IF
YOU WERE TOLD ABOUT MY BOURBONNAIS
ISBN 2-9504430-6-0
"
I was lucky to belong to a happy generation,
the one of the " baby-boom ",
which was born just at the end of the
second world war, and too young to get
involved in the colonial events. I spent
my childhood in a geographically limited
area, but such a rich and varied one:
a schoolyard at the foot of the townhall
and a vast and peaceful square. I took
great pleasure in bringing this world
back to life: games, friends, the class,
the family. The personality of my father.
In the background, the Bourbonnais of
the merry years, the taste for celebration,
the unconcern of the post-war period "
VARENNES-SUR-ALLIER:
The Fifties
"
From the first pages, the reader is conquered
by the beauty of the style, its discreete
humour, the delicacy of the thought, the
meticulousness of the details... "
Romuald Galetti, Vichy: Regional press.
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ALONE
AGAINST MAFFIA
ISBN2-9504430-4-4
"
Why did Jean Dalcin live in the certainty
that Italy was his true country? What
was the obscure reason why he could not
he be satisfied with the soft and safe
life that his immigrant parents had gotten
for him in the South-west of France? What
torment was he complaining about? Life
difficulty and the digs at his sel-esteem
made his life topple over. But Sicily
with its frightening and bloody whirl,
would not be long ruining his illusions.
Death was on the watch in the the path.
"
ACTION,
DANGER in the heart of the town of Palermo.
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HAPPY
HOLIDAYS
ISBN2-9504430-01
"
Let ourselves be carried towards the Mediterranean,
this world where it is forbidden to take
oneself seriously: a daily experience,
its charm and its limits, its small worries
accepted with a sense of humour which
makes the good times lived in Bourbonnais
come back to us."
"...
I took great pleasure in reading these
memories of holidays. They reminded me
of... this proverb which is current in
the country of DonCamillo: Chi ride toglie
un chiodo alla bara. (The one who laughs
removes a nail from his coffin.) Thanks
to you, I removed several of them..."
JEAN ANGLADE
"
Immagini variopinte, dai toni vivaci si
succedono offrendo dell'Italia molteplici
sfaccettature, in un clima a volte ironico
E critico. " MONICA MARTINELLI, Bollettino
del Centro Interuniversitario di ricerche
sul viaggio in Italia, Moncalieri ITALY
PRECEDENTS
TITLES: U PINZUTU, MEDITERRANEAN POSTCARDS,
and of J.FERRIEUX: TALES FROM BOURBONNAIS
EDITIONS
SCALEA
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Some extracts:
IF YOU
WERE TOLD ABOUT MY BOURBONNAIS
Being
a child of the post-war period, suffering
from no shortage, without benefitting
for all that by the abundance the following
generations were to know, I grew up as
a fragile boy, almost weak at times, but
I usually enjoyed a good health and except
the normal epidemic diseases, I didn't
often know the joy of the sudden high
temperature which justifies the family
mobilization, a dry wood fire, the serious
and reassuring melody of the diagnosis...
MISS JULIE
Another
person was in service with our family
once per week. Miss Julie, ironer by trade...
Miss Julie
had only one failing, a single one. Poor
Miss Julie! To be used to living lonely
in a lower ground floor in the poor part
of the town, to go only on foot through
a district criss-crossed by trucks, to
be able to widen one's horizon only very
seldom by going up the hill which dominates
the city to consider the nice round forms
of a deadened volcano keeping whatch over
its subdued pack, required some compensation.
Miss
Julie would begin with " a small
drop " at 1.30 p.m., which was undoubtedly
followed by several others when she was
alone, since my father who was the owner
of a farm let in share-cropping, gathered
various barrels of wine and a great many
bottles of marc every year. In the evening,
he exclaimed: " My wine is tasteless.
He (the share cropper), gave me pressing
again ". In fact, he finally realized
that with the complicity of the tap Miss
Julie compensated small misdemeanours
which she did not certainly wish to reveal.
Never did my father dare go and reproach
her for that. At the most he gave back
to Miss Julie personally the light wine
she had watered down the week before.
That bottle had an unusual longevity.
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ALONE
AGAINST MAFFIA
... My
troubles had begun a few days before because
of an imprudent glance a simple glance.
What a shame !
A double-dotted
line of detonations had torn the night.
I had stuffed the key of the front door
down the bottom of my pocket, I had rushed
in a stupid reaction, ( quite a french
reaction), towards the parapet which dominates
the small dark square where I parked my
car. I had leaned forward; the figures
could hardly be distinguished: a lying
body in the ultimate convulsive movement,
losing its blood, and the murderer, young
man who leaped on an enormous motor bike
controlled by an inscrutable helmeted
character. *** TRANSLATION ENDS HERE ***
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