France Memoir

Bursting with humorous stories about local characters and vivid description of French landscapes and customs gleaned from thirty-five years in the country, Raising Olives in Provence tells the story of how the author improbably came to renovate a run-down house and raise olive trees in the hills above Saint-Tropez.

Par la chroniqueuse judiciaire et la créatrice du podcast "Fenêtre sur cour" d’Arte Radio. "La morale dans les affaires criminelles, ça n’existe pas, pas plus que les saints ou les démons, les héros ou les monstres. Chaque fois, c'est une histoire de gens ordinaires." Tous les chroniqueurs judiciaires se sont déjà vu poser cette question : "Comment fais-tu pour dormir la nuit ?" Ce livre est une réponse. Quand la journaliste Élise Costa décide d’écrire sur le crime, son quotidien en est bouleversé.

Tome 2 : Madrid - Essling - Torres - Vedras. Après Austerlitz, Eylau Friedland, nous retrouvons Marbot au siège de Saragosse, il y est grièvement blessé ; quelques semaines s'écoulent et nous le voyons en ligne à Eckmühl, à Essling, à Wagram.

Louis XIV, known as the Grand Monarch, or the Sun King, was a sovereign of the House of Bourbon who reigned as King of France from 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years is the longest recorded of any monarch in European history. In the age of absolutism, Louis XIV's France was the leader in the growing centralization of power.

The Congress of Vienna, which took place over several months during 1814 and 1815, was an attempt to resolve the numerous challenges presented by Napoleon’s expansion and his subsequent defeat. The talks have been seen as a critical moment in European history, and depending on the point-of-view, the results were either a diplomatic breakthrough or the last gasps of the continent’s conservative elites. It was also a crucial step toward German unification, although this was not clear at the time.

Claude Monet has been the icon for the impressionist movement. His family life wasn’t perfect, but despite all obstacles, the French genius painter has left us a legacy and a new perspective on realism and technique in their purest forms. In this guide, we’ll go over his youth, his style, his methods, his most famous paintings, and many of the reasons why he made the decisions he made.

The story of Nostradamus is tougher to determine than one would have ever imagined. By the end of this audiobook, you will have hopefully been able to piece together some of the answers to the questions you have about the individual known simply as Nostradamus.

In Montparnasse begins on the eve of the First World War and ends with the 1936 unveiling of Dalí’s Lobster Telephone. As those extraordinary years unfolded, the Surrealists found ever more innovative ways of exploring the interior life, and asking new questions about how to define art. In Montparnasse recounts how this artistic revolution came to be amidst the salons and cafés of that vibrant neighborhood.

In the tradition of Agent Zigzag comes this breathtaking biography, as fast-paced and emotionally intuitive as the very best spy thrillers, which illuminates an unsung hero of the French Resistance during World War II - Robert de La Rochefoucald, an aristocrat turned anti-Nazi saboteur - and his daring exploits as a résistant trained by Britain's Special Operations Executive.

Described as both “one of the most important novels ever written” and “the gospel of evil,” 120 Days of Sodom was written by the Marquis de Sade, a notorious eighteenth-century aristocrat who waged a campaign of mayhem and debauchery across France, evaded execution, and inspired the word “sadism,” which came to mean receiving pleasure from pain. Despite all his crimes, Sade considered this work to be his greatest transgression.

Pourquoi tant de peine - de détresse même - associée au sentiment de l'amour? L'état amoureux peut nous faire rapidement passer de l'extase sublime à la douleur profonde, du bonheur à la folie, de la bonté à la méchanceté et à la jalousie lorsqu'il nous échappe. Mais du point de vue spirituel, quel est le vrai sens de l'amour? Quelle serait la vraie nature du sentiment amoureux?

The most celebrated general in history, Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) has for centuries attracted eminent male writers. Since Thomas Carlyle first christened him “our last Great Man”, regiments of biographers have marched across the same territory, weighing campaigns and conflicts, military tactics and power politics. With Napoleon, Ruth Scurr, one of our most eloquent and original historians, emphatically rejects the shibboleth of the “Great Man” theory of history, instead following the dramatic trajectory of Napoleon’s life through gardens, parks, and forests.

Even before Susan Herrmann Loomis wrote her now-classic memoir, On Rue Tatin, Americans have been compelled by books about the French's ease with cooking. With In a French Kitchen, Loomis—an expat who long ago traded her American grocery store for a bustling French farmer's market—demystifies in lively prose the seemingly effortless je ne sais quoi behind a simple French meal.

Paul Johnson's book is a refreshing return to a concept whose time has come once again: the Great Man theory of biography. It serves as "the greatest possible refutation of those who hold that events are governed by forces, classes, economics, and geography rather than the powerful wills of men and women". Napoleon truly was the Great Man of his age, a towering and terrible genius who managed to conquer the Continent.

Set in Provence, London, and New York, this is a daughter’s wonderfully evocative and witty memoir of her mother and stepfather—Dee Wells, the glamorous and rebellious American journalist, and A. J. Ayer, the celebrated and worldly Oxford philosopher—and the life they lived at the center of absolutely everything.

Who was the real Marie-Antoinette? She was mistrusted and reviled in her own time, and today she is portrayed as a lightweight incapable of understanding the events that engulfed her. In this new account, John Hardman redresses the balance and sheds fresh light on Marie-Antoinette's story. Hardman shows how Marie-Antoinette played a significant but misunderstood role in the crisis of the monarchy.

Voltaire, born François-Marie Arouet in Paris, France, was a writer and leading figure of the Enlightenment. His insistence that all authority could and must be questioned was so radical, he ended up in prison several times and was ultimately exiled. Voltaire’s writings were instrumental in influencing the American and French revolutions. Man as a being with natural rights was a radical concept at the time, but one which the American founding fathers embraced. Voltaire’s anger was specifically directed at the arbitrary powers of the state and the church.

A language barrier is no match for love. Lauren Collins discovered this firsthand when, in her early 30s, she moved to London and fell for a Frenchman named Olivier - a surprising turn of events for someone who didn't have a passport until she was in college. But what does it mean to love someone in a second language? Collins wonders, as her relationship with Olivier continues to grow entirely in English. Are there things she doesn't understand about Olivier, having never spoken to him in his native tongue?

Saint Louis: A King's Obsession with Relics, Magic, and Spells is a richly detailed exploration of the life and reign of King Louis IX of France, a monarch whose legacy is steeped in both sanctity and the supernatural. This book delves into the hidden aspects of Louis IX’s life, revealing a ruler driven not only by his devout Christian faith but also by an insatiable hunger for mystical knowledge. King Louis IX, canonized as Saint Louis after his death, is often remembered for his piety.

Tome 3 : Polotsk - La beresina - Leipzig - Waterloo. On a laissé Marbot en Portugal, combattant à Torrès Védras, à Fuentes de Ońoro ; dans ce tome, on va le retrouver franchissant le Niémen avec la Grande Armée... "J'engage le colonel Marbot à continuer à écrire pour la défense et la gloire des Armées françaises et en confondre les calomniateurs", écrivait Napoléon dans son testament.