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Peter Mayle: My Twenty-Five Years in Provence: Reflections on Then and Now
By
Published: Jul 12, 2018
Category:
Memoir
Peter Mayle toiled for decades in advertising, beginning as a copywriter and finishing thirteen years later as a creative director (“I think I was also a vice president, but I never had the cards printed”). What he really wanted to do was write a novel. Because of his advertising experience, he thought he could: “You’re obliged to stick to the plot — to be concise, informative and if possible entertaining. These are not bad qualities for a writer to cultivate.”
Mayle and his wife Jennie had a dream: trade London for the South of France: “We had talked about it during the long gray winters and the damp green summers, looked with an addict’s longing at photographs of village markets and vineyards, dreamed of being woken up by the sun slanting through the bedroom window.” In 1987, they took the plunge and moved to Ménerbes, a village in Provence.
But there was a problem: “I found myself completely distracted — much more taken up with the curiosities of life in Provence than with getting down to work on the novel. The daily dose of education I was receiving at the hands of the plumber, the farmer next door, the mushroom hunter and the lady with the frustrated donkey was infinitely more fascinating than anything I could invent.”
After six months, he’d written nothing. He sent his agent a letter, listing these distractions. To Mayle’s surprise and relief, the reply urged him to do another 250 pages like the letter. Those pages were “A Year in Provence,” which sold a million copies in England, 6 million around the world, and has been translated into 22 languages. [To buy the paperback of “A Year in Provence” from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.]
Peter Mayle died earlier this year. But he had completed a new book, “My Twenty-Five Years in Provence: Reflections on Then and Now,” and it’s a pleasant update to his mega-bestseller. In 179 brisk pages, he retells the story of touring Provence, the charming hotel, the excellent dinner at the café, the move, and the first lesson of life in Provence: “Don’t be late for lunch.” The renovation, of course. A question: Why do these lovely people become savages when they get into a car? The best meal ever: fois gras, with a slice of truffle on top, heated in the oven. “Guest season.” The evening market. [To read an excerpt from the book that explains the evening market, click here.] And then.. how Provence has changed over the years. It’s not bad — there’s no Walmart — but it’s not nothing. And a very happy ending: “Lunch is calling. I must go.” [To buy “My Twenty-Five Years in Provence” from Amazon, click here. For the Kindle edition, click here.]
What I love about Mayle is the effortlessness of his charm. Here he is, in a passage from another book, puncturing the myth of Provence’s magically pure air:
A man in a bar once told me that the air in Provence was the purest air in France, perhaps even in the world. He was a large and somewhat aggressive man, and I thought it wise not to argue with him. In fact, I was delighted to believe what he had told me, and for several years I would pass on the good news to friends and visitors. “Every breath you take of Provençal air,” I used to say, “is like ten euros in the bank of health.” It wasn’t until I started to research the subject that I discovered the truth.
Here it is: The départements of Bouches-du-Rhône, the Vaucluse, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, and the Var make up one of the four most polluted zones in Europe, a distinction they share with Genoa, Barcelona, and Athens. (Source: Greenpeace France.) Apart from the emissions coming from heavy traffic on the routes nationales and the autoroutes, the principal villains are to be found in the industrial complex — l’industrie-sur-mer — that straggles along the coast from Marseille to the Gulf of Fos and the oil refineries at Berre.
How bad is it? By August 2003, there had been thirty-six days during the year on which the level of air pollution exceeded the official limit of 240 micrograms per cubic meter. More was to come as the summer heat wave continued. And, so we were told, the pollution was not necessarily confined to the area immediately around those who produced it, but could spread as far away as sixty to ninety miles.
Since each of us breathes about thirty pounds of air each day, statistics like this make uncomfortable reading. And yet, walking every day in the Luberon as I do, it’s difficult to believe that such a thing as pollution exists. The air looks clear and tastes good. Vegetation seems untouched. Butterflies thrive. Birds and game go about their business, apparently in rude health. Can it be that the mistral is protecting us by blowing away the foul breath of industry?
I knew him slightly. I wish I’d seen him more often. He set a good example.
BONUS VIDEO
“I like well-fed characters.”
