As a child, I thought August was the quintessential summer month and my birthday party, usually a pool party in my grandmother’s French-style garden marked, for me in any case, its height and glory, not its dénouement. I am now up in the High Sierra’s packing up to return to Fresno; from there I’ll go to San Francisco where I’ll catch my flight back to Paris. Summer draws to an end so early these days, mostly because school starts earlier and earlier every year. And I wonder: what is the rush? August once heralded respite, a generous stretch of downtime; in Paris most of the artisans close shop for the entire month and the baguette becomes rare. But even France is making incursions into this fast lane that has made vacation a shoddy thing, a quickie. This is not necessarily a good sign, because as we look to America for the rush of innovation, we look to France to uphold certain values, namely human ones, against the tsunami of global economics. I’m being overly schematic, of course, for the French have their industrial mavericks and the Americans their humanist beacons, but there is some truth to this comparison and a good example is France’s 1981 law that bans heavy discounting of books such as is practiced in the U.S. and the U.K. In France books are sold everywhere at the same price, with the exception of the FNAC, a large chain, which offers a slight, very slight discount. What is the reasoning behind this protectionism? I think the French see it this way: books are not just any commodity, they are (sometimes) works of art, products of the intellect and spirit and therefore should not be bought and sold like boxes of cookies. When the master of ceremonies of the Grand Ole Opry told Pasty Cline he hoped her records sold like hotcakes, Miss Cline responded, “Well I hope they just sell like records.”
Thank you, Patsy, for setting the record straight.
Julia Kristeva (a.k.a. Special K in The Baby of Belleville) writes “we have two conceptions of freedom: that which adapts to the changes of technology and the globalized market and that which favors the indefinitely reconstructible and open quest for identity and singularity, contrary to economic, scientific, and identity-based imperatives and certitudes.”
The first conception of freedom she refers to, which adapts to and in the end serves “technology and the globalized market” has taken shape in America; the second in France, and Europe more generally. One of the key words here, pertaining to the French notion of freedom is “singularity.” According to JK, “only this concern for the singular can keep us from seeing humanity as a mass of diversities poised to consume the products of the free market.” I agree with her, and though France tries through its legislation to protect this right to singularity, it also, I fear, finds itself like a mouse surrounded by traps loaded with pasteurized cheese (not au lait cru – too much tastiness there) tempting its greed. How long will it hold out? Particularly if Sarkozy gets a second mandate as president…
In America we talk a lot about diversity, but singularity is a whole other beast; diversity refers to groups of people with a common trait distinguishing them from the mainstream while singularity places its bet on the individual. It’s much easier to incorporate, manipulate and congratulate these satellite groups than it is the more unruly individu. If art is put to the service of the market like a common commodity, this clearly weakens the position of any emerging Proust. Not only does the singular voice find it difficult to emerge today, when it does, it tends to be quickly dismissed, derided, or simply grossly misunderstood: nearly always it is kept on the margins of acceptable taste. On the one hand this is nothing new; Proust incurred difficulties on the road to recognition, but the fact remains that his work received enough attention to provoke a major shift in literary consciousness. Fiction and poetry have largely become an industrial affair, their training camps no longer life and reading but MFA programs, and while good writing can be nurtured to excellence in these havens, I do wonder how our Proust would have fared at Iowa. Currently the book business is more concerned with commodifying diversities than celebrating singularities, and many writers, perhaps without even knowing it, have their pens humming in sync with the industrial activity that surrounds them; there are more rewards to be reaped in keeping to the general hum than in risking raising a voice that, like Proust or Melville’s, rings beyond the recognizable, and in this way, perhaps even challenges the legitimacy of the literary machine.
And now, I shall step off my soapbox.
Et revenons à nos moutons. Yes, back to vacation.
I wanted to call this entry “From Bourgogne to the Boot Barn” but the writing had its way with me. I’ll tell the rest of my tale in photos.
Here goes…
First we spent a week in Bourgogne, near the medieval village of Noyers-sur-Serein where my friend Michelle Anderson Binczak is converting a half-timbered hotel into a gallery space and artists residency called La Porte Peinte (http://www.laportepeinte.com). We fell immediately in love with the space and entire village, which despite being adorably medieval and labeled one of “les plus beaux villages de France” allows a few stones to slip from its comely coiffure. Unlike the impeccably refurbished villages in the more frequented regions of France, Noyers, for the moment at least, has resisted the comb and brush and its hollyhocks grow wild with abandon.
Many artisans have set up shop here including this pottery studio:
Nearby is the celebrated Vézelay basilica, the largest Romanesque cathedral in France and home of the bones of Mary Magdalene. My son and I lit candles in the crypt and placed them beneath the Magdalene’s relics.
– Who was Mary Magdalene? asks my son who hasn’t yet gone to catechism. He wasn’t sure he liked the look of her bones. Reassurance was needed.
– She was a very good friend of Jesus’. So we can make this a prayer for friendship, for our good friends and our friends to come and for ourselves as friends; may we be good ones.”
My eight-year-old cowboy seemed to go for this. He has started a new school and is building up his posse base.
We also visited the Cistercian abbey of Fontenay with its gorgeous, serene setting.
The hydrangeas are not to be believed.
I highly recommend visiting Bourgogne and before going there, or while you’re there, you must read French Spirits by Jeffrey Greene. This gorgeous, completely delightful book recounts Greene’s adventure buying and renovating a 300-year-old presbytery with his wife in the Puisaye region of Burgandy. Touching, at times hilariously funny, precisely observed and written with a poet’s ear (Greene is an award-winning poet) for language, this is the perfect read for anyone interested in discovering France and its more unexplored corners. It’s the kind of book you look forward to cuddling up with at night, and to prolong the pleasure, I am now reading his second installment called The Golden-Bristled Boar and loving it every bit as much.
Clearly I would make a bad shepherd and this, despite my Basque blood, for I’m wandering again…
Eh bien, on continue:
The shift from the overcast but historically rich Burgandy to the hellish heat of the central Valley couldn’t have been more dramatic and required a change in attire. Upon arrival in Fresno, we drove with the AC blasting to The Boot Barn –a cultural hub of sorts — to outfit ourselves. Here’s a quick look inside the barn:
The Wrangler man and…
The ole ro-de-o
And for the ladies:
All decked out and nowhere to do: my cowboy in Paris!
Returning to the Sierras was the best part of my summer: the hallowed, gigantic trees and our cabin in the fragrant woods greeted us like kin, which we are.
I took several wonderful hikes with my sister and though my photos don’t do justice to the breathtaking vistas of the High Country, they at least give an idea of the flora.
Did you know that pine cones can look like this on the inside? I thank the chipmunk who gnawed the opening into this candied, floral swirl.
A puff ball mushroom. Only edible in its early stages. Here it’s full and poisonous. Gorgeous!
Coming down from Kaiser Peak at about 10,000 feet.
This ends my photo gallery. There’s a great deal to be said about the West of the West, as writer/journalist Mark Arax calls the San Joaquin Valley in his fascinating eponymously titled book. For me, what was once too familiar has become exotic. Perhaps it’s time to write about it. On verra… In any case, les vacances sont finies!