Extrait :
In 1990, our first summer here, I bought an oversized blank book with Florentine paper on the cover and blue leather binding. On the first page I wrote ITALY. The book looked as though it should have immortal poetry in it but I began with lists of wildflowers, lists of projects, new words, sketches of tile in Pompeii. I described rooms, trees, bird calls. I added planting advice, "Plant sunflowers when the moon crosses Libra," although I had no clue myself as to when that might be. I wrote about the people we met and the food we cooked. The book became a chronicle of our first four years here. Today it is stuffed with menus, postcards of paintings, a drawing of a floor plan of an abbey, Italian poems, and diagrams of the garden. Because it is thick, I still have room in it for a few more summers. Now the blue book has become Under the Tuscan Sun, a natural outgrowth of my first pleasures here. Restoring then improving the house, transforming an overgrown jungle into its proper function as a farm for olives and grapes, exploring the layers and layers of Tuscany and Umbria, cooking in a foreign kitchen and discovering the many links between food and the culture--these intense joys frame the deeper pleasure of learning to live another kind of life. To bury the grape tendril in such a way that it shoots out new growth I recognize easily as a metaphor for the way life must change from time to time if we are to go forward in our thinking.
Revue de presse :
"Lyrically written and beguiling... What makes it special is the sustained note of joy in it; joy in the beauty of the Tuscan countryside, the sights and sounds of daily life, the physical labour involved in the restoration of this 200-year-old villa and the five acres of land that go with it" (SUNDAY TIMES)
"Like many delightful books, this account of restoring a Tuscan farmhouse and its land is hard to classify. The author is a poet, good at evoking atmosphere and describing place; a cook who collects appetizing winter and summer recipes; an academic who sets her new home in its Roman and Etruscan context. Above all, Mayes is an enthusiast for starting over. After the dissolution of a long marriage, she celebrates Christmas in Italy with her grown-up daughter and her new partner. 'Is this much happiness allowed?' she asks. You bet" (MAIL ON SUNDAY)
"Frances Mayes is a wonderful writer. She captures with exceptional poetry and vivacity the extraordinary beauty of Tuscany. She understands Tuscany like a person who was born and has lived here all her life" (Lorenza De'Medici)
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