The front side

The least we can say is that the archipelago is intriguing. The number of adventurers who have stopped there or mentioned it in their memoirs, from the very illustrious Claudius Ptolemy who lived at the very beginning of our era, to the no less famous Jacques-Yves Cousteau, much closer to us, is proof of this. It is also said that Ibn Battûta visited the Maldives in the 14th century, the time to marry - several times -

and to leave descendants, then, in the following century, the Chinese explorer Zheng He visited the archipelago in his turn.

However, at least three men prolonged their stay as much as possible in order to discern behind the paradisiacal scenery the traces of disappeared civilizations. The trained eye of Harry Charles Purvis Bell (1851-1937), a British subject whose three first names are often reduced to their simple initials, thus came to rest on strange engraved copper plates that had been discovered on Haddhunmathi Atoll and in the city of Malé, the "lōmāfānu." The archaeologist then returned to his first loves, epigraphy and linguistics, to try to decipher a script that had changed a lot since the 12th century, the estimated date of these remains. Thus, if Maldivian (divehi or dhivehi) is a language of Indo-Aryan origin strongly impregnated with external contributions, from Arabic, Sinhalese, but also from Portuguese, English or French, its written transcription has also evolved considerably, the reading direction has been reversed and it now uses an alphabet specific to it (thâna). Thor Heyerdahl (1914-2002), a Norwegian who gained some fame for the Kon-Tiki expedition he had mounted, also devoted himself to archaeological excavations in the Maldives, wanting to put forward hypotheses on the subject that had fascinated him all his life: to find clues confirming the displacement of populations that took place so long ago that human memory could not keep track of them. The fruit of his research was published by Albin Michel under the title Le Mystère des Maldives

but this work is unfortunately out of print. Finally, in 1979, a man from Spain, Xavier Romero-Frias, born in 1954 in Barcelona, settled on the island of Fua Mulaku. An anthropologist by training, he was particularly interested in the oral tradition, collecting and translating the tales entrusted to him by the natives whose language he had learned. He then went to India to research nearby myths, in order to determine from which peoples they had originated. His publications were nevertheless banned by the Maldivian government. Condemned according to scientists to be submerged one day by the waves, let's hope that the archipelago will not disappear with its secrets.

The back

The relative geographical and political isolation, added to the linguistic particularism, has certainly not benefited translations, which are non-existent in French for the time being. However, the archipelago has seen the birth of poets, and one of them who can claim the status of father of Maldivian literature is certainly Husain Salahuddin (1881-1948) who ensured, in both directions, his role as ferryman. He was a member of the Writers' Committee set up by President Mohamed Amin Didi, and founded and directed the first school in Malé, thus occupying an influential position that was reinforced by his involvement in politics. Husain Salahuddin transposed Arabic, Urdu and Persian texts into Divehi, but also arranged various writings to provide a biography of Muhammad in his language. As a careful collector of oral tradition, he transcribed popular legends into an epic dedicated to the mythical national hero, Sultan Muhammad Thakurufaanu Al Auzam, who drove the Portuguese out of the archipelago in the 16th century. Finally, he has complied with the requirements of the subtle Maldivian sung poetry which plays with anagrams, and with the respect of the "Boki Furaalhu Ali" which refers to the seven types of literature.

Bodufenvalhuge Sidi (1888-1970), considered the last great poet to master the art of "Raivaru" and to innovate in the composition of "lhen", also evolved in this highly refined style. He was above all recognized as one of the few who still understood the ancient island script, the "Dhivehi Akuru", whose rules he explained in a book of the same name. His first poetic experience was in political satire, and in 1925 he was associated, perhaps wrongly, with a plot against the current sultan, which led to a long exile of eight years on Hulhudheli. Sidi did not stop writing, however, even if he later became more polite, even trying his hand at the novel with Dillygey Ibrahim Didi ge Vaahaka or Maa Makunudu Bodu Isa ge Vaahaka.

Grammar and pedagogy were also central to the work of Muhammad Jameel Didi, who was born in 1915 and died in 1989. The national anthem also includes some of his verses. The portrait of this fertile period would not be complete without mentioning Aminath Faiza (1924-2011), who was also encouraged by the short-lived President Mohamed Amin Didi to continue along the path her uncle had opened up for her by encouraging her to write poetry as a teenager. Mother of Maldivian poetry, or "daisy flower" as it is called in the archipelago, she devoted her life to evoking love and religion as well as societal problems and national unity. Finally, we could mention Ibrahim Chihab (1926-1988), Saikuraa Ibrahim Naeem (1935-2008) or Abdul Rasheed Hussein born in 1946, three scholars who navigated between political life and cultural action through the writing of essays, novels or poems. While it is said that Rasheed Hussein now heads the Liyuntheringe Gulhun, a writers' association, the names that are now emerging are rather those of journalists such as Ali Rafeeq, editor of Haveeru Daily,

who received a National Award for Excellence by the government, or Hussein Fariyaaz, also commended in 2019 for his work in the sports field. This perhaps augurs a new openness to the world, although some of their colleagues have had run-ins with the judicial system, but at the same time, this shift probably remains indicative of a certain disinterest in Divehi, which is complex and less valued during schooling, in favour of English, the national second language, which does not yet seem to have produced any great works.