Tucholsky and France Book

I did not think I would enjoy this book as much as I did but, by the end, I felt as if the byways and paths of Provence on which they author loved to travel were equally familiar to me.

My familiarization with the region of Provence had previously been limited to the beautiful camera shots from motorcycle and helicopter on one of many days the Tour de France travels through each year. But, as I have challenged myself to read a work by every Nobel Laureate for Literature, my task fell to finding an English translation of Frederic Mistral who was the Nobel recipient for 1904. I confess having limited knowledge of the works of Mistral but was intrigued to discover that he was the spiritual leader of a group of late 19th Century French writers who took it upon themselves to rescue the dying language of Provencal.

While sharing much with French, Provencal is actually more akin to Latin and the people of Provence more derivative of ancient Romans in style and culture then they are French. In this volume, Mistral's memoirs are primarily of the turbulent period of his youth in the second half of the 19th Century when he found himself among a cavalcade of kindred writers and artists, mostly men but also a number of women, who meticulously crafted Provencal dictionaries, encyclopedias, almanacs and s treasure trove of stories and music from Provence in the face of a nation striving hard to make France indelibly French.

And for his efforts, Mistral was awarded the Nobel for 1904 and,in the process, donated all of the money to a folklore museum he founded in the ancient Roman city of Arles, the cultural heart of Provence.

I greatly admire Mistral's quixotic effort that, in the end, rescued a language from the inevitable assimilation of the dominant Francophone. His writing is lovely and he was made me anxious for those soon to come summer days when the peloton will push through Aix and Avignon and the towering moonscape of Mont Ventoux.

E l'innoucenci, coume es bello!

And how beautiful is innocence!