A fascinating document of an extraordinary life, Memoirs of a Breton Peasant reads with the liveliness of a novel and bristles with the vigour of an opinionated autodidact from the very lowest level of peasant society. 19th century Brittany was a place seemingly frozen in the Middle Ages and backwards by most French standards. Formal education among rural society was either unavailable or dismissed as unnecessary, while the church and local myth defined most people’s reasoning and motivation. Jean-Marie Deguignet is unique as a literate Breton peasant.