This is the novel I turn to when I am in need of cheering myself up. It is such a cosy, comfortable read: just right as we enter a long period of austerity. I love all the eccentric characters: volatile Uncle Matthew, vague Aunt Sadie, Lord Merlin and my favourite, charming Davey Warbeck. I love Nancy Mitford’s humour, eye for detail and her descriptive, elegant style of writing that captures an era long gone.
I especially love the scene when Linda arrives back at her Paris home to find her two old friends waiting for her in the drawing room who invite her for lunch the next day at the Ritz.
One boiling hot afternoon in July she arrived home wearing a new and particularly ravishing straw hat. It was large and simple with a wreath of flowers and two blue bows. Her right arm was full of roses and carnations, and in her left hand was a striped bandbox, containing another exquisite hat.
The novel is bitter-sweet, funny and tragic, set against the uncertainties of war; Linda’s happiness is fleeting as she finds the great love of her life too late.
When I first read this novel I laughed and laughed but now I smile, as I do when someone tells familiar jokes I thought I’d long forgotten. My sister Sarah loves this story too and it’s created a bond between us, recalling ‘the thin end of the wedge’, the diseased fossils and Uncle Matthew’s disapproval of Linda’s tulle ball-gown, ‘on the grounds that he had known three women burnt to death in tulle ball-dresses’.
It’s very comforting to know this book will always be around, whatever the future holds.
So the winter slowly passed. The spring came with extraordinary beauty, as always at Alconleigh, with a brilliance of colouring, a richness of life, that one had forgotten to expect during the cold winter months
Wednesday, 26 May 2010
Wednesday, 19 May 2010
Le Grand Meaulnes by Henri Alain-Fournier
I fell in love with this novel when I studied it for French A Level, aged seventeen, and it has haunted me ever since: comme des vagues sur un rocher desert, nos aventures…les jours les plus tourmentes et les plus chers de ma vie. I loved its wistful sadness evoking a ‘land of lost content’ in the misty French countryside – a place of abandoned chateaux and dovecotes at the turn of the century.
Yvonne de Galais, loved by both the adventurous Grand Meaulnes and his gentle friend, Francois Seurel, epitomised the heroine I longed to be: a princesse lointaine. The writer was inspired seeing a beautiful girl wearing a brown cloak by the River Seine one afternoon with whom he instantly fell in love, although she was already betrothed to someone else. She became his muse for Yvonne, the unrequited love of his life until he was killed in action in 1914 near Verdun. Yvonne de Galais has remained a constant role model, although thankfully my life has not been cut short so tragically as hers.
I loved Albicocco’s film, The Wanderer, based on the novel with its hazy photography of the Sologne and have seen it many times. Years ago I managed to buy a VHS copy of the film in Paris and had it converted to the English system. Thirty years after reading Le Grand Meaulnes my husband, daughter and I visited all the places associated with the novel; we made a little film, I wrote a long article, gave a talk and finally I was able to let it go. Or so I thought because it has surfaced again.
Later this year we are staying near Verdun and I hope to visit the writer’s grave at Saint-Remy la Calonne. His body was found in a mass grave in 1991 where he had been buried by German soldiers and has since been given a proper burial. It is time to read the novel again. In French, if I am brave enough.
Yvonne de Galais, loved by both the adventurous Grand Meaulnes and his gentle friend, Francois Seurel, epitomised the heroine I longed to be: a princesse lointaine. The writer was inspired seeing a beautiful girl wearing a brown cloak by the River Seine one afternoon with whom he instantly fell in love, although she was already betrothed to someone else. She became his muse for Yvonne, the unrequited love of his life until he was killed in action in 1914 near Verdun. Yvonne de Galais has remained a constant role model, although thankfully my life has not been cut short so tragically as hers.
I loved Albicocco’s film, The Wanderer, based on the novel with its hazy photography of the Sologne and have seen it many times. Years ago I managed to buy a VHS copy of the film in Paris and had it converted to the English system. Thirty years after reading Le Grand Meaulnes my husband, daughter and I visited all the places associated with the novel; we made a little film, I wrote a long article, gave a talk and finally I was able to let it go. Or so I thought because it has surfaced again.
Later this year we are staying near Verdun and I hope to visit the writer’s grave at Saint-Remy la Calonne. His body was found in a mass grave in 1991 where he had been buried by German soldiers and has since been given a proper burial. It is time to read the novel again. In French, if I am brave enough.
The Mozart Question by Michael Morpurgo
This author generally writes for children but, as his well-known tale War Horse demonstrates, his stories are loved by adults too.
The Mozart Question, a little hardback edition illustrated by Michael Foreman is one of my favourites. Paolo Levi, a world-famous violinist, grew up in Venice. Throughout his childhood his parents kept a dark secret. The violinist unfolds their story to a young reporter and, for the first time, reveals the answer to the Mozart Question he has never answered till now.
The sight of a small boy listening to a busker near the Accademia Bridge in Venice inspired the writer to develop his story. As the horrors of Auschwitz are revealed Mozart’s sublime music takes on a sombre tone. But in time it soars again to fly free. The violinist tells the reporter:
"At my fiftieth birthday concert in London I shall be playing Mozart, and I shall be playing it on Mama’s violin, and I shall play it so well that he will love it, they will all love it, wherever they are."
This story captures the atmosphere of Venice, one of my favourite cities, as much as others that have caught my attention over the years: The Wings of the Dove, Miss Garnett’s Angel, Don’t Look Now. It is a mysterious, compelling place that draws me back time and again.
The Mozart Question, a little hardback edition illustrated by Michael Foreman is one of my favourites. Paolo Levi, a world-famous violinist, grew up in Venice. Throughout his childhood his parents kept a dark secret. The violinist unfolds their story to a young reporter and, for the first time, reveals the answer to the Mozart Question he has never answered till now.
The sight of a small boy listening to a busker near the Accademia Bridge in Venice inspired the writer to develop his story. As the horrors of Auschwitz are revealed Mozart’s sublime music takes on a sombre tone. But in time it soars again to fly free. The violinist tells the reporter:
"At my fiftieth birthday concert in London I shall be playing Mozart, and I shall be playing it on Mama’s violin, and I shall play it so well that he will love it, they will all love it, wherever they are."
This story captures the atmosphere of Venice, one of my favourite cities, as much as others that have caught my attention over the years: The Wings of the Dove, Miss Garnett’s Angel, Don’t Look Now. It is a mysterious, compelling place that draws me back time and again.
The Snow Goose by Paul Gallico
It is not a story that falls easily into sequence.
For the sea has claimed its own and spreads its rippled blanket over the site, and the great white bird with the black-tipped pinions that saw it all from the beginning to the end has returned to the dark, frozen silences of the northlands whence it came.
The Snow Goose is a beautifully written, poignant tale set against the background of the Dunkirk invasion. Frith’s unspoken love for Rhayader, a lonely artist, the snow goose’s constant presence and the haunting landscape of the Essex coast all fuse together to make this story as memorable now as in 1941,when it surfaced.
Gallico’s spare, poetic writing evokes a desolate sadness of both time and space: the sense of place of a war-torn past.
Greys and blues and soft greens are the colours, for when the skies are dark in the long winters, the many waters of the beaches and marshes reflect the cold and sombre colour.
The Snow Goose gives me everything I need: a poignant story, a sense of place, beautiful descriptions and authentic characters drawn from the landscape. Less is more: forty pages to be read again and savoured with as much joy as when I first came across it in 1972.
For the sea has claimed its own and spreads its rippled blanket over the site, and the great white bird with the black-tipped pinions that saw it all from the beginning to the end has returned to the dark, frozen silences of the northlands whence it came.
The Snow Goose is a beautifully written, poignant tale set against the background of the Dunkirk invasion. Frith’s unspoken love for Rhayader, a lonely artist, the snow goose’s constant presence and the haunting landscape of the Essex coast all fuse together to make this story as memorable now as in 1941,when it surfaced.
Gallico’s spare, poetic writing evokes a desolate sadness of both time and space: the sense of place of a war-torn past.
Greys and blues and soft greens are the colours, for when the skies are dark in the long winters, the many waters of the beaches and marshes reflect the cold and sombre colour.
The Snow Goose gives me everything I need: a poignant story, a sense of place, beautiful descriptions and authentic characters drawn from the landscape. Less is more: forty pages to be read again and savoured with as much joy as when I first came across it in 1972.
Tuesday, 18 May 2010
Gigi by Colette
Last week I spent a day in Paris with a couple of American friends from Massachusetts. I had forgotten how easy it is to travel there on Eurostar and so much more convenient now trains leave from St. Pancras and are even faster. In the old days we had to take a taxi to Waterloo to catch an early train – now we rolled on to the Victoria line around 6 and caught the 6.55 train. Despite losing an hour we arrived at the Gare du Nord at 10.15. A short taxi ride later we were sitting at a café in Montmartre as the bells of Sacre-Coeur rang out for Ascension Day. I was seventeen when I first visited the Place du Tertre and little has changed – it still reminds me of a film set from Mistral’s Daughter! The rest of the day was swallowed up with lunch in the Boulevard Saint Germain, tea in the Champs Elysees and taking the hop-on/off bus tour from the Eiffel Tower to the Trocadero. How lovely Paris looks from an open top bus – usually I walk miles through all the arrondissements but I was able to savour the impressive architecture on a grand scale and all the pleached horse-chestnut trees bursting into blossom along every boulevard. And then we passed Maxim’s, the famous belle epoque restaurant and I was reminded of Colette’s novella, Gigi.
Written in 1944, it describes a young Parisian girl, Gilberte, being groomed for a career as a courtesan by her grandmother at the turn of the century. Gigi’s transformation from ingenue is charmingly portrayed with a light touch throughout as when, for example, wealthy, handsome Gaston Lachaille buys her dresses for her prepared launch into Parisian society as his new mistress.
The full sleeves and wide-flounced skirt of blue-and-white striped silk rustled deliciously, and Gilberte delighted in pecking at her sleeves to puff them out just below the shoulder.
He laughs, and says she reminds him of a performing monkey, admitting to preferring her in her old tartan dress. Gigi is reluctant to enter into her new role; she loves Gaston, an old family friend, too much to be cast aside when he becomes bored with her, as may inevitably happen, but as she comes to terms with her future position he asks for her hand in marriage. For the first time in his life he has truly fallen in love.
Gigi was made into a film in 1958 starring Maurice Chevalier, Louis Jourdan and Leslie Caron. My mother took me to see Gigi at the cinema and I fell in love with Cecil Beaton’s beautiful costumes, the elegance and ambience of Paris, the most romantic of cities. The city retains that charm for me, all seasons, all weathers. I long to return. And if you’ve been there many times before and seen all the monuments, museums and galleries one day could well be long enough to savour its charms again.
Written in 1944, it describes a young Parisian girl, Gilberte, being groomed for a career as a courtesan by her grandmother at the turn of the century. Gigi’s transformation from ingenue is charmingly portrayed with a light touch throughout as when, for example, wealthy, handsome Gaston Lachaille buys her dresses for her prepared launch into Parisian society as his new mistress.
The full sleeves and wide-flounced skirt of blue-and-white striped silk rustled deliciously, and Gilberte delighted in pecking at her sleeves to puff them out just below the shoulder.
He laughs, and says she reminds him of a performing monkey, admitting to preferring her in her old tartan dress. Gigi is reluctant to enter into her new role; she loves Gaston, an old family friend, too much to be cast aside when he becomes bored with her, as may inevitably happen, but as she comes to terms with her future position he asks for her hand in marriage. For the first time in his life he has truly fallen in love.
Gigi was made into a film in 1958 starring Maurice Chevalier, Louis Jourdan and Leslie Caron. My mother took me to see Gigi at the cinema and I fell in love with Cecil Beaton’s beautiful costumes, the elegance and ambience of Paris, the most romantic of cities. The city retains that charm for me, all seasons, all weathers. I long to return. And if you’ve been there many times before and seen all the monuments, museums and galleries one day could well be long enough to savour its charms again.
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