The 'France Profonde' of Tessa Traeger's book refers to one of the remotest regions of the country. 'France Profonde', as a general term for 'deepest France', a place much loved by outsiders for embodying an imagined past, has on occasion been greeted with scorn by villagers reluctant to be presented as residents of some forgotten age. Tessa Traeger's "France Profonde" is grounded not in fantasy but in the reality of the Vivarais, or what is known as the Ardeche - a high, plateau region on the eastern edge of the Massif Central between the Loire and the Rhone, which she has been photographing and writing about for fifteen years. The country and the people she has recorded provide an inspiring and unsentimental document of life in this narrow corner of Europe. Far from romanticising their plight, she passionately believes their struggle is a lesson. This book is, as Mark Haworth-Booth claims in his introduction, 'an act of preservation, a warning and a resource'. At the heart of this book is the portrayal of food and its production. At the centre of the communities are the baker, the beekeeper, the shepherd, the miller, the cheese-maker, the butcher and other producers.
"France Profonde" begins at a fabulous restaurant, once championed by Elizabeth David, and reaches a climax with the unsparing view of a pig slaughter. Tessa Traeger fulfils a 'duty of memory' through which knowledge is passed down from generation to generation. Her photographs of life in the Vivarais are delicate and exquisite, but they form an urgent and timely document.
- ISBN10 0224082329
- ISBN13 9780224082327
- Publish Date 1 January 2099
- Publish Status Cancelled
- Publish Country GB
- Publisher Vintage Publishing
- Imprint Jonathan Cape Ltd
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 236
- Language English