LE PAGE TURNER

I’m delighted to announce that the eagerly-awaited biography of the late G B Edwards, author of The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, is now available.

Professor Edward Chaney, author of the biography of G B Edwards

Professor Edward Chaney is currently in Guernsey to launch his book, entitled Genius Friend, and will be on stage during the Guernsey Literary Festival, which starts today.
Despite the unfortunate scheduling of Professor Chaney’s talk, which coincides with the Festival Opening Party, the event sold out within hours and a second performance has been hastily arranged.
I understand that this too is already fully booked and that, jointly, these appearancess have proved by far the most popular events in this year's Festival Programme. 
If you didn't manage to obtain a ticket, you can still meet Edward Chaney at the Guernsey Press Bookshop in St Peter Port this Friday lunchtime between twelve and two.
Here’s a reminder of my two previous posts on the subject of G B Edwards and his immortal creation, the cantankerous Guernseyman, Ebenezer Le Page.

First Posted 25 April 2015

Professor Edward Chaney will later this year publish his long-awaited biography of celebrated Guernsey writer, G B Edwards, author of that much-loved modern classic, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page.
Gerald Basil Edwards, who died in 1976, was a Guernsey-born writer and self-imposed exile, a contemporary of Middleton Murry, Katherine Mansfield and D H Lawrence. 
His one great novel was not published until after his death. 

This Proustian tale, set in our small island but with universal themes, has been justly praised, worldwide, although Edwards himself has received little in the way of acclaim in his island birthplace, Guernsey. 

Let’s hope that Edward Chaney’s forthcoming book will put this right. 

First Posted 7 May 2015

You’ll be hard pressed to find a copy of The Book of Ebenezer Le Page in any of Guernsey’s bookshops and seeking what has been described as one of the finest novels of the Twentieth Century in Guernsey’s many tourist outlets can also prove to be a fruitless exercise.
How can it be that this modern masterpiece written by a native Guernseyman, the late  Gerald B Edwards, has become all but invisible on the island of his birth?  
New York Review of Books described the novel as: “A triumph of the storyteller’s art that conjures up the extraordinary voice of a living man.” 
Praise of the book has been echoed by literary critics across the globe, yet in Guernsey this memorable book is virtually ignored.
I was introduced to The Book of Ebenezer Le Page by my wife, Jane, who has campaigned tirelessly to promote recognition of both the novel and its author, G B Edwards.
I read it, struggling, as many do, with the early chapters, and found myself immersed in a truly amazing tale, set on the small island of Guernsey, yet having a universal appeal.
The narrator, elderly, cantankerous Ebenezer Le Page, recounts the story of his life and passions in a voice that grows ever more familiar and full of humanity with each passing page and, while doing so, introduces the reader to a cast of characters that are totally believable and absolutely full of life.
A long-awaited biography of G B Edwards, written by Professor Edward Chaney, is due to be launched later this year by Blue Ormer Publications.