Name: The Serpent of Stars
Price: 367.00 ZAR
Availability: InStock
Author: Jean Giono
ISBN: 9780972869287

Type

Physical Book

Author

Jean Giono

Publisher

Archipelago

Year

2004

Language

English

Pages

117

Format

Paperback

ISBN

097286928X

ISBN13

9780972869287

Edition No.

The Serpent of Stars

Jean Giono (Author) · Archipelago · Paperback

New Book Imported to South Africa

Delivery: 20 Jul - 13 Aug

R 367

R 367

Add to Wishlist

Synopsis "The Serpent of Stars "

The Serpent of Stars (Le serpent d¢étoiles, 1993; reprinted 1999 Grasset) takes place in rural southern France in the early part of the century. The novel’s elusive narrative thread ties landscape to character to an expanse just beyond our grasp. The narrator encounters a shepherding family and glimpse by glimpse, each family member and the shepherding way of life is revealed to us. The novel culminates in a large shepherds’ gathering where a traditional Shepherd’s Play—a kind of creation myth that includes in its cast The River, The Sea, The Man, and The Mountain—is enacted. The work’s proto-environmental world view as well as its hybrid form—part play, part novel—makes The Serpent of Stars astonishingly contemporary. W.S. Merwin’s "Green Fields" begins, "By this part of the century few are left who believe/in the animals for they are not there in the carved parts/of them served on plates and the pleas from slatted trucks..." This novel leaves the reader believing not only in the animals, but the terrain they are part of, the people who tend them, and the life all these elements together compose.

Jean Giono

(Author)

View Author's Page

Jean Giono (Manosque, 1895–1970) was a prominent French writer whose work is characterized by a deep love for nature and a focus on the rural life of Provence. A self-taught and convinced pacifist after his experience in World War I, Giono developed a lyrical and humanist narrative that made him a central figure in 20th century French literature

Among his most recognized works are Hill (1929), Return to Love (1930), A King Without Diversion (1947), The Horseman on the Roof (1951), and The Man Who Planted Trees (1953). His novel Hill received the Brentano Award in 1929, and Return to Love won the Northcliffe Prize in 1930. In 1954, he was elected a member of the Goncourt Academy, and in 1953 he received the Prince Pierre of Monaco Literary Prize for his entire body of work

See less