TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/072291/0722470.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 5.9 KB | 125 lines

                                                                                BOOKS, Page 62

How to Eat, How to Live


Sick of foul British weather, Peter Mayle finds a paradise in
Provence, and even a pot of gold

By MARTHA DUFFY


    Oh, to discover in the pages of a book the secret of the
sweet life -- the joys of a bountiful climate, brilliant sun and
a splendid cuisine. The problem is that contentment is a tough
subject for a writer. Travel literature is rich, the annals of
staying put sparse. Cookbooks fill libraries, but the
revelations of satisfied palates, at least accounts that seduce
and inspire a reader, are scarce.

    All that makes Peter Mayle something of a wonder. A devout
sun worshiper and the husband of an expert amateur cook, he
stumbled on a patch of Provence and left his native England
without delay or regret. He did the things a lot of dreamers do:
he bought language tapes, a 200-year-old house, a Citroen deux
chevaux, and resolved to write a novel. But the renovation of
ancient stone and the crafting of new fiction do not mix; each
day workmen banished Mayle to a succession of chalky corners.
So what could he do with his time except make his fortune -- by
chronicling the scene around him in irresistible prose?

    Two books later, Mayle is something of a publishing
phenomenon. Toujours Provence (Knopf; $20), his second
collection of essays, is climbing the best-seller lists. The
success story began two years ago with the British publication
of A Year in Provence. The hardback edition at first received
a mild, pleasant response, but never underestimate favorable
word of mouth. In paperback the book was No. 1 on the charts for
60 weeks, and Mayle's plumber, mason and the rest of the
artisans became popular heroes. In the U.S. the paperback has
just appeared, and the publisher is rushing extra printings.

    It's significant that the first sentence of the first book
is "The year began with lunch." This flat-bellied author ("only
one real meal a day") loves food with discriminating passion and
in Provence has found his ideal turf. "You pay attention," he
observes, "to when the melons are good, when asparagus arrives,
to the fact that wild mushrooms are due in three weeks. It's
about as far away from pretentious cuisine as you can get.
Everyone's got an opinion or a secret. With a couple of
questions, they'll talk about it."

    Or they'll talk to this curious listener. Toujours
Provence contains an intricate aria of shoptalk from an expert
truffle hunter who has even filmed his pig at work, "its snout
moving rhythmically back and forth, ears flopping over its eyes,
a single-minded earth-moving machine." A similar cameo on the
history of pastis ("the milk of Provence") is written with an
unpompous sense of discovery and an appropriate amount of
thirst.

    Though he has mastered the offhand approach, Mayle, 52,
has a sophisticated sense of how to make words count and how to
charm a reader. He credits his skills to his early career in
advertising. He had chosen the field mostly because of his
favorite English teacher, who, in addition to pointing out the
elements of style, noted that writers "can live where they like,
work on their own schedule, choose their subject and blame no
one but themselves for failure." Mayle had finished college in
Barbados, where his father was living. There he discovered
another lifelong love: the sun. Says he: "I thought, you don't
have to wear socks here. I am physically attracted to warm,
bright skies."

    In London he became the protege of adman David Ogilvy,
whom he greatly admires. People in advertising are reviled
nearly as often as lawyers, but Mayle thinks it makes a fine
first career. "You learn to present an idea lucidly, and you
must have a picture of who your audience is," he says. "It's a
wonderful preparation for several things, like politics and
charity work."

    Sixteen years ago, Mayle quit the field. "I ran out of
enthusiasm, which is essential," he says. The worst part was the
drop in income: "Huge . . . huge." But other things suggested
themselves. When his eldest son (he has five children) asked him
about the facts of life, he found himself tongue-tied. He sat
right down and wrote a manuscript, Where Did I Come From?, which
was bought by a publisher in 15 minutes. Mayle's conclusion:
"This is the game to get into."

    He is still chastised in the press for another project --
a series of silly books, done with a cartoonist, called Wicked
Willie. Willie is an erect penis. Until the publication in
Britain of Toujours Provence, the author had pretty much slipped
under the critical net and tended to think of reviewers as
tolerant folk like himself. But second time around, his
detractors were ready. The Spectator magazine published not one
but two critiques upbraiding Mayle for barging into print after
only three or four years in the area, using occasional French
phrases and being arch. One account even disparages Provencal
cooking ("never the kind of haute cuisine to be found . . . in
Burgundy or the Perigord").

    Yes, there are occasional foreign words, and once in a
while the author's geniality shades into coyness. But it is also
true that the South of France has been a favorite stamping
ground for British vacationers for generations now; many of the
intelligentsia have bought houses. It just may be that Mayle has
committed the unpardonable sin of making money out of simple
material that was available to all.

    On a book-promotion tour through the U.S. last month,
Mayle met five people in Cleveland who had driven through his
town within the past year. Small world. Now it's home to the
"true heat and sharp light" of his adopted country. Not much has
changed. The Mayles have a new car, but it is another Citroen.
Finally he will finish his novel, to be called Hotel Pastis. It
promises to be a good place to check into.