Stephen Clarke lives in Paris, where he divides his time between writing and not writing. His first novel, A Year in the Merde, originally became a word-of-mouth hit in 2004, and is now published all over the world. Since then he has published three more bestselling Merde novels, as well as Talk to the Snail, an indispensable guide to understanding the French.
Stephen will be appearing at Northcote library on 1st April, to talk about and sign his latest book “1000 Years of Annoying the French ”
Research for Stephen’s novels has taken him all over France and America. For 1000 Years of Annoying the French, he has also been breathing the chill air of ruined castles and deserted battlefields, leafing through dusty chronicles, brushing up the medieval French he studied at university and generally losing himself in the mists of history.
In the book he takes a penetrating look into those murky depths, guiding us through all the times when Britain and France have been at war – or at least glowering at each other across what we Brits provocatively call the English Channel. Along the way he explodes a few myths that French historians have been trying to pass off as ‘la vérité’, as he proves that the French did not invent the baguette, or the croissant, or even the guillotine, and would have taken the bubbles out of bubbly if the Brits hadn’t created a fashion for fizzy champagne. Starting with the Norman (not French) Conquest and going right up to the supposedly more peaceful present, when a state visit by French President Nicolas Sarkozy becomes a series of hilarious historical insults, it is a light-hearted – but impeccably researched – account of all our great fallings-out. In short, the French are quite right to suspect that the last thousand years have been one long British campaign to infuriate them. And it’s not over yet . . .
Book details
Title: 1000 Years of Annoying the French
Pages: 286
Author: Stephen Clarke
Publisher: BantamPress
Available in all good bookshops and Amazon.co.uk
Book signing
Date: 1st April 2010
Venue: Northcote Library
Address: 155e Northcote Road
SW11 6QB
