For anyone who loves France (or just feels strongly about it) comes a тАЬbeautifully writtenтАЭ collection of essays (The New York Times Book Review) on the country and its cultureтАФfrom the bestselling, Booker Prize-winning author of The Sense of an Ending.
Julian BarnesтАЩs appreciation extends from FranceтАЩs vanishing peasantry to its hyper-literate pop singers, from the gleeful iconoclasm of nouvelle vague cinema to the orgy of drugs and suffering that is the Tour de France. Above all, Barnes is an unparalleled connoisseur of French writing and writers. Here are the prolific and priapic Simenon, Baudelaire, Sand and Sartre, and several dazzling excursions on the prickly genius of Flaubert. Lively yet discriminating in its enthusiasm, seemingly infinite in its range of reference, and written in prose as stylish as haute couture, Something to Declare is an unadulterated joy.