“Surfing landed in France during the shooting of a film”

How did surf appeal to Western society?

He was born in the North Pacific, within the Hawaiian civilization, the founding myth of which affirms that the ocean is at the origin of life. From the 19th century, when the first American and British tourists saw the natives “walking on the water”, they want to try it and sometimes relate their experiences. We can cite writers like Mark Twain around 1860, Jack London in 1907 or Agatha Christie in 1922. From 1910, the practice was popularized in California by the swimming champion Duke Kahanamoku.

When does he arrive in France?

In 1956, the Californian screenwriter Peter Viertel came to Biarritz the adaptation of the Sun also rises, Ernest Hemingway brings a board in his luggage. He ends up breaking it in the rocks and had it repaired by a local cabinetmaker. The object will then be replicated and an entire generation will make its weapons on the waves of the Basque coast: the “Tontons surfers”, of which scientist Joël de Rosnay is a part.

How is this passion diffuse?

The practice is institutionalized with the creation of the French Surf Federation in 1964. It is also carried by the hippie movement which advocates the return to nature. From the 1980s, specialized magazines as Surf session Present skiing as an ideal of discovery of new horizons and new people. But also an ideal of life without work, depending on whether we size the road with three times nothing or that we rest on family or financial capital.