Clochemerle by Gabriel Chevallier

This is a vintage classic book, first published in Great Britain in 1936. It was originally written in French. It has been continually in print since 1936. Though not quite on par with Lady Chatterley's lover it is quite 'racy' and 'base' at times and surprisingly so for its time.

The story is of a French village in the Beaujolais wine region and complexity of living the simple life in a community centred around wine production!

Some of us enjoyed the Windmill Players stage performance of the story of Clochemerle and were quite surprised at the depth of the story in the book. In fact most of our group felt the book had taken longer to read then anticipated. The sentences are long, convoluted and very 'rich'. This is a book to read in small chunks and to be savoured. Our French member confirmed that this is the same in the French language version.

The underlying tone is satirical. We have a Frenchman poking fun at his fellow countrymen, and it is brilliantly witty and very funny. The outrageous behaviours of the church, the administration, the wartime military, the 'aristocracy' are carefully interlaced with the culture and traditions of ordinary small town/big village country folk.

We (inevitably as an all female group) got on to the subject of feminism and quickly concluded that we actually really enjoyed the scandalous way Gabriel wrote about the women of the village. This is irony, it's not supposed to be 'politically' correct!

So of the characters, the behaviour of two 'neighbourly' priests was, we felt, a 'hoot' and the stand off between the Contessa and Taridot is a perfect example of the way the author ridicules the establishment (in this example the class divide). The story is so full of brilliantly observed characterisation that it is impossible to single out any one person or incident.

We briefly considered whether English life at the same time bore any similarities. Yes, of course it probably compares on a rural community lifestyle perspective but the revolutionary undertones of the French culture has a style all of its own - when it comes to deference, the English do it and the French do not!

Would we recommend it? Yes, it's hard work but it's a very worthwhile read. We should challenge ourselves more often with our reading and so, we were pleased this book was suggested. So, on that basis we will 'suggest' it to others.

Our next book is The Road to Little Dribbling by Bill Bryson and we will discuss that when we next meet in The Hundred of Ashendon on Thursday 22nd September.