Malta Ħanina
Daniel Rondeau
Bernard Grasset, Paris 2012 pp 300
ISBN 978 2 246 79503 2
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Our National Library in Valletta can boast of tens of travelogues penned by famous French voyagers who since the time of the Mediterranean grand tours included Malta on their cultural pilgrimages of this ancient sea.
...the author’s wingspan covers centuries of history flashing back to several past glories of tiny Malta encountering outstanding personages- Charles Xuereb
The latest addition to this collection has just been published in Paris in the shape of Malta Ħanina, an author’s gleaning of the island, its history and its people.
Following three years of representing France as ambassador to Malta, novelist Daniel Rondeau poured out his heart in 300 pages of lyrical testimony embracing such romantic reminiscences as orange blossoms, clear skies and golden rays of sunshine falling on low white abodes often surrounded by the limpid blue sea.
But the writer does not stop here: his sharp journalistic sense of observation combines with his warm personality in interlocking a series of tableaux featuring the inhabitants of the island ranging from the fishermen of Għar Lapsi to the remarkable late President Emeritus Guido de Marco.
While in Malta, Mr Rondeau went all over the place. He endeared himself to so many on a variety of wavelengths, from singing to boxing, that those who read the book cannot but help notice the reflection of his boundless energy, which according to a quote found between these covers, is greater than perfection.
Not unlike the French sky fighter Rafale, the author’s wingspan covers centuries of history flashing back to several past glories of tiny Malta encountering outstanding personages such as Abulafia on Comino, Grandmasters de la Sengle, La Valette, Wignacourt and de Rohan as well as colourful Caravaggio, Preti, Favray, Vassalli, Count de Beaujolais, Byron and of course Bonaparte during his week’s stay in Malta.
He swoops over the beginnings of the French naval school in Valletta’s harbour on one page only to share the trepidations of Libyans from Misurata during their Arab Spring last year in Malta on the other.
Fond of their past closeness, especially during the 19th century when unemployed Maltese were forced to seek pastures anew in nearby North Africa, Maltese and French citizens of Maltese origin, who had to emigrate for the second time to France in the sixties of the 20th century, immediately recognise the popular affable expression Malta ħanina, ħobża u sardina (generous Malta, a loaf with sardines) from which the title was inspired. But ħanina is not the only word Mr Rondeau borrows from il-Malti in his French text.
In his chapter Bonġu għalikom the author playfully relates how the Maltese adopted the French morning and evening salutations of wishing each other a good day (bonġu) and good evening (bonswa) clearly illustrating the strength of influence the French community, foremost among them French knights, had left on the Maltese during 268 years of life under the Order of St John.
The author has a knack for making himself feel at home be it in Żebbuġ where the historical French ambassador’s residence is; Cottonera, the first home of the Order upon its arrival in the 16th century before building the new capital city Valletta; or Gozo, Malta’s petite soeur. In Vittoriosa Mr Rondeau laments the forgotten auberges in the city, in particular that of France.
He is invited by the mayor to see with his own eyes the restorations going on inside the building and proudly notes the Fleur-de-Lys still present on the fireplace.
Readers of this book will discover that Malta Ħanina is not just a guide book to the marvels of the Maltese archipelago – in its pages one can also meet the author in one of his most intimate moods.
French reviewers in Le Figaro Magazine, Le Point, Paris Match, Le Nouvel Observateur and Libération, who dedicated gen-erous space to this little literary treasure on Malta, recall their encounters with Mr Rondeau, the man, the believer, the inquisitor, the philosopher, the journalist in all the hues an author of Mr Rondeau’s dimension can gather after writing and editing so many articles in the French press and after a long list of publications.
Together with the love of his life, Noëlle, who shared his Malta experience, Mr Rondeau weaves his paragraphs into a tapestry of flowing verse floating down the river of impressions after meeting so many inhabitants and contemporary visitors to the island: politicians, journalists, historians, Mediterranean poets and authors, academics and bus-inessmen but also bird watchers, fishermen, boat people fleeing from troubled lands, performers and troubadours from Israel and Palestine, freedom fighters from emerging democracies and dedicated people giving a good service to humanity.
Żebbuġ never witnessed so much of Champagne, his region of residence in France; not only through the glittering glasses of the celebratory drink but also through the flavour of so many French men of letters, artistes – his friends – who came to Malta to report on our heritage and touristic appeal but also to sing, to play instruments, to interact with local intellectuals, politicians and members of the commercial sector, but also to discover the wealth of such a tiny spec on the map, which once was so close to France.
From time to time the book takes the reader aside and introduces him or her to shared opinions on so many subjects under the sun, such as Braudel who is quoted as saying, after visiting the island in 1972: the Mediterranean has always belonged to Malta; it is a little bit of Africa and is in Europe.
It is in the East and it is in the West.
For local readers in part-icular this book offers an unusual tour of the islands by an author who is fascinated by all that makes us Maltese, at times discovering tales which quite often elude even the inhabitants themselves.