Gloire à nos illustres pionniers

“I found the title for this collection of short stories in Sacha Tsipotchkine’s Les Promenades sentimentales au clair de lune: ‘Man (…) one day, he will make himself! A little patience, a little perseverance: we are not down to counting the last ten thousand years…’ For the moment, man is only a pioneer of himself… Glory to our illustrious pioneers! There was no premeditation on my part: in writing these stories, I believed I was simply indulging in the pleasure of storytelling: my familiar demons once again prevented me from going on holiday.”

Do not look for Les Promenades sentimentales au clair de lune by Sacha Tsipotchkine: the writer and his book are purely products of Gary’s fertile imagination. The collection comprises sixteen stories, some previously unpublished, others already published in periodicals or in volume form: “Les oiseaux vont mourir au Pérou,” “Le Luth” (published as “Ainsi s’achève une journée de soleil,” La Table ronde, June 1954), “Un humaniste” (published as “Les belles natures,” Preuves, February 1958), “Décadence,” “Le faux,” “Les joies de la nature,” “Noblesse et grandeur,” “Citoyen pigeon” (Le Cadran, 1945), “Une page d’histoire,” “Le Mur” (a simple Christmas tale, Preuves, February 1958), “Tout va bien sur le Kilimandjaro” (Le Cadran, 12, 1945), “Je parle de l’héroïsme” (published as “Je rencontre un barracuda,” Elle, 23 March 1956), “Les Habitants de la Terre” (Revue de Paris, January 1951), “J’ai soif d’innocence” (published as “Je rêve d’innocence,” Elle, 30 April 1956), “La plus vieille histoire du monde” (Preuves, March 1962), and “Gloire à nos illustres pionniers.” The first and second-to-last were written during Gary’s stay in Bolivia.