The Empress Eugenie's chamber-pot...

It's always amazing what strange stories appear during a forage among the archives of any place, anywhere. This week I've been in Pontivy (once Napoleonville and famous for its imperial town planning), before and after a welcome interlude with friends in Arradon on the Gulf of Morbihan. I'm looking at 19th century politics in this piece, and a very tedious subject this can be, but every so often something ridiculous or amusing turns up to brighten the long hours.
The allure of royal, or imperial, souvenirs is not a new thing. After the brief visit of Emperor Napoleon III and his wife Eugenie to Pontivy in 1858, the 'vase de nuit' (chamber-pot, rather than 'night-jar' which you sometimes see in translations!!) used by the Empress during her night's stay, became a much sought-after item, and not merely for its quality English porcelain. But the very nature of 19th century politics is seismic shifts. Fifty years later, the pot was on sale in a second-hand shop in Vannes.
The Empress was good enough to promise funds for a new church in the town, having been asked pretty bluntly by the priest during the celebratory banquet organised for the imperial couple. How pleased she was to be represented in gargoyle form on the facade, we'll never know. And sometimes it is better not to know things, especially endless detail about the lives of people in whom we have no interest at all.

Qui voit Ouessant voit son sang

Just back from a working holiday on the amazing island of Ouessant. Managed to complete the coastal walk started on a previous trip and highly recommend it: for me it is far the best of all the Breton islands, being harsher and more remote than much vaunted, pretty Belle-Ile. That sense of being far out in the Atlantic (with weather to match - from hot sun to a wind force I've never experienced), and the lengthy, often rough, journey to get there adds to the experience.

Qui voit Groix, voit sa croix

Trip to the Ile de Groix in very bad weather yesterday. Whilst walking for hours in sodden clothes is not my favourite occupation, it turned into a great day thanks to my companion, a geologist - an essential on this island once tortured by tectonic plate movements that have left the most spectacularly dense folding and the coloured stones for which Groix is famous. Garnet dust turns many sands red, and tiny garnets stud the deep blue/green glaucophane.

My other goal was to visit the haunts of one of my favourite poets, Yann-Ber Calloc'h, a tragic loss to Breton literature at the age of 28 in WWI. To hear his moving lines about his beloved native island read aloud in Breton beside his memorial on the cliff-top was an experience that saturation could not spoil.

We left in a brief of spell sunshine, past the very unusual convex beach of Grand Sables, Groix gleaming greenly in our wake.

Ile de Sein

On the Ile de Sein today for my chapter on Breton islands. It's eight years since I was last here but not surprisingly it seemed pretty much the same. Strange experience, as nowhere is more than 8m high, and the surrounding seas, even on a quiet day like today, were rough.
Not sure yet what theme I'll rest on, but women and/or death are sure to figure. Admired Mathurin Meheut's drawings of women at work in the museum, which also has an extensive section on the war. I think enough has probably been written already on Sein's contribution there, de Gaulle's admiration and the illustrious honour of the Ordre de la Liberation.
High recommendation for the restaurant at the Hotel Armen, where I had the best cod fillet in seaweed sauce (one of my favourite dishes) ever, plus good homemade bread and home smoked fish with salad to start.

Guided tour

I was pleased to do a guided tour for the association AIKB today, highlighting some of the great sights covered in my new Saints Shore Way book. First we visited the remarkable crypt in the church of St Melar at Lanmeur, followed by a quick look at the Romanesque church of Kernitron.
Onward to the coast at the Pointe de Primel (pictured above - with those of the group who wanted a bit of exercise after lunch) where we had a picnic and some walked out to the gouffre or chasm between the butte and the culminating rocky pinnacle. This was an Iron Age éperon barré, or fortified peninsula, where the natural landscape was enhanced by artifical ramparts to form an impressive defensive position, occupied over later centuries by the Vikings, the English, the Spanish (Wars of Religion) and the Germans in WWII. Finally to the neolithic cairn at Barnenez, a site I cannot visit often enough, for a glimpse into the life, death and values of people in Brittany around 4700BC. This monument was called "the Parthenon of the neolothic" by culture minister André Malraux in the 1950s when it was classified as a matter of urgency to stop a predatory developer who had begin dismantling several of the eleven passage graves under the cairn.

Great day for guiding work, with those three top criteria - quality sites, lovely people and kind weather.

La Paimpolaise

My latest research trip was a few days in Paimpol as I'm writing something about 19th century Breton cod-fishing in Iceland. This incredibly arduous, grim and frequently fatal endeavour was elevated into a kind of super-heroism by popular culture of the time, notably the novel Pecheur d'Islande (1886) by Pierre Loti and the song summarising its whole story in six verses by composer Theodore Botrel a few years later. The latter has a simple and hence infuriatingly catchy lilt that keeps it going round and round in my head ...
J'aime Paimpol et sa falaise
Son eglise et son grand Pardon
J'aime surtout la Paimpolaise
Qui m'attend au pays breton

There are no cliffs around Paimpol, but that rhyme's an irresistible gift ...

This is what Loti dubbed the Widows' Cross, sighting point for the return or non-return of the ships. The excellent Musée de la Mer tells the whole painful story with a variety of documents and artefacts. Well worth a visit, and nearby is the unmissable Abbaye de Beauport. I've been numerous times and it was not on the agenda, but it's just too good to pass by, especially on a sunny May morning...

Tréguier

I've been in Tréguier, one of my favourite places in Brittany, for some research on the rationalist philosopher Ernest Renan, and more specifically the clash between the religious establishment and progressive Republicans in 1903 when a statue to the great man, flanked by Athena, goddess of Reason, was provocatively erected opposite the entrance to the cathedral. This building is associated with Tugdual (or more accurately Tudgual), one of the seven founding saints of Brittany from the Dark Ages, and later with Saint Yves, whose tomb and grinning skull lie there. The latter is the patron saint of Brittany and was an historical figure from the 13th century (d1303). His reputation as a priest and ecclesiatical judge was that of one predisposed towards the poor and disadvantaged. Odd that he is now the patron saint of lawyers, who come from all over the world to celebrate the Pardon on May 19th. Yves is also that rare thing - an 'official' Breton saint, canonised by Pope Clement VI in 1347.

Both St Yves and Renan are sons of Tréguier (600 years apart), offering me a profitable juxtaposition for the new book. Renan's great sin was to present Christ as a 'very remarkable man' (and not the divine son of God) in his lectures and book The Life of Jesus, published in 1863. This led to suspension from his teaching post until the Republican govenrment of 1870 reinstated him. The vicious caricatures of Renan with the Devil's horns and pictures of armed soldiers trampling good, honest citizens to the floor during the confrontations of that wet day in 1903 reflect the often violent polarisation of state and church during the later part of the 19th century, resulting in the final separation in 1905.
The immediate response of the Catholic Church to Renan's statue was to commission the last great calvaire in Brittany, erected on the quay of the Jaudy river at the foot of the hill leading up to Renan's family house and his statue. This lavish monument (complete with lists of donors) is called both the Calvaire of Reparation or the Calvaire of Protestation, depending on your religious stance. Renan's earlier spiritual advisors - for he had been intended for the priesthood, only experiencing a crisis of faith at the very last moment - refused to join the outcry about his book in the 1860s, retaining their affection and respect for him to the last.

Cornish trip

Great trip to Cornwall, walking the Saints Way with a friend (the Cornish artist Haddow, www.haddow-art.com) and publicising my own Saints Shore Way book, which details a long-distance walking trail on the north coast of Brittany conceived as an extension of the Cornish route.
The Saints Way (Padstow - see Camel estuary above - to Fowey) took form in the 1980s from the discovery of ancient granite stiles in a valley near Luxulyan. These were probably part of an old drovers route but they gave the idea of a north to south coast path that earlier migrants may have followed to avoid dangerous seas around Lands End. The path today connects many Celtic crosses and churches to give character to the saints' theme. From the harbour at Fowey, these Dark Age pilgrims set sail for Brittany, or ultimately for Jerusalem or Compostela.

Our two day walk was slightly marred by driving winds which made lingering on the heights of Saint Breock Downs an unattractive prospect, but we had a restorative night at the excellent St Benets Abbey hotel/B&B. I had quite forgotten the old problems of walking in England with dubious directional arrows across fields, farmyards to avoid and bulls in waiting. We don't have any of that in Brittany, which certainly simplifies matters. Give me track walking any day for ease of nagivation and that welcome give underfoot - there was too much road slogging in the Saints Way for a fairly short route (42 kms).
Also managed quick visits to Penzance and St Ives in the rain before a very welcome meeting with John Fleet of CERES (Centre for European Research within Cornwall) in Truro. Overall it was a fine experience and I added a couple of days in London with my nearest and dearest thanks to the overnight sleeper train from Truro to Paddington. Have to say though, it's good to be home in France.

Out at last

My new book The Saints' Shore Way is out at last - a project with the Baie de Morlaix tourist board supposed to last three months that has in fact taken up eight and caused me all manner of hardships. It has certainly been an eye-opening experience to see how tourist organisations work in terms of project development.
The guide gives maps, directions, sights and themes for a 133km route between Roscoff and Lannion, via Morlaix, mostly on the coastal path. It's a week's walk, accessible without a car as it starts from Roscoff ferry port and there's a good train service back from Lannion. The cover, designed to say sea, summer, dramatic rocks and lonely paths away from it all, has been a hit. Even the English distributor emailed to say it made one want to be there at once. The whole book looks and feels great, so all that meticulous work on the page lay-out and design was worth it in the end.
As I've sold my rights, very cheaply as things have turned out, the sales are not a direct concern, but I've done a great deal of publicity here and in England to help things along. Pity it is quite late in the season for planning holidays, especially with Easter so early. I'm doing a tour of some of the highlights for the AIKB in May and publicity in Cornwall, because of the connection with the Saints Way there, before that.

Celtic punk

I'm enjoying a chance to get on with the new book - cultural history of Brittany - without distractions, apart from finishing the Huelgoat walking for the little guide coming out in April. Yesterday I was able to write all morning, get out over lunch-time on the high hills on a cold and grey day perfect for walking and thinking, and then read all afternoon.

As I have already accumulated a veritable moutain of books (all in French, so inevitably a bit slower to get through) for research, that reading time is vital. Ended a very productive day listening to the Ramoneurs de Menhirs, my favourite Celtic punk band. Actually I don't know any others (yet) but I'm determined to get them in somewhere. Their wit and energy are inspiring, a sure antidote to the heavy literary mob who will also figure here and there in the book. And I like their music.

The tallest menhir in France

The Menhir de Kerloas - slightly taller than me ...

Le Conquet trip

Had a great (too short) holiday in Le Conquet. Stayed in a very cheap but perfectly functional chalet in the holiday village run by the mairie. Two minute walk into centre and five minutes to coast path, so well placed for walking, eating and drinking. I rarely drink alcohol but it seemed the height of civilised behaviour to wander into town for an aperitif before supper. Just as well I revisited the Pointe de Corsen, westernmost point of France, where my new book opens - it has been heartily sanitised with a manicured path and pristine table of orientation. No more signpost to Moscow, Morocco and London. Maybe not such a great loss. Let's hope there are no plans for a tourist circus like at the Pointe de Raz.
Fabulous walk one day down the coast path to the Pointe St Mathieu with its ruined abbey and lighthouse on the cliff-top. Few better sights in Brittany than that, no matter that I've been there many times before. The fort has been transformed into a memorial to those lost at sea, the walls covered with photos of each individual. It's a disturbing and uncomfortable experience.
Partly also on the quest of Michel Le Nobletz, the 17th century missionary who did so much to galvanise Catholicism in western Brittany and invented the taolennou, sheep-skins or wood painted with biblical or allegorical scenes to revive notions of keeping to the straight and narrow in order to attain the ultimate reward in heaven. Some illustrations of these powerful documents in his little chapel above the port at Le Conquet and in the parish church where his tomb rests.

Busy ...

Seem to have had a great deal to do on many fronts lately. The book fair at Cloitre-St-Thegonnec on Sunday was not very lucrative but a pleasurable day out reconnecting with other writers. As I'm now a member of the Association  Ecrivains bretons I'm more in the swing of events and competitions, not that there's any time to do much creative writing these days. I've made a start on the cultural history of Brittany for Signal Books (www.signalbooks.co.uk).
The Saints Shore Way book is finished and going to press shortly, and I hope to the complete the Huelgoat booklet by the end of this month, although I've a bit of walking still to do to complete the path maps. Due a short break with a friend before that at Le Conquet (pictured) to have some quiet thinking time and breathe the sea air.

At the top

Managed to struggle up onto the highest point in Brittany, Roc'h Ruz, this week, drawn out from my sick bed by beautiful weather. Two weeks seem to have disppeared without much result under the onslaught of a virus that has felled half the population of Brittany, very expensive car repairs and days with no transport and a terrible mistake (OK, my fault) that has seen all files labelled Brittany (hard to imagine how many) disappear from my computer, many never to be fully recovered.
Life goes on. On the plus side, I've just agreed to write a cultural history of Brittany for Signal Books in their excellent series Landscapes of the Imagination.

France 6 Wales 16

We won! Fantastic result in Paris and even better in that it will make the French absolutely determined to beat England. Looking to Ireland tomorrow now for another display of passionate graft. Celtic discipline - who knew?

Fantasy (and Horror)

I was delighted to be asked last year to contribute to the latest in the very successful Now Write! series, published by Tarcher/Penguin in the US. Each book deals with a different genre: established writers describe their conceptual approach and current preoccupations, then set an exercise for aspiring writers to develop new skills.
So, which genre? History? Travel writing? No, I'm to be in Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror! And in some distinguished company - Ursula Le Guen et al. This has come about through my work on legend and landscape, a satisfactorily loose fit for Fantasy, despite my usual protestations that legends are historically based and connected with specific places.
I wrote a piece called 'Leaping into Landscape' with an exercise of getting imaginatively lost in a forest. Looking forward to publication in coming months. Fun.

Moor art - January

Landscape Writing

The Mirror of Landscape begins with a semi-diary entry for December 30th, describing a moor-land walk. I follow the same route today through a changed world. Squelching is replaced by crackling as the land is finally frozen after weeks of fairly constant rain. I cannot resist that satisfying snap of ice beneath my boot, although soon regret this childish over-enthusiasm as I sink deep into the earth and have to wrench my leg out of the reluctant bog.

The muted winter sun is a novelty, brightening what has been lost in mizzle for so long. Sounds are sharper, no longer muffled by the wet air or hurled away by the buffeting winds. Where the moor runs right down into the reservoir below me, the oatmeal expanse of grasses is transformed into a shallow beach of lemon sand. On the same gorse plants sit rusty stems of old woody growth and fresh deep green points newly alert. The long, unmarked body of a dead snake lies lightly coiled, mostly upside down, on the broad rutted path. It must have been lured out of a warm lair by the deceptive sunlight into an unwelcoming chill. On the bottom of a tiny footprint pond, its lifeless pen-nib head moves gracefully in time with the trickling current above, as run-off water is carried into the lower bank.

As I’m looking at everything, so familiar and yet so constantly fluctuating, I’m thinking about writing and expressing what’s around me, and then wonder if this is inevitable. Is it possible to remain within the landscape without anticipating the warmer hours in the study capturing the experience on paper? Does that degree of separation forcibly introduce a note of manipulation or make the temptation of enhancement irresistible? Is the original experience in the head or of the body?

I see I have written ‘muted sun’ when on the spot it was simply ‘pale.' So can I be true to the land and to my own criteria, or is this a meaningless distinction? I know it bothers me a lot. 

Please visit the Saints Shore Way blog

Please have a look at the new blog, even though it is only a baby blog as yet. Now that the text is almost finished, I'll be updating much more regularly with articles, photos, etc. Once the Saints Shore Way book is out in April, I hope to add personal experiences of walkers on the route during the rest of the year.

www.thesaintsshoreway.blogspot.fr or link opposite.

Boots made for walking

Very pleased with my new boots from Hotters. I've admired them online for a while and decided to take advantage of a good sale price - turning out to be a real bargain. I walked several miles with them straight out of the box the day they arrived, in total comfort. They are also warm which would never have been a criterion for me in the past but since my terrible and chronic right foot problems, it makes an important difference. (I should maybe wear them in the house, as no heating is not helping my poor foot's long term recovery.) Only possible concern is that the tread seems to pick up small stones easily, but that's not an issue on most walking terrain. Definitely recommend these walking boots and Hotters shoes are pretty hot too ...www.hottershoes.com

New Year begins ... back to work

My 2013 begins with a walk in Huelgoat forest under alternating sunshine and heavy rain, and a cloudy day checking details around Locquenolé, Ploujean (ruined chapel of the Chateau de Keranroux pictured), Plouezoc'h and Barnenez. I must finish the Saints' Shore Way text by the end of January and my little Huelgoat book for April. More excitingly, I am back to the Mirror of Landscape with a rather clearer vision of the form the book will take, but it will take at least a year to write. This is one case where the process is to be spun out and savoured.

Maths and Geography

I see you through the window,

Absent in a meeting.

A short span

From my finger-tip

To the contours of your face.

Beloved geography:

I always did like maps,

But not those tedious tallies

Of economic growth,

Some soulless reckoning.

How can so many so muches

Add up to nothing in the end?

That’s our kind of maths.

Driving home, the sky is sadly

And I am not so shining.

© 2012

Great year ending...

Happy Yule and 2013 to all my readers, with thanks for all the cards and messages received.

Never mind the end of the world, there will certainly soon be an end to 2012. A great year for me, full of interesting work, important new people and improving health. My main book Legends of Brittany has been very well-received and had excellent sales - the two don't always go together - and the West Coast Brittany Focus guide I did for Footprint in Janaury has also done well.
I've had so many commissions and projects with others that there's been little time for my own stuff, so the new landscape writing remains undeveloped thus far, although I've done a lot of reading and research, and not a lot of progress has been made on the fiction front. Still, once my two 2013 books are out in April/May maybe there'll be a chance to focus on those things. Maybe not.
In fact, all I really want for 2013 is a home of my own.

Sea walking

First time I've ever seen this - sea-walking at St-Pol de Léon this morning. Now I want to try it ...

Brest again

Gave a tour of Brest to a small group this week and was once again struck by how much improved the city feels with the new tram and modern artwork brightening up the place. It looks clean and less mean, ready to put itself on display with a degree of pride rather than the old take-it-or-leave it vibe.
Brest developed relatively late. A fortified site on the mouth of the Penfeld river defended by Celts and Romans, it became the chateau stronghold of the lords of Léon until they fell on hard times and let the duchy of Brittany get their hands on it. During the 14th century Wars of Succession (part of the Hundred Years' War), the English - over here in numbers to support Jean de Montfort's claim to the duchy, as Edward III was eager to get into France by this back door - managed to grab and hold onto the castle for nearly fifty years. Even that archetypal medieval warrior du Guesclin baulked at a full siege to oust them and supplies finally came in via the magnificent Rade to secure their position.
But it was not until the 17th century, when Brittany was firmly part of France, that a larger centre grew up here, thanks to the decision of Richlieu in 1631 to make Brest the main base of the French navy on the Atlantic coast. The creation of the Arsenal, a vast worksite of ship-building, rope-making, barrel-turning, hinge-forging enterprise led to an upturn in the city's fortunes, as everything that was needed to construct, equip and supply the ships was made on the spot. Add to that all the sailors, officers and administrators and the simmering pot of nautical life illustrated in many painting and engravings springs to life.
Not surprisingly, Brest flourished in times of war when these activities were in high demand and there was work for many thousands of hands. England was happy to keep it all going in serial exchanges during the 18th and 19th centuries, but when there was peace, hardship soon followed for the Brestois labour force.
It was all the other way about in WWII, when German occupation and in particular the submarine base, a crucial factor in the Battle of the Atlantic, made Brest an essential target for allied bombing. Much of the city lay in ruins when it was all over and a brand new structre had to be thrown up in a hurry to house more than a million displaced people.
The grid-plan lay-out between the hideous concrete Place de la Liberté and the Chateau along the axis of the rue du Siam contrasts with much older pockets to be found across the bridge in Recouvrance. The Maison de la Fontaine retains its Renaissance doorway, and the rue St-Malo has preserved a row of houses dating back perhaps to the 17th century. But the large space for rebuilding and rethinking a city (a bit like Rennes after the great fire of 1720) has led to some interesting modern structures, none more so than the Eglise St-Louis, rebuilt on a vast scale in the 1950s. The interior is stunning, with a bleak wall of lamentation in direct contrast with slashes of light outlining the coloured chess-piece figures of Breton saints and biblical luminaries. The windows recalling the life of St-Louis himself - pictured - are pretty damn fine.

A cross-Channel connection

I had the good fortune today to be given a personal tour of the Musée Maritime in Carantec by Jean-Pierre Daffniet, President of the museum association.  On one side of the road there's a well-presented room devoted to resistance evacuations from Carantec to England during WWII, plus a highly symbolic artefact - the actual boat, Le Requin (The Shark), in which local boat-builder Ernest Sibiril got a small group away on October 31st, 1943. Among these was George Wood, an English pilot who miraculously escaped after his plane exploded over Ploujean and was hidden for months by the resistance before being taken across to Plymouth. J-P Daffniet spoke movingly of his recent encounters with George Wood, who visited Carantec and Morlaix in 2010 at the age of 90.
Across the road the main building has two large rooms of maritime memorabilia such as objects recovered from the Malouin corsaire ship L'Alcide, which went down nearby in 1747, numerous models of boats and some curiosities like scrimshaws and, weirdest of all, a tiny model of an allied plane made by the Germans to educate anti-aircraft gunners about what to look for overhead.
What I particularly liked about this museum was that all temptation to chuck in anything vaguely related to the themes has been resisted: what is here is a telling local record of important experiences. Many of the families involved in war-time activities are still here, many buildings where allied airmen and Free French fighters were hidden under the very noses of large German contingents remain. The emphasis is on individuals, who spring to life under M.Daffniet's articulate rendering of quiet heroism and fortitude in a time of profound uncertainty and danger. His narrative brings home the extraordinary responsibility and risk borne by almost the entire community of Carantec to shield and succour those who needed to be saved.
It is a proud, though sobering memory that belongs collectively to its community, however much it also represents a piece of the jigsaw of events repeated all along the north coast. The museum association is not just preserving the past but transfering local heritage - a precious possession - from one generation to the next so that no-one will forget what has shaped post-war society in Carantec.

Happy day

Glorious walking today from Beg an Fry to Toul an Hery. I am nearly at the end of my very long journey for the Saints' Shore Way, having cunningly done the last section first during the summer months.

Montecassino - landscape and emotional connection

Watching the BBC Alba documentary about Montecassino last night was an emotional experience.
In 1972 I walked the site of the siege with my father who fought there in WWII, spending a month in a freezing, mud-bound hole in the ground under heavy fire. The Scotsman interviewed on the programme had exactly the look in his eyes, the sudden tremble in his voice when he recalled going back to visit the war graves as I witnessed in my father's deeply moving reaction to returning to the landscape where he spent the formative period of his life. He fought elsewhere during the long years of war and wrote a memoir of his time as a soldier entitled A Good War, a characteristically ironical title with massive subtext.
But the intense physical, emotional and mental ordeal of Montecassino stayed with him. From it grew, almost as a reactive healing instinct, an equally intense love for the land of Italy. The happiest times of his life were spent walking and hitch-hiking about that simple, passionate country in later years.
It is true that suffering can create strong bonds with landscape that has shared it. In a Somerset village I became great friends with an elderly man who had also fought in Sicily and then Italy. He took up painting in middle age, and his scenes of the Italian coutnryside - in better weather than the incessant rain that beleaguered the Montecasino action - reproduced exactly that particular bond of affection for a landscape that only adversity can breed.
He gave me one of these images that still brings tears to my eyes for all it says to me of a beloved father, who found life hard in many ways and whose powers of emotional expression were crushed in a conflict that both bound him to mankind in general and separated him from individuals for a long life-time.

The start of strange

My walking is just reaching the beginning of the singular granite rock formations (here the Pierre double) that culminate in the monster rocks of the Pink Granite coast. I prefer it here, simpler and more effective. 

Now taking a few days rest to try to alleviate the severe back pain that's hampering my journey.

November walking

The Saints' Shore Way project is now full steam ahead and I must finish walking the 125km route asap. Although none of this coast path is new to me, it often appears so as I am walking from west to east, contrary to my usual (and preferred) practice. The changes of weather from one minute to the next make November a dramatic time for views and sensations, with storms tracing their path across moody seas to dissolve in rain or rainbows against dark landfall lit to brilliance by dashing sunshine seconds later. Sometimes the air is so still it feels as if the globe has stopped turning; then simply round a headland and I must pocket the tape-recorder or GPS or camera to have a free hand to hold my hat on. It all contributes to a good night's sleep after any day spent on the SSW.