How to Travel Incognito - Softcover

Bemelmans, Ludwig

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1853755214 ISBN 13: 9781853755217

Publisher: Welbeck Publishing, 2003

Synopsis

Monsieur Le Comte de St Cucuface, a charismatic aristocrat fallen on hard times, slums his way around postwar France in elegant style, trading on his name and his exquisite manners. After a chance encounter on a train, he convinces a wide-eyed Ludwig Bemelmans to adopt the identity of an imaginary German prince and join him in his ruse. Together they set out on an enchanted adventure through a France that is crumbling to dust, feeding off the comically vulgar continental set that is fast replacing Cucuface's blue-blooded caste. They dine on the finest food and wine, stay at the most splendid hotels and chateaux, pausing only for Cucuface to recount another amusing tale of his eccentric lineage. Mixing autobiography and fiction to magical effect, How to Travel Incognito is an affectionate and melancholic hymn to the passing of an ancient order.

About this title

Review:

"a complete original" Saturday Review "The singularity of Bemelmans, whether he draws or writes, is his double capacity to see freshly like a child and comment shrewdly like a grown-up. The product is an awry wisdom, the wisdom of a reflective innocent who is surprised at nothing and delighted with everything." Clifton Fadiman "An excellent story-teller" Cyril Connolly, Sunday Times "I know of no other writing that pleases the mental palate as pungently, swiftly and freshly as does Mr Bemelmans" Elizabeth Bowen, Tatler "An artist in both line and words... with talents of gold" The Observer"

About this edition

• Publisher: Welbeck Publishing
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1853755214
• ISBN 13: 9781853755217
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224