Saint Lucian children's author Dawn French and her good friend Peanut.
AMONG THE JEWELS that make up the Caribbean archipelago is Saint Lucia—the Helen of the West—so called because, like Helen of Troy, it is very beautiful. It is also home of the famous Pitons and two Nobel laureates. It further boasts an imaginative and accomplished children’s author by the name of Dawn French who is the creator of the Peanut series, a collection of stories about a fictitious little girl nicknamed Peanut, whose actual name is Sabine Clementine James.
I first met French when we were finalists in the Ducreay Foundation’s inaugural annual Caribbean Literary Works Competition for children’s authors, and I was intrigued by her entry, which featured Peanut. What was even more fascinating was that French had written over two hundred Peanut stories, and her entry that year was based on a real-life little Nigerian girl called Hanhah who suffers from sickle cell anemia. In French’s story Peanut and the Pen Pal, Hanhah is in the United States to have a bone marrow transplant, and Peanut befriends Hanhah and becomes her pen pal. This meshing of the fictitious Peanut and the actual Hanhah brings Peanut’s character to life in a remarkable way, especially since, at the end of the story, French invites readers to send emails to the real Hanhah and encourage her along the way in her difficult fight—which, by the way, they did!
“They were very concerned when they did not hear back from Hanhah in a timely fashion,” French explained. “And I had to tell them that she was a sick little girl who was not always well enough to respond right away.”
I wanted to find out more about French, and she turned out to be just as interesting as her stories. In this wonderful, technological age, we were able to link up via Signal, and she in fact read like the who’s who of distinguished Saint Lucian citizens. She actually has a place in the 100 Saint Lucian Women’s Hall of Honour for her contribution to education and history for children. The 100 Saint Lucian Women’s Hall of Honour was created in 2021 in recognition of Saint Lucian women, both living and dead, who have made invaluable contributions to the island nation. French was among the first members to be inducted.
“I am a retired civil servant,” French informed me. “I was born in Saint Lucia and started writing at the age of six. At one point, I was deputy director and then director of NEMO Saint Lucia [the island’s National Emergency Management Organisation]. I later became Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Culture and Creative Industries.”
It was her work with NEMO that inspired the character Peanut, when French was deployed to Haiti after Hurricane Matthew devastated that country in 2016.
“At the time, Creole speakers were needed to assist in the cleanup, and I had deployed out with CDEMA [the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Response],” she said. One night as she sat at a table in Haiti eating peanuts, the character came to her.
The Peanut Pledge
“When I deployed out to Haiti, I was enrolled in a writer’s workshop sponsored by the Canadian government for people who were interested in becoming writers,” French elaborated. “On rejoining the class after returning from Haiti, I wrote my first Peanut story, which was called Peanut and the Storm. This story was inspired by the storm that had just hit Haiti and came about because, in working with NEMO, I realized that there was not much information on disaster preparedness for children.”
Out of this simple Peanut character came the Peanut series, which gave birth to the Peanut Pledge after Hurricane Maria hit Dominica in 2017.
“Once a year at the end of May, I ask my friends to pledge twenty dollars towards one of my Peanut stories,” French said to me. “I then use the money to cover printing costs, and I give the books away to children who cannot afford them.”
When she was deployed to Dominica in 2017 following Hurricane Maria, French discovered that all the libraries had been destroyed by the hurricane. With no books for the children to read, she decided to send them one of her titles.
“I selected Peanut and the Bird, and aimed to send twelve copies, but with the help of friends I ended up donating eighty-five copies instead,” French said. “The books have been translated into French Creole, French and Portuguese by the respective embassies.” (The Spanish and German versions should also be available at some point.)
Peanut, who earned this moniker because she is tiny, goes to the fictitious Jean Baptiste Bideau Combined School. French has shared Peanut’s adventures on Saint Lucian radio at Christmastime and has taken part in the Bocas Lit Fest in Trinidad. At this, the island’s premier literary festival, French read A Christmas Haunting, which features a seventeen-year-old Peanut. (Peanut, it must be noted, is always eight years old in the Peanut series. However, in the spin-off series, she ages.)
Children help with creative process
Peanut is definitely French’s muse. Topics such as sickle cell anemia, Alzheimer’s, dyslexia, climate change, domestic violence, and reparations all figure in her work, and she is careful to conduct background research on all her topics beforehand.
“My Peanut series targets eight- to twelve-year-olds, and with ten embassies in Saint Lucia I have written stories which have featured the countries of those ten organizations,” French stated. In July 2020, she participated in Trinidad’s “Read to Me TT” on Facebook. The program involves a different person reading to the children every night.
“The children love the series. They give me ideas on what to write, and their responses are always positive.” In fact, it was when she read Peanut and the Pen Pal to them and suggested that they email the real-life Hanhah that the children eagerly did so.
“In 2021 the Peanut Pledge went to the children of Saint Vincent and Saint Lucia, and my goal was to divide five hundred books equally between the two islands,” said French. “So each island received two hundred and fifty copies of a colouring book titled Peanut and the Anti-bully Day. A private enterprise shipped the copies to the islands free of charge.”
I asked French whether she had written other children’s stories about the pandemic. She has written a total of fifteen books. “They were triggered by what happened when the virus was declared a pandemic in March 2020,” she explained. “Each story deals with a different topic about COVID. Peanut and the Shutdown, for example, shows a child’s reaction to the closing of schools and businesses through Peanut’s eyes.”
Peanut and the pandemic
In this particular story, French does a brilliant job of having Peanut’s dad explain to her why these places must be closed and why it is important to wash their hands. This is followed by clearly illustrated pages showing exactly how to do this while singing the “Happy Birthday” song, to ensure hands are washed for at least twenty seconds.
Other books cover topics such as why wearing a mask is necessary and what a vaccination is. One story even explains the difference between an epidemic and a pandemic.
“In Peanut and the Professors, Peanut and her friends ask PAHO [Pan American Health Organization] officials and professors from the University of the West Indies questions about COVID-19. The questions were actually posed by my friends’ children, and I asked doctors for the answers before I wrote the story,” French said. “When one child wanted to know if the family’s pet dog could catch COVID, I spoke to a real-life vet to find the answer.”
French, who calls herself Dawn “Rising Sun” French, is definitely a bright star in the constellation of Caribbean children’s writers. I am pleased to have met up with her, and to know that the children of our region have such a caring and accomplished writer rooting for them. Her books can be bought on Amazon and are also available as e-books. Readers can also tune in to YouTube to hear some of Peanut’s adventures.
