ABOUT THE AUTHOR AND THE COMPANY The performance of The Man THE AUTHOR ABOVE: The narrator sets the scene at the beginning of the performance. What can Who Planted Trees that you will Jean Giono, the only son of a you tell about the setting based on what experience was adapted from a cobbler and a laundress, was one you see in the photo? short French novel by writer Jean of France’s greatest writers. He Giono. The company that created wrote stories, essays, poetry, the stage adaptation is Puppet plays, filmscripts, translations and THE SHOW’S State Theatre from Scotland. over thirty novels, many of which CREATORS have been translated into English. Puppet State Theatre was Read on to learn more about the founded in Edinburgh, Scotland in author and the creators of the Giono was a pacifist, meaning he 2003 by Richard Medrington, a stage performance. did not believe that conflict should professional puppeteer since be resolved through violence. He 1984. In 2006 he teamed up with was twice imprisoned in France Rick Conte and Ailie Cohen to for speaking out at the outset and develop an adaptation of Jean conclusion of World War II. Giono's The Man Who Planted Trees, which has travelled to all He was born in 1895 in the little corners of the United Kingdom, city of Provence, and died there, Ireland, Bermuda, Malaysia, and too, in 1970. the United States of America. AWARDS: AWARDS: Prix Bretano Eco Prize for Creativity 2007 Prix de Monaco (for the most Total Theatre Award for Story outstanding collected work by Theatre 2008 a French writer) Best Children's Show: Légion d’Honneur Brighton Festival 2009 Jean Giono, the author of The Man Who Member of Academie Victor Award for best show: Planted Trees. Image courtesy of mots.extraits.free.fr. Goncourt 2009 International Performing Arts for Youth showcase “I wrote this story to make people love trees, or more precisely to make people love planting trees.” -Jean Giono Des Moines Performing Arts The Man Who Planted Trees Curriculum Guide ABOUT SCOTLAND The Man Who Planted Trees is KNOWN FOR ABOVE: Scotland’s largest lake, Loch Lomond, surrounded by mountains. coming to Des Moines from the Scotland is also famous for its Image courtesy of loch-lomond.net. international company Puppet clans, kilts, medieval castles, and State Theatre, which is from poetry. OTHER FACTS Scotland. Learn more about Scotland prior to seeing the Well-known people from Scotland Currency: Pound Sterling (£) show. include: Walter Scott Official Language: English GEOGRAPHY Robert Louis Stevenson Scotland is in north-west Europe Arthur Conan Doyle Largest lake: Loch Lomond and is part of the United Kingdom. David Hume (24 miles long) It shares a land border to the The actor Sean Connery south with England and is National Animal: Unicorn surrounded by the North Sea on the east and the Atlantic Ocean on the west. Scotland is a mountainous country that is famous for its fresh water lochs (lakes). There are over 600 square miles of them. (One of the most famous is Loch Ness, where a mysterious monster is said to live.) EDINBURGH Scotland’s capital is Edinburgh (which is also the city where Puppet State Theatre is based). Theater lovers from around the world come to Edinburgh for its famous theater festival. Other major cities are Aberdeen, Dundee, and Glasgow. Des Moines Performing Arts The Man Who Planted Trees Curriculum Guide ABOUT TREES, pg. 1 Author Jean Giono once said that TREES AS HISTORIANS GROWTH RINGS he wrote The Man Who Planted Trees keep track of history. As A narrow ring indicates a Trees because he wanted to “to they grow, trees record weather, season in which the tree grew make people love trees, or more physical events and the passage very little, during a drought, precisely to make people love of time. Some species, such as for example. planting trees.” the bristlecone pine, can live to be A wider growth ring indicates thousands of years old. a season in which the tree Read on to learn more about grew a great deal. trees and the many amazing A tree records “memories” within Trees growing in regions with things that trees do for us and the structure of its trunk. no distinct seasonal change, our world. Everything that impacts the tree such as tropical rainforests, throughout its life – from insects, do not have annual growth wounds and disease to floods and rings because their growth is WHAT IS A TREE? fire – leaves its mark. fairly constant. A tree is a woody perennial plant. A tree usually has a single stem Sometimes the impact will result or trunk from which limbs or in rapid or slower growth, which is branches sprout some distance shown by different ring sizes in from the ground. Limbs and the cross-section of a tree. branches carry a spreading crown Trees growing in regions where of leaves. A tree is a living thing there are marked seasonal with its own natural life cycle changes record their growth in through which it germinates, rings. In these regions trees have grows and dies. Stages include: distinct period of growth and dormancy. A growth ring usually 1. Seed appears each year in dry or cold 2. Sprout weather with the outer rings the 3. Sapling most recent. 4. Mature Tree Image courtesy of idahoforests.org. 5. Snag (Dead Tree) 6. Rotting Log ABOUT TREES, cont. pg. 12 Which of the stages of a tree’s life cycle are depicted in the illustration, above? Des Moines Performing Arts The Man Who Planted Trees Curriculum Guide ABOUT TREES, pg. 2 MINERAL AND NUTRIENT ABOVE: Hikers walks through an old- BENEFITS OF TREES growth forest. Trees are amazing and provide RECYCLING many important benefits to the Throughout their lives, trees cycle and utilize minerals and nutrients earth and all living things: MEDICINES from the air, water, and soil. Trees provide substances with CLEAN WATER medicinal value. For example, Trees’ hair-like root fibers help HABITAT FOR WILDLIFE taxol, a drug extracted from the filter groundwater. They trap Trees and forests provide homes bark of the yew, is used in treating nutrients and pollutants that are for many different species of cancer. potential contaminants. Tree roots animals. filter pollutants out of soil, ECONOMY producing clean water. RECREATION AND HEALTH Making room for trees in our cities Forests are great places for provides job opportunities and a CLEAN AIR activities such as hiking, healthier environment. The forest Trees produce oxygen and absorb backpacking, skiing, hunting, and industry also provides jobs for carbon dioxide. They also capture bird watching. Looking at trees many people, from cabinetmakers particulates (dust, pollen, makes people feel better. Studies to homebuilders. Trees planted for pollutants). have shown that hospital patients energy conservation help who can see trees outside their consumers save money. SOIL PROTECTION AND windows tend to recover more NUTRIENTS quickly than those who look out ENERGY Tree roots hold soil in place so it on pavement and buildings. Trees are used to shade homes cannot be easily blown away by and businesses, keeping them wind or washed away by water. cool and conserving energy. In Without trees, heavy rains can some parts of the world, trees are wash soil into streams and rivers, the main source of fuel for creating avenues for nutrient cooking food, warming houses, pollution and habitat destruction, and running small businesses. and increasing the likelihood of flooding. The decaying of dead tree parts returns nutrients to the soil. LEFT: Tree roots below the ground hold soil in place. Des Moines Performing Arts The Man Who Planted Trees Curriculum Guide VOCABULARY PUPPETRY & THEATER FROM THE SHOW: linden tree: a type of tree that mouth puppet: a charcoal: a grows abundant puppet that has fuel made by bright green an open-able and humans from leaves, and moving mouth. wood that has produces nectar “Dog” is an been slowly -bearing flowers example of a burned to that smell like mouth puppet. “carbonize” it. honey in After the wood summer. The A linden tree grows Image courtesy of glogster.com. linden is known near a fountain at the multi- has burned, as a “healing” center of Vergons, sensory: the resulting black ashy material tree, for it’s Elzéard’s prosperous appealing to can be burned at temperatures of and happy town, heart-shaped multiple 2000 degrees Fahrenheit or more. when the narrator leaves, sweet visits it at the end of senses; may Unchecked use of charcoal has smell, and the story. Image courtesy of draw on a Image courtesy of stephaniebee- led to deforestation. dreamstime.com. by.com. because the combination Charcoalburners were responsible shiny sides of the leaves face of sight, for the ruins and desolation in down, for poets to dream hearing, smell, touch and taste. Elzéard’s world. underneath. object manipulation: the art of lavender: World Wars I and II: World War I taking normal, everyday objects, a hardy and was a major war centered in turning them into found puppets, fragrant wild Europe from 1914 to 1918. World and operating them onstage. flowering plant that thrives in War II was a global war that began in 1939 and ended in 1945. table-top puppetry: puppetry places with little Elzéard continues to plant trees performed on top of a table. The water and Image courtesy of and care for his growing forest character of the Member of shade. Lavender thisoldhouse.com. despite hardships as a result of Parliament, pictured above, is an was the only the fighting in Europe during both example of a table-top puppet in thing that grew in Eleazard’s land of the World Wars.