the foothills of the Alps near Provence throughout the first half of the 20th century.

Synopsis

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The tale is narrated by a twenty-year-old man who remains anonymous throughout (although it has been suggested the narrator may perhaps be the author Jean Giono, there is no evidence for this). The story begins in the year 1910 in which this young man is undertaking a lone hiking trip through Provence, France, and into the Alps, enjoying the relatively unspoiled wilderness.

However the narrator runs out of water in a treeless, desolate valley where only wild lavender grows and there is no trace of civilisation except old, empty crumbling buildings. The narrator finds a dried up well but is saved, however, by a middle-aged shepherd who takes him to a spring he knows of.

Curious about this man, and why he has chosen such a lonely life, the narrator stays with him for a time. The shepherd, after being widowed, has decided to restore the ruined ecosystem of the isolated and largely abandoned valley by singled-handedly cultivating a forest, tree by tree. The shepherd, who reveals his name as Elzéard Bouffier, makes holes in the ground with his long cane and drops acorns into the holes that he has collected from a location many miles away.

The narrator leaves the shepherd and returns home, and later fights in the First World War. In 1915, shell-shocked and depressed after the war, the man decides to return to Elzéard Bouffier. He is surprised to see young saplings of all forms taking root in the valley, and new streams running through it where the shepherd has made natural dams higher up in the mountain. There the narrator makes a full recovery in the peace and beauty of the regrowing valley, and continues to visit Elzéard Bouffier every year. Elzéard Bouffier is no longer a shepherd because he is worried about the sheep affecting his young trees, and has taken up a new profession. He is now a bee keeper.

Over a period spanning four decades, Elzéard Bouffier continues to plant trees and the valley is turned into a kind of Garden of Eden. By the end of the book, the valley has a vibrant ecosystem and is peacefully settled. The valley receives official protection after the Second World War (of course the authorities mistakenly believe that the rapid growth of this forest is a bizarre natural phenomenon as they are unaware of Bouffier's selfless deeds) and more than 10,000 people move there, all of them unknowingly owing their happiness to Elzéard Bouffier. The narrator tells one of his friends in the government the truth about the natural forest, and the friend also helps protect the forest.

The narrator visits the now very old Elzéard Bouffier one last time in 1945, at the end of World War II. In a hospice in Banon, in 1947 the man who planted trees peacefully passes away.

A true story?

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The story itself is so catching that many readers have believed that Elzéard Bouffier was a genuine historical figure and that the narrator of the story was a young Jean Giono himself speaking from experience and therefore the tale is part autobiographical. Certainly, Jean Giono lived during the time period. Jean Giono while alive enjoyed allowing people to believe that the story was real, and considered it as a tribute to his skill. His daughter, Aline Giono described it as "a family story for a long time".

People who have produced similar effects as Bouffier

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There are claims that this story is true and not just allegorical, and that people in other countries at various times have managed to produce similar effects as Bouffier. For example, a man called Abdul Karim had apparently created a forest out of "nothing" over 19 years, using the same method as Bouffier. In India, One Man Creates a Forest An organization called "Trees for the Future" claimed to have assisted more than 170,000 families, in 6,800 villages of Asia, Africa and the Americas, to plant over 35 million trees. Trees for the Future The character of Bouffier also has some similarity to the legendary early 19th century American tree planter Johnny Appleseed.

Film adaptation

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An animated adaptation of the story is produced by Frédéric Back in 1987 IMDB page for the animated version. This 30 minutes, short film won the Academy Award and several others that year.

References

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French novels | Der Mann, der Bäume pflanzte | L'Homme qui plantait des arbres