The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

By choosing to relay the narrative through letters, telegrams, cable communications, and notes, the authors signal the power of the written word to unify individuals across space and time. Events, conversations, developments, and actions occur outside of what is reported within the letters, whatever details might be omitted, the words the characters share form relationships and keep them whole. In The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, the most important of those relationships are built around a shared love of reading. Juliet writes: “That’s what I love about reading: one tiny thing will interest you in a book, and that tiny thing will lead you onto another book, and another bit there will lead you onto a third book. It’s geometrically progressive—all with no end in sight, and for no other reason than sheer enjoyment” (21). The same kind of geometrical progression can be found in the relationships the characters forge throughout the novel, almost all of which revolve around writing and reading in some way. Dawsey first writes Juliet because he owns her Charles Lamb book; Mark tries to woo Juliet with flowers and then letters because he was fascinated by Juliet’s column as Izzy Bickerstaff; the Society’s inception is due to Elizabeth’s love of reading; Dawsey and Christian become unlikely friends because of their shared love for Charles Lamb’s writings; and the Society members, some of whom were not close before, become intimate friends thanks to the books they share.