‘A biography as sensuously satisfying as a fine French meal. Colette surely would have approved it as much for its aesthetic appeal as for its rare insight and scholarship.’ Robyn Davidson Colette’s France is the remarkable life story of an extraordinary woman, who was known simply as ‘Colette’. This lavishly illustrated biography of the French writer, who was as famous for her novels as for her often controversial life, follows her journey through the landscapes of France where she lived and loved – from a childhood in Burgundy and coming of age in the Belle Époque Paris, to Provence and St Tropez. Jane Gilmour recounts the varied lives of a sensual, artistic, rebellious woman who lived life on her own terms, from prodigious writer and journalist, risqué performer, lover and seducer, businesswoman, baroness, mother, and finally, grand old lady of letters. Dr Jane Gilmour is an Australian with a personal passion and extensive knowledge of Colette and her life. Jane lived in France for many years where she studied the writer at the Sorbonne and completed her thesis on the writer there. Jane has continued her passion for her subject frequently returning to France to write this book and to visit the regions where Colette lived, loved and worked.

French author Colette has a special place in French literary history, her life and writing novels Cheri, Gigli and the Claudine series spanned the renowned artistic period of Belle Epoque Paris, the art scene in the South of France and war time Paris. Colette's France is the remarkable life story of this extraordinary woman, who was known simply as 'Colette'. This lavishly illustrated biography of the French writer, who was as famous for her novels, Cheri, Gigli and the Claudine series, as for her often controversial life, follows her journey through the landscapes of France where she lived and loved - from a childhood in Burgundy and coming of age in Belle Époque Paris, to Provence and St Tropez. Jane Gilmour recounts the varied lives of a sensual, artistic, rebellious woman who lived life on her own terms, from prodigious writer and journalist, risqué performer, lover and seducer, businesswoman, baroness, mother, and finally, grand old lady of letters.

Paris, 1947: Colette Rossant returns to Paris after waiting out World War II in Cairo among her father's Egyptian-Jewish relatives. Initially, the City of Light seems gray and forbidding to the teenage Colette, especially after her thrill-seeking mother leaves her in the care of her bitter, malaisé grandmother. Yet Paris will prove the place where Colette awakens to her senses. Taken under the wing of Mademoiselle Georgette, the family chef, she develops a taste and talent for French cooking. The streets of Paris soon become Colette's own as she navigates the outdoor markets and café menus and emerges into her new, gastronomical self. Return to Paris is an extraordinary coming-of-age story that charts the course of Colette's culinary adventures -- replete with expertly crafted recipes and family photographs. An exploration of passion in all its flavor and texture, Colette's memoir will live in the hearts and palates of readers for years to come.

In France's Third Republic, secularism was, for its adherents, a new faith, a civic religion founded on a rabid belief in progress and the Enlightenment conviction that men (and women) could remake their world. And yet with all of its pragmatic smoothing over of the supernatural edges of Catholicism, the Third Republic engendered its own fantastical ways of seeing by embracing observation, corporeal dynamism, and imaginative introspection. How these republican ideals and the new national education system of the 1870s and 80s - the structure meant to impart these ideals - shaped belle époque popular culture is the focus of this book. The author reassesses the meaning of secularization and offers a cultural history of this period by way of an interrogation of several fraught episodes which, although seemingly disconnected, shared an attachment to the potent moral and aesthetic directives of French republicanism: a village's battle to secularize its schools, a scandalous novel, a vaudeville hit featuring a nude celebrity, and a craze for female boxing. Beginning with the writer and performer Colette (1873-1954) as a point of entry, this re-evaluation of belle époque popular culture probes the startling connections between republican values of labor and physical health on the one hand, and the cultural innovations of the decades preceding World War I on the other.

A scandalously talented stage performer, a practiced seductress of both men and women, and the flamboyant author of some of the greatest works of twentieth-century literature, Colette was our first true superstar. Now, in Judith Thurman's Secrets of the Flesh, Colette at last has a biography worthy of her dazzling reputation. Having spent her childhood in the shadow of an overpowering mother, Colette escaped at age twenty into a turbulent marriage with the sexy, unscrupulous Willy--a literary charlatan who took credit for her bestselling Claudine novels. Weary of Willy's sexual domination, Colette pursued an extremely public lesbian love affair with a niece of Napoleon's. At forty, she gave birth to a daughter who bored her, at forty-seven she seduced her teenage stepson, and in her seventies she flirted with the Nazi occupiers of Paris, even though her beloved third husband, a Jew, had been arrested by the Gestapo. And all the while, this incomparable woman poured forth a torrent of masterpieces, including Gigi, Sido, Cheri, and Break of Day. Judith Thurman, author of the National Book Award-winning biography of Isak Dinesen, portrays Colette as a thoroughly modern woman: frank in her desires, fierce in her passions, forever reinventing herself. Rich with delicious gossip and intimate revelations, shimmering with grace and intelligence, Secrets of the Flesh is one of the great biographies of our time. NOTE: This edition does not include a photo insert.

100 stories dating from 1908 to 1945.

Superb story of a love affair between Lea, a still-beautiful 49-year-old ex-courtesan, and Cheri, a handsome but selfish young man 30 years her junior, is widely considered the author's best work.

Newly revised with a fresh introduction, updated quotes, and a charming, contemporary aesthetic. "Gratitude is the most passionate, transformative force in the Cosmos." This beautiful companion journal to the national bestseller Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy, the mega-bestselling guide that has led so many women to live fulfilling, harmonious, and joyful lives, has been refreshed for fans of the original Simple Abundance Gratitude Journal -- and a whole new generation of journalers. The Simple Abundance Journal of Gratitude offers insight via uplifting, inspirational quotes and gives women a place to record their daily moments of gratitude. Through daily practice, this journal can help you embrace everyday epiphanies: profound moments of awe that forever alter your experience of the world.

Movie "Colette" coming in September starring Keira Knightley! From her marriage at the age of 20, until her divorce, this snapshot of Colette's life focuses on her formative years. Incredibly complex, powerfully determined, truly gifted, Colette challenged herself to reinvent her life and assert herself as a free woman. In her day, her behavior scandalized and vexed the establishment. But in the end, she helped to free women in their thinking and became member and then president of France's prestigious Académie Goncourt, among many other honors as one of France's preeminent authors. For mature readers.