In France Profound: The Long History of a House, a Mountain Town, and a People

by T.D. Allman

From the National Book Award-longlisted author of Finding Florida, a sparkling, sweeping chronicle of the author’s life and discoveries in an ancient town in “Deep France,” from nearby prehistoric caves to medieval dynastic struggles to the colorful characters populating the area today

When T. D. Allman purchased an 800-year-old house in the mountain village of Lauzerte in southwestern France, he aimed to find refuge from the world's tumults. Instead, he found that humanity’s most telling melodramas, from the paleolithic to the post-modern, were graven in its stones and visible from its windows. 

Indeed, the history of France can be viewed from the perspective of Lauzerte and its surrounding area—just as Allman, from one window, can see Lauzerte unfold before him in the Place des Cornières, where he watches performances of the opera Tosca and each Saturday buys produce from “Fred, the Foie Gras Guy;” while from the other side facing the Pyrenees he surveys the fated landscape that generated many events giving birth to the modern world. The dynastic struggles of Eleanor of Aquitaine, he finds, led to Lauzerte’s remarkably progressive charter issued in 1241, which even then enshrined human rights in its 51 articles. From Eleanor’s marriage to English king Henry II in 1154 dates the never-ending melodrama pitting English arrogance against French resistance; in 2016 Brexit demonstrated that this perpetual contretemps is another of the vaster conditions life in Lauzerte illuminates. Allman chronicles the many conflicts that have swirled in the region, from the Catholic Church’s genocidal campaign to wipe out “heresy” there; to France’s own 16th-century Wars of Religion, which saw hundreds massacred in the town square, some inside his house; to World War II, during which Lauzerte was part of Nazi-occupied Vichy.

In prose as crystalline as his view to the Pyrenees on a clear day, Allman animates Lauzerte and its surrounding communities—Cahors, Moissac, Montauban—all ever in thrall to the magnetic impulse of Paris. Witness to so many dramas over the centuries, his house comes alive as a historical protagonist in its own right, from its wine-cellar cave to the roof where he wages futile battle with pigeons, to the life lessons it conveys. “The onward march of history, my House keeps demonstrating, never takes a rest,” he observes, pulling us vividly into his world.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Travel, France, World History

475 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 13, 2024

About the author

An American freelance journalist.

Reviews

[Darcy Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

The scope of the writing and observations on history are phenomenal. Believe this is the authors last book in a long and meaningful career- he passed in 2024 at 79. An amazing life. I'll be thinking about this book a long time. I purchased this book at Warwick's bookstore in La Jolla, CA after listening to recommendations on their YouTube weekly video called "Tea Time".

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rambling, eccentric, and eye opening account of the author's love affair with Lauzerte, France. Some of the key points in French and English history were revelations to me and I was a history major. The powerful but constrained role of women in royalty, especially Eleanor of Aquitaine as well as Queen Blanche. The Magna Carta being the result of a French victory. Lots of connect the dot moments.

What's really sad is that this is the author's last book. Was he dying and knew it and this was his last gift. He died from pneumonia in NYC on May 12, 2024 and this book was published three months later.

So many great insights and observations about the French, the English, and humanity. The world will miss Timothy D. Allman for sure.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._D....

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

T. D. Allman bought an old house in southern France and then wanted to understand what history it had seen. He reviews the history that passed through (or rolled over) his home town of Lauzerte and the region around it.

I particularly appreciated the jaundiced eye with which he viewed the popes and potentates who repeatedly devastated the region. As he points out, mostly the Christian European crusaders killed other Christians and never really had much impact on the Muslim overlords of the places the said they wanted to "take back" from the "infidels." It turned out that it was more fun, profitable, and straightforward to just pursue whatever heretics the pope or the king in Paris invented and pointed their soldiers at. He portrays the 'national heroes' Richard the Lionheart and St Louis of France as the actual losers they were, dying young while achieving virtually nothing of meaning. He also has no use for the English, in the form of the pseudo-expats who buy real estate in France and then do everything they possibly can to avoid having anything to do with French people or the French language. While he has the typical outlier's resentment of the arbitrary hegemony of the government in Paris, he truly esteems the ordinary folks who operate the businesses he patronizes every day.

He reserves his esteem for pragmatic figures like Philippe Auguste of France and the counts of Toulouse, who saw their first responsibility as engineering the survival of themselves and their subjects, megalomaniac popes be damned. When possible, he highlights the local heroes who contributed to the survival of their towns from the 13th century to World War II, through pragmatic avoidance of conflict rather than by flinging themselves into doomed operations where they were bound to die.

The only thing missing for me, as I am fascinated by old houses, is the actual house (or as he calls it, my House). I wanted to know its history as a house, not as an observer of what happened around it, and what it is like to own it. But that isn't the book he wrote.

If you are interested in France at all, this book will fascinate you and keep you reading through what can at times feel like a series of history lessons.

Thanks to NetGalley for letting me read a galley of this book.

[Amy Crisp · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reminded me of Peter Mayle’s books about living in Provence. Wonderful stories of the people he encountered as he made a life in Lauzerte, but also of the many people throughout history that came before him. Really enjoyed reading the historical accounts and insights as Allman described the flow of life in Lauzerte (past and present).

[Book Club of One · Rating 3 out of 5]

T.D. Allman saw much in his life pursuing his work as an author, journalist and historian. He interviewed leading figures such as Yasser Arafat and Boris Yeltsin and broke stories about the CIA's secret war against communists in Laos. In France Profound, is Allman's posthumously published reflection on the house he bought on a whim and its storied history and location in rural France.

The house was first constructed sometime in the 12th century, but has had many changes over the centuries, just as the town of its home, the French mountain village of Lauzrete has been changed. Allman's narrative follows the id of interest jumping through time and subject, sometimes guided by occurrences in the house or Lauzerte or the history of France.

It is also a work steeped in the mortality of humans and the legacy one can leave. Allman speaks of the different kings and power seekers as they crossed this region in hopes of glory or wealth, but some only had fleeting success. One interesting factoid is the regional governmental structures is one of the few surviving decisions of Napoleon.

There is also the everyday concerns of owning a house, dealing with mother nature, maintenance or war with local wildlife. There is a lot of content, but not always linked in the clearest of fashion. While some of the recent past is explored, especially with the changes to village life with the increasing accessibility of roads and vehicle travel, much like the house, In France Profound is steeped in the past.

Recommended to readers of history, micro-histories or rambling travelogues.

I received a free digital version of this book via NetGalley thanks to the publisher.

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I won an advance reader copy of In France profound from a goodreads giveaway.

My favorite part of the book was reading about Eleanor of Aquitaine. I don't think I have ever read about her before. I thought she had an interesting life marrying off her kids to royalty.

I also liked learning about France and its kings. I had never thought much about them before. I never realized that the last king of France was in the 1900's.

In France profound talks about the authors house in the town Lauzerte. It also talks about some of the history of Lauzerte and the surrounding towns.

It also has personal stories of the author and his house and his experiences in France. Such the Lauzerte Saturday market or the things he has watched from the window of his house that is over the town square. I think the window is over the town square. He also talks about how the town has changed since he has been there.

An also where T.D talks about pigeons was also interesting. For some reason I must have thought that France did not have pigeons.

I was hoping it would talk a lot more about what happened in Lauzerte during world war II. So it was disappointing that it did not talk much about world war II.

So I thought that in France profound had some interesting stories and a few times it made me laugh. Some of it was not that interesting to me. And maybe it could have been shorter.

[Randal White · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the kind of book that I really enjoy! History, told through the eyes of a particular area, this being of a 800 year old house in a small village of France. The author purchased the house, and through hard work and years of effort, has pieced together a story of what the house has "experienced". The people, the events, everything that, if the house could have eyes and talk, it could tell us. It's a fascinating way of looking at history, not through a giant lens encompassing entire nations and such, but just how the events affected the people and homes of the village.
I wish that I could find many many more books like this. I would love to read this perspective on many different small areas!

[Stacie Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was working on this book exclusively for awhile due to it being a library book. This was a really good telling of the history of a region of France by an American writer who invested a lot of time and money into an ancient home. At times the narrative style to me was a little odd, and there wasn't much on who was in the house and most of the history of the house as proclaimed by the book. I did learn a lot of the history of the area in France over the years up to the current day. This was interesting and so I may read more on that topic as time goes on. For the somewhat disjointed narration I gave this a 4/5 stars.

[Mike Longman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting premise for a book. The author uses a small French village’s connection to famous figures, events and cultural movements to tell a broader story about history and society. The first half of the book was filled with fascinating stories, covering popes, Kings and Queens and everything from the Crusades to modern car culture. The last third of the book got a little long and overtly anti Catholic Church and anti English.

[MAM · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author is clearly well educated. I learned words I’d never known before. And his humor shines through.

He gets carried away at times, particularly when describing bloody battles. But overall an interesting and informative book.

[Lady Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received this book as a Goodreads Giveaways win with gratitude. This, in no way, will reflect in my honest opinion of the book. I have given quotation locations by chapter, paragraph, and lines, as the pages of the ARC may not match the pages of another copy.

There is a passage that I do have trouble with. And that is in chapter 10 (paragraph 7, lines 10-12).

The sentence as written is "In front of it, a closed-up auto repair shop and a weed-infested passel of rusted used cars give this place, where some of history's gaudiest figures once stood, an Appalachian look."

Having been born in and grown up in a rural Appalachian town, I find this characterization problematic at best, for a few reasons.

When I think of Appalachia, I first think of lush green mountains, waterfalls, and populations that are isolated both geographically and culturally. Rusted, old, weed-infested cars is not a first thought. Does that image exist in Appalachia? Absolutely, but it also exists in many rural and impoverished areas, and is not exclusive to the Appalachian areas, which are vastly spread and diverse from one community to the next. To say that it is an "Appalachian look" is both inaccurate and a continuation of harmful stereotypes, which seems irrelevant on a book about France.

When quoting this book to others (without revealing its title), I've come across some misunderstandings. I read that sentence to my mother, an analytic chemist (so pretty intelligent), and her response was, "The author has probably never been here." While I don't share her assumption, I do think it speaks to how Appalachian residents feel about the passage.

Another friend of mine, when I read her the sentence, assumed I was reading _Hillbilly Elegy_ by J.D. Vance, and recommended better book choices on the Appalachian area.

Incidentally, even I, a product of a rural Appalachian town, would not eat unwrapped and unwashed food from a garbage bag. I don't care how new the garbage bag was.

Additionally, there is another sentence that may cause some offense, which is in chapter 29 (paragraph 17, lines 11-13) and reads "The cantonment, the club, this iota of England Janna and her successors had constructed were, like autism, parts of a spectrum. Although this sentence is accurate regarding autism, many in the autistic community would be offended by the mention of "the spectrum," which connotes, to them, deficit. Many autistic people feel that their neurodivergence is a difference and not a disorder.

There are also parts of the book I found incredibly insightful, like this passage in chapter 22, last paragraphs "As I observed the children's delight in violence, it occurred to me that maybe so much history is so fake because it is written by grown-ups. Adults feel obliged to try to impart direction on history, to impose meaning on events. From egoism and murder they confect happy endings, They like to pretend humans are essentially benign.
Children know better."

Overall, I find Mr. Allman has a very negative and pessimistic world view, which probably comes from reporting on wars. It just gave my reading a darker tone than I expected. The book does contain unnecessary violent details of deaths. I'm perfectly happy knowing a man died from a stone thrown at his head. I didn't need to know how far his grey matter or blood traveled.

Having said that, I love learning new things, and I did enjoy learning some of the area's historical details. This book is replete with historical information, a wealth of knowledge of it, which appeals to my curiosity.

[John Michael Stroh · Rating 4 out of 5]

It reads a bit like a text book but the history of France is interesting to me....so it's all good.
I received this book as part of a Goodreads giveaway.

[Ron Schneider · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book. Follows the history of France as it discusses the history of the house.

[Mollypputnam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insightful and witty, yet long winded.

[Chrome · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wonderful. Reading this was like a vacation out of time and place into a space of wonder.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

See my review at Reading World