Provence
Move over, Mrs Bennet – I’ve seen two daughters married in less than a month
Provence A few days before my middle daughter’s Oxfordshire wedding this summer, my youngest announced that she and her fiancé,…
My dinner date with the detective
Provence ‘What do you mean?’ I wanted to ask the man who told me last autumn it was time to…
The ‘Clooney effect’ hasn’t touched my corner of Provence
Provence My eldest daughter’s husband is from Como. In the early 2000s George Clooney caused a stir in the town…
My nights with the eagle owls
Provence Summer has arrived. The evenings are warm enough to sit out on the balcony terrace and watch the lights…
My dreams of Jeremy Clarke
The other week my eldest daughter and I were staying with friends in Richmond for the launch of Jeremy’s third…
Who will my wife marry next?
Since I had a brush with death a couple of years ago, I have often wondered who my far younger…
The genius of Cezanne
Pity the poor curators of major exhibitions struggling to find fresh takes on famous masters. The curators of Tate Modern’s…
The global elite and me
Here come the global elites. They love it here. Their spiritual second home. The heat, the rosé, the food, the…
French kissing with the French
Every year Vernon celebrates the gathering in and pressing of his olive harvest by inviting friends to a ceremony at…
A tale of bitter brotherly rivalry
For early humans there was no distinction between spirit and matter. There was no idea of self; no barrier between…
My happiness has given way to a paralysing melancholy
From our hypothetical drone-mounted camera let us look down into a secluded valley in the same series of valleys as…
A tale of many swimming pools
My two grandsons are staying with us here in Provence for a week. Roman soldier Catriona flew from Marseille to…
I found a confused elderly man in my bedroom
There are several cave houses built into the cliff. Ours is the highest and can be reached only by a…
Nuns, a maquisard and the Devil’s Own Rum: a Provençale pilgrimage
Avid Spectator reader Mr Brown had endured the very strictest of lockdowns for family health reasons in Tunbridge Wells. Since…
40-plus reasons to love and hate France
I apologised, was gladly granted an indulgence, and on Sunday I packed a small bag and reached into a drawer…
Back from the brink
The long table was set out under four beautifully pollarded plane trees festooned with coloured lanterns and red balloons. Twenty…
Has Provence cured my cancer?
During the past three years I have spent quite a bit of time in a rented house in Provence. Volets…
Low life
On Sunday morning we went, Oscar and I, to a vide grenier in the ancient, picturesque Provençal village. Vide grenier…
Low life
My grandson and I are reprising the 1968 film The Swimmer. Burt Lancaster is an advertising executive at a pool…
Even a Cambridge-educated spook couldn't make me believe in ghosts
Denis was my guide to and from the new out-of-town Lidl superstore at Salernes in Provence. I drove. The road…
Why would a dissolute rebel like Paul Gauguin paint a nativity?
Martin Gayford investigates how this splendid Tahitian Madonna came about and why religion was ever-present in Gauguin's art
Happiness is a chainsaw and a maul in the rain and the mud
It rained all day long last Friday in Provence, and it rained all night, and on Saturday morning it was…
Jeremy Clarke: The day I walked into a postcard
This time last year the postman delivered a picture postcard depicting a village square in Provence. The photograph on the…
