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Provence, from minstrels to the machine
Book by Ford, Ford Madox
- GenresTravelFranceNonfiction
371 pages, Paperback
First published April 30, 1984
72 people want to read
About the author
Ford Madox Ford
452 books366 followersFord Madox Ford was an English novelist, poet, critic and editor whose journals The English Review and The Transatlantic Review were important in the development of early 20th-century English and American literature.
Ford is now remembered for his novels The Good Soldier (1915), the Parade's End tetralogy (1924–1928) and The Fifth Queen trilogy (1906–1908). The Good Soldier is frequently included among the great literature of the 20th century, including the Modern Library 100 Best Novels, The Observer′s "100 Greatest Novels of All Time", and The Guardian′s "1000 novels everyone must read".
Ford is now remembered for his novels The Good Soldier (1915), the Parade's End tetralogy (1924–1928) and The Fifth Queen trilogy (1906–1908). The Good Soldier is frequently included among the great literature of the 20th century, including the Modern Library 100 Best Novels, The Observer′s "100 Greatest Novels of All Time", and The Guardian′s "1000 novels everyone must read".
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 14, 2015
I found this curious book by chance in a second-hand bookshop near King’s Cross, which was a piece of luck: not only am I a fan of the author, but this one (like so many of his other books) is generally out of print. This edition, published by Ecco Press and distributed in America by Norton, is part of a set dedicated to travel writings by other notable writers of the nineteenth and twentieth century like Evelyn Waugh and Edith Wharton and Charles Dickens; and even without having read any of those other books, I can be fairly sure in saying that this one is probably the most unusual out of any of them. It’s devotedly digressive, and somehow both absolutely conventional and extremely strange.
The first thing to say is that this would be fairly useless as a guidebook to the actual region of France which is its subject. Certainly there are descriptions of excursions into specific towns, and the book tries to give a good and comprehensive impression of the history of the place, but neither of those things are the main draw here. Reading this book is much like being subjected to a lengthy monologue by an articulate, effusive, opinionated old chap; he may or may not be drunk on something or other by the time things come to a close, and certainly he will sometimes come across as a bullshitter or just plain unhinged, but there is nevertheless something darkly fascinating about the whole affair.
Ford is best known today for ‘The Good Soldier’, which is justly regarded as one of the finest early novels of literary modernism, and for the series of books that made up the ‘Parade’s End’ series. The loose, freewheeling style on show here is somewhat reminiscent of the former title, though it was written many years afterwards near the end of his life. Both share a style of shattered impressionism, where memories glisten in little passages of beautiful writing broken up between passages of meandering ruefulness. But while ‘The Good Soldier’ attempted to deliberately beguile the reader through ambiguity and a thoroughly unreliable narrator, this book very much feels like non-fiction. The only plot on show here is the author’s own moral concerns, which are expressed in terms of his feelings about Provence in relation to the rest of the world.
Things, it seems are not looking good. Processed and canned foods, and the terrible digestive demands of North European cooking spell for this author the doom of mankind. His experiences in the First World War come up from time to time, and it’s clear that he believes it was at least made possible by those early advances in the preservation and transportation of food. In contrary he is a great enthusiast for what we would now call the Mediterranean diet: plenty of vegetables, olive oil and wine, supplemented by lean meat and a good deal of seafood. He abhors English food, in particular those bloody cuts of roast beef and Brussels sprouts demanded by tourists abroad. More than once I was reminded of the approach to authentic cuisine that would later be championed by the likes of Elizabeth David and Keith Floyd: good, simple ingredients enjoyed with friends in the local style, with no attention given at all to current trends in high-class restaurants or fashionable eateries.
Not that the book is set entirely in France — quite often the author dispenses entirely with the pretence of journalistic objectivity, and pulls us into the room where he is (supposedly) writing: a garret on a high floor overlooking a distinctly gloomy 1930s London. He meets up with friends; they go on an (abortive) trip to the British Library; he argues and berates imaginary adversaries with the blunt force of his opinions. All of this is expressed rather more entertainingly than I have made it sound, and all of it actually ends up being far more interesting than much of the bare facts about Provence that are provided here. He was a good man for a tall story, and he clearly wasn’t shy of showing off about his unbelievable connections in the word of art and literature. Ezra Pound gets frequent mentions, and there are walk-on roles from Hemingway and Conrad and plenty of others. And there’s several astonishing passages about Henry James that are unbelievably bitchy, occasionally bordering on what we would consider homophobic.
In that regard, perhaps it isn’t hard to tell why this book has fallen out of print. It’s littered with casual racist epithets, and though most of those are put into the mouths of individuals we’re expected to read as loathsome, this is absolutely a book of its time that is only really concerned with the attitudes of its time. At times it becomes difficult to pick out that which is universal from amongst the detritus of thoughts and opinions and rants and dreams on show here.
But this also is its principal fascination for me: it forms a complete picture of a gifted writer near the end of his life, reflecting on what has meant the most to him. Despite the occasional lapse into prejudice, he is basically a thoughtful, good-hearted small-c conservative. He chooses to tell us everything and nothing, and as much as he might confess, the true complications of his life remain obscure, glimpsed only in passing through hints, non-sequiturs and half-baked allegations. Aside from a lovely anecdote about his grandfather, the painter Ford Madox Brown, he doesn't write about his family, nor about his notoriously complicated romantic life; perhaps all of that was still too fresh in his mind at the time. The whole thing is a kind of grand performance, a marvellous trick; and behind the trick you think you glimpse something else, something desperately sad; but that in itself might only be another aspect of the trick.
The first thing to say is that this would be fairly useless as a guidebook to the actual region of France which is its subject. Certainly there are descriptions of excursions into specific towns, and the book tries to give a good and comprehensive impression of the history of the place, but neither of those things are the main draw here. Reading this book is much like being subjected to a lengthy monologue by an articulate, effusive, opinionated old chap; he may or may not be drunk on something or other by the time things come to a close, and certainly he will sometimes come across as a bullshitter or just plain unhinged, but there is nevertheless something darkly fascinating about the whole affair.
Ford is best known today for ‘The Good Soldier’, which is justly regarded as one of the finest early novels of literary modernism, and for the series of books that made up the ‘Parade’s End’ series. The loose, freewheeling style on show here is somewhat reminiscent of the former title, though it was written many years afterwards near the end of his life. Both share a style of shattered impressionism, where memories glisten in little passages of beautiful writing broken up between passages of meandering ruefulness. But while ‘The Good Soldier’ attempted to deliberately beguile the reader through ambiguity and a thoroughly unreliable narrator, this book very much feels like non-fiction. The only plot on show here is the author’s own moral concerns, which are expressed in terms of his feelings about Provence in relation to the rest of the world.
Things, it seems are not looking good. Processed and canned foods, and the terrible digestive demands of North European cooking spell for this author the doom of mankind. His experiences in the First World War come up from time to time, and it’s clear that he believes it was at least made possible by those early advances in the preservation and transportation of food. In contrary he is a great enthusiast for what we would now call the Mediterranean diet: plenty of vegetables, olive oil and wine, supplemented by lean meat and a good deal of seafood. He abhors English food, in particular those bloody cuts of roast beef and Brussels sprouts demanded by tourists abroad. More than once I was reminded of the approach to authentic cuisine that would later be championed by the likes of Elizabeth David and Keith Floyd: good, simple ingredients enjoyed with friends in the local style, with no attention given at all to current trends in high-class restaurants or fashionable eateries.
Not that the book is set entirely in France — quite often the author dispenses entirely with the pretence of journalistic objectivity, and pulls us into the room where he is (supposedly) writing: a garret on a high floor overlooking a distinctly gloomy 1930s London. He meets up with friends; they go on an (abortive) trip to the British Library; he argues and berates imaginary adversaries with the blunt force of his opinions. All of this is expressed rather more entertainingly than I have made it sound, and all of it actually ends up being far more interesting than much of the bare facts about Provence that are provided here. He was a good man for a tall story, and he clearly wasn’t shy of showing off about his unbelievable connections in the word of art and literature. Ezra Pound gets frequent mentions, and there are walk-on roles from Hemingway and Conrad and plenty of others. And there’s several astonishing passages about Henry James that are unbelievably bitchy, occasionally bordering on what we would consider homophobic.
In that regard, perhaps it isn’t hard to tell why this book has fallen out of print. It’s littered with casual racist epithets, and though most of those are put into the mouths of individuals we’re expected to read as loathsome, this is absolutely a book of its time that is only really concerned with the attitudes of its time. At times it becomes difficult to pick out that which is universal from amongst the detritus of thoughts and opinions and rants and dreams on show here.
But this also is its principal fascination for me: it forms a complete picture of a gifted writer near the end of his life, reflecting on what has meant the most to him. Despite the occasional lapse into prejudice, he is basically a thoughtful, good-hearted small-c conservative. He chooses to tell us everything and nothing, and as much as he might confess, the true complications of his life remain obscure, glimpsed only in passing through hints, non-sequiturs and half-baked allegations. Aside from a lovely anecdote about his grandfather, the painter Ford Madox Brown, he doesn't write about his family, nor about his notoriously complicated romantic life; perhaps all of that was still too fresh in his mind at the time. The whole thing is a kind of grand performance, a marvellous trick; and behind the trick you think you glimpse something else, something desperately sad; but that in itself might only be another aspect of the trick.
October 8, 2014
What lean and luscious prose! What maddening meandering...
October 4, 2021
Quite enjoyable but it read like an old duffer relating random experiences. And a pompous old duffer too! I expected someone else to leap from the pages, after all he had been at the heart of things when modernism hit London. But I enjoyed listening to the old amn.
March 31, 2023
I find another side to Ford through this whimsical (whatever thought pops in my head now) look at Provence. Somehow it makes sense but there is a bit too much waffle for my tastes. But definitely compliments his novel writing side.
July 18, 2013
Struggled with this book, so much so in fact that I couldn't finish it. I left it feeling inadequate; I wasn't intellectual enough or as well-read as I should be to understand it, one almost had to have been from the same intellectual circle as him to follow it. But that is just my opinion!
January 9, 2011
This book was originally written before WWII!!! Interesant...cette Provence!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews