The Grave of Germain Nouveau, Pourrières (83), Var (83)

The grave of Germain Nouveau in Pourrières, which I missed on the first visit to the town. Far in the background is the Montagne Sainte Victoire.

'Qui est mort dans la misère

Lui, de la pléiade des rois

Le plus grand poète varois

Germain Nouveau de Pourrières'

'Mélancoliquement mon esprit fait la planche'

                                             Germain Nouveau

My Germain Nouveau posts:

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The Grave of Germain Nouveau, Pourrières
Germain Nouveau in Pourrières

Germain Nouveau in Pourrières, Var (83)

5 rue Germain Nouveau, Pourrières, named after the poet who was born in the village in 1851 and who died here in 1920. He spent his childhood and adolescence in Marseilles and left for Paris in 1872. He met Mallarmé and Jean Richepin, frequented the zutistes, etc, and even, in 1874 – went to London (178 Stamford Street) with Rimbaud and helped with the manuscript of Les Illuminations. Aragon said he had a great influence on the surrealists, and considered him a great poet, equal to Rimbaud. In 1891, when teaching at the lycée Janson de Sailly, he was stricken by an attack of 'mystic madness' and was interned in the Hôpital Bicêtre for several months.  Much of his life, in fact, was spent as a kind of tramp, or pilgrim. He returned to Pourrières in 1911, where he died. Objecting to having his writings published in his lifetime, his work was essentially published posthumously.

This homage to Germain Nouveau was made by the sculptor Pierre Mathieu in 2008, and stands in the Place du château.

The village library is also named after Germain Nouveau.

My Germain Nouveau posts:

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The Grave of Germain Nouveau, Pourrières
Germain Nouveau in Pourrières

Paul Cézanne and the Montagne Sainte Victoire

Montagne Sainte Victoire taken from Pourrières today. An information board in the Place du Château claims that Paul Cézanne, whose grand-father lived in the village, made forty-four oil paintings and forty-three water colours of the mountain and the plateau de Bibémus. And yes, the mountain itself of course is in Bouches-du-Rhône (13), and Cézanne usually took it from Gardanne (13)?

Jules Gérard in Pignans, Var (83)

Jules Gérard, the son of a tax collector, was born in Pignans, Var (83). He went on to be a lion killer, which in the early nineteenth century was obviously not seen in a bad light, although by the way the plaque on his statue in La Place des Écoles is worded it seems to be more than a little tongue in cheek: the representation of Gérard, too, could almost be inspired by Don Quixote or Don Quichotte in French. Certainly Alphonse Daudet's ludicrous Tartaron de Tarascon was inspired by Jules Gérard, from which Daudet managed to stretch to three books: Les Aventures prodigieuses de Tartarin de Tarascon (1872), Tartarin sur les Alpes (1885) and Port-Tarascon (1890). Gérard himself wrote a book called Le Tueur de lions (1855). He died in 1864 by drowning in a river in...Sierra Leone!

Jules Gérard was born in what is now the Mairie, as this plaque at the side states.

'Le 12 Septembre 1964 la Ville de Pignans et le Comité des amis de Jules Gérard ont auguré solennellement ce monument[,] œuvre du sculpteur Olivier-Ducamp[,] érigé par souscription publique à la gloire du plus illustre des enfants de Pignans'.

(My translation): 'On 12 September 1964 the Town of Pignans and the Committee of the Friends of Jules Gérard solemnly unveiled this monument, a work by the sculptor Olivier-Ducamp, erected by public subscription to the glory of the most illustrious of Pignans' sons'. Umm.

Manfred Flügge: Amer azur : Artistes et écrivains à Sanary (2007)

What can I say about this book? It's Manfred Flügge's first book in French, and it feels so justifiable to be so: Flügge is an expert in certain kinds of French culture, and this book is a tribute to the exiles of any nationality on the Côte d'Azur, especially in Sanary-sur-Mer.

I can't read this book from cover ot cover as it contains so much information about so many people, I have to re-read, go over the multiple stories, treasure them over a time. This is not a book to read in a few hours, or even a few days.

Amer azur begins with the 'patron saint' of exile,  Hermann Heine, who was an exile from Germany whose statue, after many wanderings, ended up in Toulon. It continues with the various 'generations' of visitors to the coast, beginning with the writers such as Huxley, D.H. Lawrence, Sybille Bedford (born in Germany but married by convenience to conceal her birth), then painters such as André Masson and Walter Bondy. And then the mainly German writers such as Thomas Mann, Bertolt Brecht, Lion Feuchtwanger, Franz Werfel and Alma Mahler-Werfel, Franz Hessel of Jules et Jim fame, and on and on.

Amer azur: Artistes et écrivains à Sanary is a book to treasure, to read over and over again in order to discover, to understand,  just a part of France's rich literary history. Wonderful.