Robert Service biography penned by great-granddaughter

The first time Charlotte Service-Longepe read The Shooting of Dan McGrew, written by Yukon's most famous poet, Robert Service, she struggled. 

"I have to admit, I had difficulties to understand," she laughs. 

That's because Service-Longepe, whose native language is French, was reading her great-grandfather's whimsical, rhyme-riddled poems in English.

Now Service-Longepe, who lives in Monaco in the south of France, has written a biography about her great-grandfather for the French-speaking world. La vie aventureuse de Robert W. Service is due out in May. 

As a child, Service-Longepe says she was always fascinated by her great-grandfather, but she had no idea how famous he was in the Yukon. As she grew older, she became aware of how little of his work was available in French. Only the Trail of '98 has been translated, she says. 

"I thought, such a pity that nothing was available and I was feeling that something could be done for him to promote, a bit, his memory." 

Book includes new insights

Although there are other books written on Robert Service, Service-Longepe says her biography is the first one to be written in French. It will also have new insights that haven't be written about before.  

She says she's lucky to have access to family archives, including Service's photographs, personal letters and documents. 

"My grandmother and my mother have kept everything about Robert Service." 

Service-Longepe hopes her book will inspire some French speakers the way her great-grandfather's poems have inspired her.  

​Service was born in England in 1874 and travelled extensively but some of his most famous poems — including The Shooting of Dan McGrew and The Cremation of Sam McGee — were written during his time in the Yukon between 1904 and 1911.

Service lived his later years in France, where he died in 1958 at age 84. 

Service-Longepe has not yet been to the Yukon, but says maybe she will visit next year. 

"I really wish to come and to visit and discover. I believe it's really important to know all those places I wrote about, to feel even more his poetry," she says. 

Although the biography is only being printed in French at the moment, Service-Longepe would like it to be translated into English eventually. She's also working on translating some of Service's poems into French.