Harvest

Originally published in 1930, this is an English translation by Henri Fluchere and Geoffrey Myers of Jean Giono's novel Harvest. The remote farming village of Aubignane has seen better days. As the generations have worn on, all its inhabitants have fled for greener pastures. The fields are barren and the houses and shops are an abandoned ghost town. Everyone is gone except for two people. One of them is Panturle, a 40 year old man who has reverted to a neanderthal hunter due to the squalid conditions of his delapidated environment. He delights in rending animal flesh and hearing the yelps of beasts caught in his traps. The only other inhabitant is Mameche, an old woman who recognizes what Panturle's problem is. He needs a woman to recivilize him. Mamache promises Panturle that she will leave Aubignane and return with a woman who will be his wife. While Mameche does not return, mysteriously enough, a woman named Arsule, who has been treated like a pack mule by Gedemus the knife grinder, shows up in the village. She is as lonely and sexually frustrated as Panturle, and their chance encounter might just lead to eternal love and rebirth of life in both them and the village. Harvest was an exquisitely written novel which blended the pastoral poetry of Theocritus and the hidden power of the Holy Bible. All that, and it had a happy ending too, something that is sorely lacking in contemporary fiction. The characters of Panturle and Arsule are primitive forces and purer humans than the lying race we have become. They tell each other what they truly need for their souls and lusts to be sated. At times I felt as though I were reading an adult lullaby, so seamless and pacifying is this novel. Great. Recommended.

Le petit village d'Aubignane a été abandonné par la plupart de ses habitants il y a bien longtemps déjà, essentiellement à cause de la mauvaise qualité des terres environnantes. Pourtant les derniers habitants persistent dans leur volonté de demeurer à Aubignane: Le Panturle, paysan énorme qui continue à travailler ses terres avec acharnement et Arsule qui deviendra l'épouse du Panturle. Bravant un climat rude et une nature hostile, ils sont déterminés à lutter pour la survie d'Aubignane. Leur courage s'ébruite dans les villages alentours et lorsque Désiré et Delphine vienne s'installer avec leurs enfants à Aubignane, le Panturle, "les bras le long du corps, il ne bouge pas. Il a gagné: c'est fini", peut savourer le succès de ses efforts.

This book is an enjoyable look at the old country French, self-sufficient individual. Somewhat stuck in his ways of hopeless strife and solitude, the main character appreciates his daily existance until fate grants him a gift through a dear loss. Filled with wonderful characters and imagery, this books also includes a look at the mysterious world of nature and fate. This book is an intriguing, delightful tale of a humble man and how his good works reward him.