Albert Gervais Archive

Item set

Type
Private collection
Title
Albert Gervais Archive
Description
Jen-I-Kouan – aka Albert Gervais – was a French Doctor who lived in Western China between 1919 and 1925. This private archive unveils this person’s memory through his photographic archives, texts and other documents.
content
This private collection includes:
- 2 photo binders
- 2 binders containing letters written after his trips to China. It includes letters to editors, to translators, and his personal correspondence.
- Personal notebooks
- Series of reports in “Voilà” periodical (October 1934): 1 printed issue, the rest are digitized photographs (French publishing house Gallimard Archives)
- 1 wooden book (wooden cover, handmade drawings and texts)

Albert Gervais, a French military doctor, originally compiled this archive. He was born in Marseille (France) in 31 December 1891 but his birth was officially declared the next day to gain a year. He died in Nice (France) the night of 25-26 November 1979. Taken between 1919 and 1925, the photographs of this archive document chiefly Sichuan province in Western China. Gervais (called Jen-I-Kouan in Chinese) was based in Chengdu, where he worked in a hospital managed by French missionaries while teaching Western Medicine to Chinese students. Back in France, he published several novels and journal articles (see references below) about his personal experience in China.

Today, Albert Gervais’ granddaughter (the independent journalist Aurore Staiger) holds and has been gathering information about this archive since 2015. She runs a blog in which she gives a fictional voice to Albert Gervais himself, as if he told directly the reader about his peregrination across China. This enables Staiger to shed light on specific documents from the archive (photographs, publications, letters…) in a discursive manner.

Staiger’s research about Albert Gervais archive was diffused in Chinese media, and she participated to conferences, more specifically at the Chine, Corée, Japon (CCJ), Centre d'études sur la Chine moderne et contemporaine – CECMC on February 2016.
https://soundcloud.com/user-820917017/conference-jen-i-kouan-medecin-francais-au-sichuan
Temporal Coverage
Twentieth century (dates CE)
Language
French
Chinese
References
Gervais, Albert. Une Fille De H'an. Paris: B. Grasset, 1928.

Gervais, Albert. Aesculape En Chine. Paris: Gallimard, 1953.

Gervais, Albert. L'ombre Du Ma-Koui. Paris : Gallimard, 1936.

Gervais, Albert. Aesculape En Chine Dans La Chine En Révolte. Paris: Gallimard, 1953.
location
Clermont-Ferrand

Items

Advanced search