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1994
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J. Dunmore, « Utopie française, auteur anglais ? », Dix-Huitième Siècle, ID : 10.3406/dhs.1994.2006
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John Dunmore : A French utopia with an English author ? The anonymous Fragmens du dernier voyage de La Pérouse (Quimper, an V) purported to give details of the discovery of Blue Island by La Pérouse' s expedition in 1788. It has been suggested that the author was Fr Receveur, member of the expedition or A. A. Dupetit-Thouars ; recently J. Gury put forward the name of Jacques Cambry. But whoever it was, he knew A Narrative of the Expedition to Botany Bay (1789) by Watkin Tench, who had met La Pérouse at Botany Bay and knew fluent French. An analysis of these works and of his correspondence has led I.McLaren to suggest that Tench himself was the author of Fragmens, which would present the unusual case of a French Utopian tale being written in wartime by an Englishman.