With the cartoonist Christian Maucler, Jean-Pierre Costille, history and geography teacher at the Jules-Haag high school, co-signs the comic strip Le Doubs, a land of history.
How were you able to summarize the history of the Doubs, from antiquity to the present day, in 46 pages?
We have retained the “expected” – César, Vauban, Courbet… –, while putting the spotlight on little-known figures, such as Jeanne Oudot, this teenager from Mancenans who kept a fascinating diary during the Occupation.
So you also tried to mix the small and the big story?
Yes, for example when we approach the French Revolution, we talk about the local clashes that echoed it. We also wanted to emphasize the key role of the campaign. Since Gallo-Roman times, it has held a central place, as evidenced by the agricultural villa discovered in Chaucenne, during work on the LGV. The countryside will also play a decisive role in the era of industrialization.
The pages of your comic strip are particularly lively…
We wanted to be educational, without being talkative. I know from experience that works like A Chinese Life allow my students to identify historical facts in a few images. Comics are the art of conciseness; history is the art of nuance. With Christian, we tried to reconcile the two (smiles)…
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