A Literary Guide to Provence - Hardcover

Vitaglione, Daniel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0804010358 ISBN 13: 9780804010351

Publisher: Swallow Press, 2001

Synopsis

Provence through the eyes of its writers—those who wrote of it in Provençal or French and also those visitors who were moved by its beauty—that is the inspiration behind A Literary Guide to Provence. In this compact travel guide, Marseilles native Daniel Vitaglione presents a literary panorama of the region of southern France from the Avignon of Mistral to Colette’s St. Tropez.

Including such sites as the birthplace of Nostradamus and the ruins of the Marquis de Sade’s castle, A Literary Guide to Provence presents a thousand years of history entwined with maps and photos that provide readers on tour with a sense of the historical import of this most beautiful of regions even as they experience it firsthand.

Both authors of Provençal ancestry and those who came to love and live in Provence are featured in this comprehensive and enchanting picture of the garden place of France. The Riviera enticed Virginia Woolf. Toulon inspired two novels by Georges Sand. Robert Louis Stevenson resided in Hyères, as did Edith Wharton. Le Lavandou was Willa Cather’s favorite place. F. Scott Fitzgerald lived in St. Raphael and Juan-les-Pins, where he wrote Tender is the Night.

This illustrated guide follows in these writers’ footsteps, and the practical information on hotels and restaurants (phones, web sites, email, etc.) make it the ideal traveling companion for armchair tourists and those who cannot resist seeing Provence for themselves.

About this title

About the Author

Daniel Vitaglione was born in Marseilles, attended the Lycée Thiers and the University of Provence, and received his Ph.D. in comparative literature at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland. He has published A Dictionary of Idioms French American, American French. He now lives in Roquebrune in Provence.

Reviews

Provence has enthralled centuries of writers, from the troubadours, Petrarch, Nostradamus and Frederic Mistral to Sade, Flaubert, Camus, Cather, Beckett and Woolf. Daniel Vitaglione (A Dictionary of Idioms: French-American, American-French), who lives in the region, tracks its eminent history in A Literary Guide to Provence. He provides information both practical (hotels and restaurants) and cultural (festival listings), plus some background on the region's language, Proven?al, still spoken "in remote villages and among the older population." Even better, however, Vitaglione provides a town-by-town tour of literary-historical sites: the abandoned monastery outside of Saint-Tropez, for example, where Guy de Maupassant encountered an elderly couple who had been in hiding since their youthful elopement. 15 maps, 35 b&w photos; 36 color photos not seen by PW. ( Sept.)
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Vitaglione, the author of several books on French literature and language (The Literature of Provence, McFarland, 2000), takes the reader on a literary ramble of Provence, visiting the land that inspired countless authors, both native-born and foreign. Colette, Virginia Woolf, Samuel Beckett, and F. Scott Fitzgerald are just a few of the better-known literary visitors who wrote fiction, poetry, and letters about Provence and its people. However, Provence has also produced many regional authors, most of whom are not as well known abroad, including Fr d ric Mistral, who championed the use of the local Proven al language. Excerpts of letters and diaries and examples of poetry are included, both in the original French or Proven al and translated into English. Practical travel information is minimal, most often consisting of hotel and restaurant names and their phone numbers. The black-and-white photographs are mostly portraits, although the publisher has indicated that 36 color photographs will be included in the final edition. There are better guides for planning a trip to Provence, such as those by DK and Fodor's, but this is a pleasant and inspiring armchair trip for anyone who has seen Provence and loved it. For public libraries. Linda M. Kaufmann, Massachusetts Coll. of Liberal Arts Lib., North Adams
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Swallow Press
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804010358
• ISBN 13: 9780804010351
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 240