The Brittany Trilogy of Mark Greenside
30 years ago, Mark Greenside rented a house for the summer with his girlfriend, in Brittany’s far western region of Finistère.
30 years ago, Mark Greenside rented a house for the summer with his girlfriend, in Brittany’s far western region of Finistère.
By the end of the summer, the girlfriend was gone, but he had become captivated by their small town in the middle of nowhere. The next thing he knew, the middle-aged Greenside was buying a house, the first he had ever owned.
Greenside has since written three books about his life in France, where he lives part of the year. The books are insightful, touching, and very, very funny. Greenside is a talented writer who brings France alive and shows us how living in Brittany has slowly changed him.
From Newbie to Old-Timer
In the first book, Greenside tells us about his life in a new country—the confusion, the ups and downs, the sense of discovery. His story is told in a loving and self-deprecating style, never mocking the French despite their sometimes-exasperating ways.
Indeed, the French he meets are uniformly kind and helpful. They treat him fairly and honestly. As a tough, self-sufficient New Yorker who is generally suspicious of others, he finds this both humbling and enlightening.
Over the course of the three books, we see Greenside’s life in Brittany evolve. He begins as a complete newbie, knowing nothing. Over the years, he settles in, makes friends, and becomes a part of the community. By the third book, he is the longest-tenured resident of his neighborhood and is looking back on his life in France, wondering how much longer it will last.
A Man of Misadventures
Greenside seems to attract hilarious misadventures. We learn what happens when you accidentally end up in the middle of a combination pig roast/talent show with a busload of elderly French tourists. And how to resolve a dispute with a neighbor over trees on the property line. And why you should definitely check the tide tables before spending the day on a low-lying island.
Greenside regularly mangles the language to comic effect. For example, milk becomes jus de vache, or cow juice. And while he makes progress over the years, even today, an acquaintance tells him, “You speak a French that no one else in the world would recognize as French.” No matter—he can share coffee with a friend and “neither one of us is sure what the other is saying, nor caring. It’s our time together that counts, and the time is always good.”
Finally French
By the end of his trilogy, Greenside considers himself French in important ways. He and his wife take the time to enjoy meals with friends—at home, at the beach, at a village festival. There is always time for another oyster, or crepe, or glass of cider. There’s time to look at the stars. It’s not the constant gogogo of American life. As Greenside puts it:
In the US, I do. In France, I am.”
If you enjoy travel memoirs with a lot of humor and a lot of heart, you can’t go wrong with Mark Greenside’s Brittany trilogy.
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