Alphonse Daudet? I've never heard of him, either. His Wikipedia article describes him as "one of a generation of French literary syphilitics". Now there's a genre you don't hear much about these days. Still, it was a real treat to come across such an evocatively titled book, and so intriguing that I decided to read it.
Letters from My Windmill is a collection of short stories written in the mid-nineteenth century. Daudet, a long-time resident of Paris, bought a dilapidated windmill in Provence, decided to live in it and he wrote home to Paris with tales of what he found there. While most of the stories are about Provence and its people, Daudet does take us on excursions to Corsica and North Africa.
The tales vary greatly in tone, from the serious, psychologically orientated opening story, to an account of the aftermath of a shipwreck, to an endearing tale of how a good-natured donkey get sweet revenge on her promotion-seeking tormentor.
I liked this book. It was very pleasant to read a story a day over the course of three weeks. It helps that I like tales of yesteryear, when there was no electricity, phones or mass-media, and when news was largely delivered by word-of-mouth. It makes for a different kind of story-telling.
Stories from Letters from My Windmill were first published in 1866. It was published as a collection of short stories in 1869. I read an e-book version. So much for no electricity, etc.
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