The Beast of the Camargue
The Beast of the Camargue

Author: Xavier-Marie Bonnot

Publisher: Quercus

Published: 2013-10-01

Total Pages: 408

ISBN-13: 1623652774

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For centuries the ceremonial order of the Knights of the Tarasque have met to bear the effigy of a mythical beast through the Provencal town of Taracson. But one summer's night the ceremony is broken by a gruesome discovery: a mutilated body found at the feet of the effigy, apparently torn apart by enormous teeth and claws. Can the monster of legend be more than just myth? The case draws an unwilling Michel de Palma, of the Marseille murder squad, into the dark heart of a Provence where mythology and untold history are part of everyday life. As more dismembered corpses continue to appear, de Palma falls into a world colored by murky financial intrigues and the tortured history of post-occupation France. It's a world where de Palma's uninvited investigations could soon see him in mortal danger.

The Beast, and Other Tales
The Beast, and Other Tales

Author: Jóusè d'Arbaud

Publisher: Northwestern University Press

Published: 2020-09-15

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 0810143135

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Winner of the Global Humanities Prize A classic of modern Provençal literature, Jóusè d’Arbaud’s 1926 masterpiece “The Beast of Vacarés” (also known as “The Beast of Vaccarès”) is a haunting parable. Set during the fifteenth century, the tale is narrated by a solitary bull herder—known as a gardian—who stumbles upon a starving creature that is half man, half goat. Terrified, the gardian is nonetheless drawn to the eloquent Beast, a dying demigod who laments the loss of his glorious past even as he wields power over the animals around him. Torn between pity and fear, unable to understand his experiences and afraid he will be condemned for heresy, the gardian records his encounters in a journal, hoping that one day readers will make sense of what he cannot. Set in the vast, lonely landscape of the Camargue delta, where the Rhône meets the Mediterranean, The Beast seamlessly melds fantasy with naturalistic detail about the region’s flora and fauna. Three additional stories—“The Caraco,” “Pèire Guilhem’s Remorse,” and “The Longline”—explore the lives of twentieth-century gardians in the region. Each man succumbs to fears and social pressure, tragically losing what he most loves.

Cock and Bull Stories
Cock and Bull Stories

Author: Robert Zaretsky

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 2004-01-01

Total Pages: 218

ISBN-13: 9780803249202

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In the French Camargue?the delta surrounding the mouth of the Rhone River and part of the southern ?nation? of Occitania?the bull is a powerful icon of nationalism, literature, and culture. How this came to be?how the Camargue bull came to confront the French cock, venerable symbol of a unified and republican France?is the story told in this ingenious study. Robert Zaretsky considers how in fin-de-si_cle France the young writer Folco de Baroncelli, inspired by the history of the American West, in particular the fate of the Oglala Sioux and other Native American peoples, reinvented the history of Occitania. Galvanized by the example set by Buffalo Bill Cody, Baroncelli recast the Camargue as ?le far-west? of France, creating the ?immemorial? traditions he battled to protect. Zaretsky?s study examines the creative tension between center and periphery in the making of modern France: just as the political and intellectual elite of the Third Republic ?invented? a certain kind of France, so too did a coterie of southern writers, including Baroncelli, ?invent? a certain kind of Camargue. The story of how the Camargue bull challenged the French cock in this ideological and cultural Wild West deepens our appreciation of the complex dynamic that has created contemporary France.

The Voice of the Spirits
The Voice of the Spirits

Author: Xavier-Marie Bonnot

Publisher: MacLehose Press

Published: 2014-06-03

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 1623655064

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When Commandant Michel de Palma follows an anonymous tip-off to a gated mansion by the coast, he finds a body whose face is obscured by a fearsome tribal mask, beneath it a mysterious wound that could not have been caused by a bullet. Surrounded by scores of masks and painted skulls, de Palma hears the haunting strains of a primal flute from the floors above. With few leads to go on, de Palma delves into an account of the murdered doctor's voyage to Papua New Guinea seventy years earlier, accompanied by a fellow amasser of Oceanic art, Robert Ballancourt. As the doctor's attractive but distant granddaughter offers de Palma further insights into her grandfather's second life as an intrepid collector, he and his team stumble upon an art-smuggling ring working out of Marseilles' dilapidated docks. But when his chief suspect is found dead, killed by the same method as Dr. Delorme, even de Palma begins to wonder whether the bodies on his hands are the victims of spirits intent on revenge. The rituals of Papuan warriors and headhunters-whose traditional way of life endured until deep into the twentieth century-form the intriguing backdrop to The Voice of the Spirits, another subtle yet satisfying novel from one of France's most original and thought-provoking crime writers.

Provence
Provence

Author: Martin Garrett

Publisher: Andrews UK Limited

Published: 2012-05-02

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 1908493410

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Celebrated by writers from Petrarch to Peter Mayle, Provence's rugged mountains, wild maquis and lavender-filled meadows are world-famous. Historic cities like Arles, Avignon and Aix contain Roman amphitheatres, papal palaces and royal residences, while market towns and picturesque villages maintain age-old traditions of wine producing and agriculture. From the highland towns of Digne and Sisteron to the marshy expanse of the Camargue, Provence encompasses a rich variety of landscapes. Martin Garrett explores a region littered with ancient monuments and medieval castles. Looking at the vibrant dockside ambiance of Marseille and the luminous atmosphere of the Lubéron, he considers how writers like Mistral and Daudet have captured the character of a place and its people. He traces the development of Provence as a Roman outpost, medieval kingdom and modern region of France, revealing through its landmarks the people and events that have shaped its often tumultuous history. Through its architecture, literature and popular culture, this book analyzes and celebrates the identity of a region famous for its pastis and pétanque. Linking the past to the present, it also evokes the intense light and sun-baked stones that have attracted generations of painters and writers.