Richard Goodman - French Dirt: The Story of a Garden in the South of France

Praise for French Dirt:

French Dirt is one of the most charming, perceptive and subtle books ever written about the French by an American.... This wise and touching book is about knowing others and finding oneself.

San Francisco Chronicle

The writing is clear, simple, evocative.

The Washington Post

The book has a nave charm which is heightened by Goodmans spare Steinbeckian prose.

The Times Literary Supplement (London)

This is a book that calls for an easy chair to sink into, an afternoon to savor, and perhaps a pot of tea. For armchair gardeners, for real green thumbs, for Francophiles or wistful admirers of the simple life, this droll and reverential chronicle of close ties to the earth will enchant, amuse and instruct.

Smithsonian magazine

[Goodman] writes lovingly of tilling the soil and watching lettuce and tomatoes and leeks spring from the ground, but at heart Goodmans book is about the generous people he met during his stay and what they have to say about life. Armchair travelers and gardeners alike will enjoy his charming memoir.

Outside magazine

Goodman is to gardening what M.F.K. Fisher is to food.

The Bookwatch (newsletter of the Midwest Book Review)

My bet is that French Dirt will wind up a word-of-mouth classic, one that will last and bloom on perennially.

The Courier-Gazette (Rockland, Maine)

[Goodman] borrows a plot of land on which to grow a garden, a project that becomes for him both mission and obsession, and that his neighbors view first with curiosity, then with sympathy and a deepening sense of involvement.... Theres a genuine sweetness about the way the cucumbers and tomatoes bridge the divide of nationality.

The New York Times Book Review

Goodman says this is a love story about a man and his garden. Well yes, and then some. French Dirt tells us about a way of life.

Baltimore City Paper

Simply a delightfulsometimes insightfulaccount of one mans attempt to better understand himself and the world around him.

Pittsburgh Press

Quietly compelling, for anyone who loves the South of France or the making of a garden.

Library Journal

Goodman delivers details, moments and a sense of place one doesnt have to be a Francophile gardening buff to enjoy.

Mirabella

A great gift book, deliciously hard to put down.

Kirkus Reviews

Goodman is a more reserved Peter Mayle, and the emphasis in French Dirt is on the growing of food rather than the cooking and eating of it, and on gardeners rather than chefs and winemakers.

Centerville Times (Dayton, Ohio)

French Dirt has wit and wisdom, fantasy, reality, and an engaging rhythm.

Billings Gazette (Montana)

Goodman is successful on every level. This book is refreshingly simple in both content and style.... This is a special book that will be meaningful to anyone who has ever tried to grow anything; so buy it for yourselfor give it as a thoughtful gift.

BookPage

French Dirt is a charming book that combines travel, gardening, and a sense of adventure in a poetic journal that is a pleasure to read for the lover of things French, the amateur gardener, and the armchair tourist.

Chattanooga News-Free Press

RICHARD GOODMAN

Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill

Published by

Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill

Post Office Box 2225

Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225

a division of

Workman Publishing

225 Varick Street

New York, New York 10014

Copyright 1991 by Richard Goodman

All rights reserved.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA IS AVAILABLE.

eISBN 978-1-56512-740-1

TO IGGY

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Certain people have helped me tremendously in writing this book. They are: Shannon Ravenel, Abby Thomas, Ron Arnold, Dodds Musser, Bettye Dew and Donna Van Buren. I thank them very much. Most of all, I want to thank Deborah Attoinese, filmmaker extraordinaire, unerring critic and best friend, for giving so much, so often.

A Note about Names...

When I came to the place I call St. Sbastien de Caisson, I had no idea that I would ever have a garden, much less write about one. Now that I have done just that, I think it only right that I change the name of the village and the villagers themselves. The villagers spoke to me unguardedly, without any idea that their words might someday appear in print. I feel I must respect their openness of heart, and their privacy, by keeping their identities hidden.

... And about Gardens and Gardeners

In St. Sbastien de Caisson, my village, the gardeners, with only a few exceptions, were men. Mostly older men, too, those who were semiretired from working in the vineyards and who had enough time to dedicate to the task of raising zucchini, tomatoes, eggplant and all the other vegetables that were planted. (I should say that whenever I speak of gardens, I mean vegetable gardens.) They tended their gardens with care, and the results were always wonderful to see. Each garden in its own way was different, but they were all successful. In the course of my time in St. Sbastien, I talked to most of the men and to the few women who had gardens. They were consistently generous with their advice, and also highly opinionated. For them, gardening was serious. It was not an amusement. It provided food. I tried not to forget that.

Intimacy with another country is ripened by pleasures but also by loneliness and error.

Shirley Hazzard, Italian Hours

PROLOGUE

THIS IS A LOVE STORY. Like most love stories, it has its share of joy and passion, of loss and pain. Like most love stories, it also has its moments of melodrama, of emotions run amok, of suspicions, worries, anxieties, of pride and panicof jealousy, even. And, like many familiar love stories, it has times of great pleasure and bliss, only to end, because fate or the gods willed it, cataclysmically.

In this case, the object of my love was not a woman. It was a small, rectangular piece of land in the south of France.

This is the story of my garden.