astray

Mis à jour: 21 mai 2025

If only he had continued as he began, if only he had remained the poet of the "Lettres de mon moulin"; if only he had not been led astray by his "task," he might have brought to the world of readers that happiness which he brought to his few friends in the attic of Auteuil. We are told the story of the publication of "Tartarin de Tarascon" by Daudet himself in his "Trente Ans de Paris."

Alphonse Daudet - Tartarin de Tarascon

Continuing Daudet says: "Only one who was raised in southern France, or knows it thoroughly, can appreciate how frequently the Tartarin type is to be met there, and how under the generous sun of Tarascon, which warms and electrifies, the natural drollery of mind and imagination is led astray into monstrous exaggerations, in form and dimension as various as bottle gourds."

Alphonse Daudet - Tartarin de Tarascon