The Man who planted Trees Summary
‘The Man who planted Trees’ is written by Jean Giono. The story begins with narrator describing his hiking experience about forty years ago. He went for hiking through hills absolutely unknown to tourists in the region where the Alps Penetrate into provence. It was a barren and monotonous land, with only wild lavender growing. After walking for three days he camped himself next to an abandoned village when there was no traces of civilization except old, empty buildings. The narrator runs out of water which made him move his comes frequently. The village with abandoned buildings had dry wells with no water. After few hours of wandering, narrator sees a shepherd surrounded by 30 sheeps. The shepherd’s cottage. The shepherd also shared his soup with narrator. There was four or five villages dispersed for on the sides of the hills in that area. The village was inhabited by wood cutters who made charcoal. That evening the shepherd pulls out a bag of acorns and separates out the 100 largest and least damaged nuts. The narrator watches the shepherd curiously. The company of shepherd brought him a felling of peace. The narrator was curious and wanted to find out more about the shepherd.
Next morning the shepherd soaked the acorns in a bucket of water. He carried an iron rod.
After reaching a particular place, he began to make hole into the ground with the help of iron rod. In the hole he placed an acorn and covered the hole again. He was planting Oak Trees. He told the narrator that over the past three years he had planted over a one hundred thousand acorns. Out of which he expects ten thousand to grow as Oak Trees. At this moment the narrator guessed the age of shepherd to be around fifty. The shepherd told his exact age to be fifty five and his name was Elzeard Bouffier. Bouffier told the narrator that he started this journey of planting trees shortly after the death of his wife and only child. Next day the narrator parted ways with the shepherd and continued his journey.
A year later world war breaks out and the narrator was engaged for five years. He forgets about the shepherd. Two years after the war ends, the narrator returns to provence because he wanted peace, quiet and clean environment. As he walks the same path that he walked years ago he remembers the shepherd. He finally met Bouffier and found out that war had not disturbed him. The continued to plant trees. The Oaks were now ten years and way taller than him. He was impressed to see the trees. He was spell bound and thought that man could be as effective as god in areas other than destruction by seeing how a man without technical aids had done so much for the environment.