A House in Flanders by Sir Michael Jenkins
Acclaimed as one of the best books of the year when it first appeared, A House in Flanders eloquently evokes the life of a French family one summer in the early 1950s, seen through the eyes of a fourteen-year-old English boy. A comparative stranger when he arrives at the large country house in northern France, he is rapidly drawn into the lives of the colourful aunts, uncles and cousins who people this new world. Portraying a generation whose lives were radically shaped by two world wars, the book is also a study of old age as observed by youth, and of the house and the beautiful countryside which form a tapestry against which the events of that summer and the following spring are played out. Praised by the late Sir Dirk Bogarde as a "radiant book...perfect, simple prose at its best", A House in Flanders takes us into an enchanted world now gone forever.
"'There is, in the eloquent descriptions of the great Flanders plain, in the sharp, clear, understanding portraits of the people, in the almost melancholy sweetness of this high summer of ripening corn and under candled chestnut trees, a sense of Colette and Alain-Fournier.. You will find a whole spectrum of colours and lights, of delights and elegances, of wistfulness and love. You will even come across glory, in a sense, as well as sweet grief. This is a radiant book... You will pick it up again and again for sheer delight.' Dirk Bogarde, The Daily Telegraph 'A tender and enchanting tapestry whose central theme is how the rituals and idiosyncrasies of old age react to the questioning iconoclasm of youth...A little gem of a book.' The Sunday Telegraph 'His directly written but elegant book...this golden world which seemed to have survived from another century. Even then it was starting to disintegrate...But its long summer days survive in this enchanting and affectionate book.' The Mail on Sunday 'The flat landscape of this part of France with its enormous skies is well described and his characters are memorable.' Thomas Hinde, The Sunday Times"
Sir Michael Jenkins has spent most of his carrer in the British Diplomatic Service, serving in Paris, Moscow, Bonn, Washington and Brussels before becoming British Ambassador at The Hague, a post from which he resigned in 1993. He now works in merchant banking. Educated privately and at King's College, Cambridge, he spent much of his youth in France and he and his wife own a house in Gascony. He was knighted in 1990.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780285635432 |
| ISBN 10 | 0285635433 |
| Title | A House in Flanders |
| Author | Sir Michael Jenkins |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Profile Books Ltd |
| Year published | 2001-05-24 |
| Number of pages | 176 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |