A Wild Herb Soup

by Emilie Carles

Emilie Carles was born in 1900 in south eastern France. Against the odds, she trained as a teacher and pursued this career alongside farming and bringing up a family. An ardent pacifist all her life, in later years she became a fierce environmental campaigner and successfully protected her home, the idyllic Claree valley, from the hands of developers. Emilie Carles enchanting autobiography tells of a world that has largely disappeared. She captures the comedy and ferocious pride of rural life with an ebullience and wit which are quite irresistible.

Genres: History, France, Nonfiction, Biography, Memoir, Biography Memoir, Autobiography

271 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1977

Reviews

[Mikey B. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an autobiography of a woman born in the rural French Alps near the Italian border in 1900. Her life had many tragedies, for example her mother died when she was very young. She overcame many obstacles. This was a remote area where education was not valued, but hard work on the farm was. Many people surrounding her were barely literate. The church held sway and life was very static. But the First World War started to change that.

By studying hard and immersing herself in books Emilie became educated and expanded her view of the world. She became a school teacher in the area she grew up in for the remainder of her life.

I found the incidents she described around both wars to be of interest. She had a brother who died of starvation while a prisoner of the Germans in World War I. The first half of the book was engaging with her story of the struggle to gain an education in this rural backwater. Afterwards I found it became too personal and maybe even self-centered.

The latter half of the book became irritating. There were too many narratives concerning family squabbles. I would have liked to have known more about the pupils in her classrooms. She gives only passing attention to this and it is mostly on her philosophy of teaching.

Her personal life values espoused pacifism, anarchy, and libertarianism with a mixture of communism mixed into this. For whatever reason she despised universal suffrage and voting. What, I would like to know, would be the alternative – dictatorship? This outlook, more so of pacifism, was not conducive to combating the evils of Hitler (his name is hardly mentioned).

She married before the Second World War. Her husband was a pacifist. They were both anti-capitalist and despised banks. She tells us over and over again how great and distinguished a human being her husband was. I became tired of the adoration.

She comes across as rather haughty with her ranting. She describes how her son joined the army – and went to fight in Algeria. But this is mysteriously left dangling as we hear nothing more of him.

I was rather relieved to come to the end of this book. I am a Francophile and this book does provide at times compelling details on French living in the 20th century. This rural area is a far cry from the intellectual metropolis of Paris! I found the memoir by Didier Eribon calledReturning to Reims far better.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this autobiography as part of the readings for a History of France Since 1870 course I am taking. Ms. Carles was raised in a peasant family in a rural, mountainous part of south France near the Italian border. From this humble provincial background, she managed to overcome many obstacles to eventually become a respected schoolteacher in her community. She describes what it was like to live in this isolated region in the early years of the 20th century and, subsequently, during two major wars. She and her husband were staunch individualists and pacifists who had little trust in government. She lived an inspiring life and this reader learned of a part of French life and culture that he might not otherwise have been aware. A most enjoyable read. À la vôtre!

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

The simply written autobiography of a courageous woman who grew up in a poor and conservative peasant family in the Hautes Alpes of France in the early twentieth century. Given the unusual gift of higher education, she rebelled against the narrow conventions within which she had been raised, speaking out against patriarchy, chauvinism, nationalism, militarism—even the Catholic Church and its God. She saw it as her role as a longtime schoolteacher in her native valley to shape and broaden the perspectives of the peasant children whom she taught, and nearing death in her mid-seventies, reflected that it was “splendid to leave life with the thought that you have done the maximum possible to defend the ideas you believe just and human, and to help those who need to be helped without discrimination.” An unusual, thoughtful, albeit sometimes naïve, look at life.

[Maëllys · Rating 5 out of 5]

star omg non seulement c'est utile pour l'agreg mais cette meuf est juste trop cool elle passe le livre à critiquer l'Eglise, le patriarcat, le capitalisme et les gros colons mais bon comme les profs de la prépa préfèrent parler de Guillaumin à toutes les sauces là...... (ref un peu niche dsl)

[Samuel Bellemin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Si ce n’était grâce au Professeur John Merriman De Yale University, je n’aurais jamais pris l’initiative de lire ce livre. Comble de l’histoire, ma mère l’avait dans sa bibliothèque. Ce livre est passionnant et très prenant. Ayant grandi dans un monde rural des Savoie, similaire a celui décrit dans le livre, je me suis identifié a beaucoup de situations dont j’ai entendu parler. Ce livre mets beaucoup en valeur la crise des campagnes et les origines, les conséquences. Bernard Pivot ne l’a pas qualifiée de « sacrée personnage » pour rien.

[Tanya · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know how I acquired this book but I saw it on my bookshelf and thought "I should read this book." I am glad I did.

I really enjoyed her story. I admired her strength and resiliency and loved her ability to work around barriers. She was not afraid to stand up for herself but also understood her limitations. Even if I didn't agree with all of her opinions, I have to admit that I respected her conviction. Her life had many struggles and she did the best she could.

[Mary Elise · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this autobiography while staying in a cabin in the same region of the French Alps. What a cool experience! My over-romanticization of French peasant life was quickly humbled. Interesting to read about her childhood, love of learning, education in Paris, days as a schoolteacher and bed and breakfast owner, and activist to save the land she loves. Also interesting to hear her experience of living on the home front during the first and second world wars and becoming a pacifist.

[Anne Makin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book an absolutely delightful read about life in provincial France and one amazing girls journey to adult hood. Not what I would normally read but loved this.

[Lara Young · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very enlightening. A simple story about an amazing woman. Very unexpected pacifist and communist twist.

[Renske Zandjans · Rating 3 out of 5]

Prachtig levensverhaal dat laat zien dat je best op idealen kunt leven.

[Catheriine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ce livre est une trouvaille. Il fut probablement acheté en Europe, et le voici dans une bibliothèque libre du centre communautaire de mon quartier. Je ne savais pas à quoi m'attendre alors je l'ai pris; je croyais une histoire un peu à l'eau de rose que j'aurais vite retourné dans une autre bibliothèque de rue. Mais voici que ce livre se révèle à être un essai féministe avant son temps; l'histoire de la vie d'une femme, peut-être bien connue en France mais pas vraiment ici au Québec; une femme qui a travaillé très fort toute sa vie et qui avait des idées et des valeurs avant-gardistes. Née en 1900, Émilie Carles a connu les deux Guerres Mondiales. Elle obtient son diplôme pour être enseignante, et décroche des contrats d'enseignement dans des villages reculés. Dès 1920, elle se considère athée, un concept qui devait être rare pour l'époque. Ayant vu ses frères être torturés et affamés par les Allemands, elle ne peut concevoir l'idée des morts injustes et inutiles qui surviennent autour d'elle. Toute sa vie, elle s'occupera d'enfants, les siens comme ceux des autres; elle rencontrera son âme sœur, Jean Carles, son mari, qui avait des idées et des valeurs similaires aux siennes. Émilie Carles verra sa maison et son commerce, l'auberge-restaurant qu'elle tient dans les montagnes, fermés par les soldats. Elle sera même témoin de la mort par accident de l'une de ses filles. À travers la besogne incessante (jusqu'à un âge avancé!) et les injustices, voilà le récit d'une femme forte et féministe, qui a travaillé sans relâche aux champs, à son commerce, en politique, et à élever tant d'enfants. Plus le livre avance et plus les idées et valeurs d'Émilie Carles sont clairement définies. Je suis impressionnée par le parcours de cette femme, et je fis de son récit une lecture soutenue, c'est pourquoi, malgré l'aspect inusité de ce livre, je le recommande car c'est une belle découverte!

[Chevalier Hugo · Rating 5 out of 5]

merci Émilie pour cette leçon de simplicitée et humanisme.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I came upon this title from a reference in the book SYLVIA'S FARM. Am I ever glad I followed up. This is the story of a French peasant woman, born in 1900, who became a teacher. She wrested her education from nuns and in the direst of living circumstances, always going back to her father's farm to work on weekends. She bicycled to her father's farm and worked like the devil, or at least, a peasant. Sycthing wheat, working with dray horses, drawing water, chopping wood. Her living conditions, while she was studying, were also severe. She had many duties after her classes and then had to study late into the night. How she did all this is a miracle. She was a pacifist because of the horrors of World War I, and a leftist, along with her husband, in revolt against conditions of the poor and downtrodden in the peasant communities where she lived As she grew older, in her 70's she became an activist in the protection of her beloved, bucolic valley in Val-des-Pres and fought commercial forces to build a super highway into the area. She died in 1979,having made a difference.

[Kelsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was not sure whether to give this book three or four stars (simply because some chapters caused her story to drag a bit, in my honest opinion), but I ultimately decided that Emilie Carles's undying strength as a French-peasant-turned-pacifist-and-feminist was basically unheard of during this period. I had to read this for my history course, but it was quite the exciting adventure. With this book I cared for the life of a countrywoman who has already left this world, and has left her wisdom behind for the rest to absorb.

"Let us learn to read, because reading means strengthening our minds through the minds of others, steeping our hearts with feelings that please, and struggling with an author according to whether our ideas and feelings agree with his or diverge. Learn to live by knowing how to live and let live. Never take anything in life but flowers, and from flowers, only the perfume..." (259-260).

[Dianne Oliver · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 Really interesting view into the realities of life in the mountain regions of France in the early 1900's. How harsh and sad it could be, and I believe the pictures in the book reflect that. I often wonder how some people are able to step outside the norms of their time and region, and she gives insight into how, in her and her husbands case, that happened- how she became educated and he, as an avid reader, educated himself. She was much influenced by her husband, and together they tried to live out their convictions. I personally am not of their ilk, humanists and pacifists, and found the final bit of the book less interesting as she expounded on those issues, but can appreciate their honesty as they put it on the table.

[E Van · Rating 4 out of 5]

How a girl from a very poor farmers family in the mountains against all odds becomes a teacher. A gripping autobiography! The grim life of her youth, the determination to follow her own path, the good things she encountered, the horrors of War, the dramatic events in her life... It is all in it. Plus a lot of stories, gossips, sidelines that taught me a lot about the hardships and the challenges of that time. A great story of a strong woman. I'm not actually sure if I do like the main character. But the boot itself I really liked a lot.

[Laura moffitt]

I loved this book. Emilie shows us what it is to have inner strength and vision. An inspiration for women everywhere written in her unique voice. It reminds me of memoirs my own mother would write capturing country life.

[Allison Wise · Rating 4 out of 5]

yeah. this book is awesome & inspiring & I wish I could have been friends with Emilie.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the autobiography of a 20th century Frenchwoman named Emilie Carles (née Allais in 1900), a peasant from a tiny village in the high Alps of southeastern France, called Val-des-Prés.

She shares with conviction and interesting detail the story of her childhood and life in a modest farm family, and the trials she overcame to become a schoolteacher when education and leaving her community was a totally foreign concept to her fellow peasants. She lost her mother as a young child and was raised by her upright, kind father who did not know how to communicate well with her or relate to her ambitions, but whom she adored because of his goodness and support for her throughout her life.

In her adolescence, she lost her brother to World War I, along with her much loved brother-in-law, and his wife, her sister, to childbirth. She lost another sister to mental health issues and helped raise her children.

The family survived brutal, harsh mountain winters and modest income. They dealt with the sweeping 20th century technological changes. Later, as a married woman with a family, she endured World War II.

After decades of teaching French schoolchildren in mountain communities in the Briançon region, in her 70s she became an activist against a proposed highway in the 1970s that would have run right through her small valley and ruined the breathtaking peace and beauty that made it so special.

The most moving part of the book for me was her relationship with her husband, Jean, whom she met on a chance encounter on a train ride from Grenoble. She said his kindness and gregarious nature brought out the best in her, and together they created a family and a life filled with friendships and the joys of country living. She taught. He was a handyman—a painter. They refurbished an old hotel and invited young couples to stay there at low cost and created 3+ decades of memories there.

She and her husband were extreme pacifists. She had strong views about education and about the war. I have empathy for her perspective about war, reading recently about her and others who suffered through the great global conflicts and how families like Emilie’s were upended forever by paying the dearest of prices, often without the proper appreciation or subsequent care from their country that conscripted their service.

However her communist and socialist political views were foreign and anathema to me and I don’t think she understood the global threat to peace posed by Hitler and other fascists, and why the world was compelled to act against his wicked ambitions.

But I was reading this book for a taste of rural mountain life in the early and mid-20th century, and I found her account and her as a person to be courageous, selfless, thoughtful, and kind.

I like reading strong, articulate first person glimpses of lives that are very different than mine. Especially ones from different places and eras. I find it satisfying to discover threads of shared experience that help me remember and appreciate our shared humanity, no matter where in the world we are from or in what era we live.

Emilie Carles was a force to be reckoned with. A wife, a mother, an educator, a farm girl, a gatherer of people, a servant to those in need, and appreciator of nature and the best parts of the old ways of life while embracing the inevitability of change, a protector of wild places, a reluctant but influential activist, and a great writer. I’m glad I spent time getting to know her.

—-
I picked this book up from Deseret Industries sometime in 2022, and was drawn to it from my library after finishing Caroline Moorehead‘s book, Village of Secrets, about another small town in eastern France, Le Chambon, and the story of their resistance to the Nazi occupation of WWII.

[Orion · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a well-written, lively autobiography. The author lived from 1900 to 1979, writing the book when she was in her 70's. She found a lot to write about, having lived in a remote, impoverished area that went through major cultural changes, and through two world wars. She spent most of her life in French alpine community near the border with Italy, working as primarily as a schoolteacher but having other occupations as well. While the book starts with her childhood and ends with her in her 70's, most of it covers her early years until about age 45. She gives an insight into the age-old rural culture of the area, and was clearly influenced by that culture. But she was also influenced by contemporary philosophies such as pacifism and anarchism, partly because of her sense of the injustices brought about by the war, paternalism, and poverty. She worked hard throughout her life, routinely sublimating her own needs so she could help out others until she followed some friendly advice that she take some enjoyment and achieve "a life of her own." Even then she continued to hold herself to a high standard of helping others.
The book written in a series of short chapters, and moves along at an interesting, fast pace. The author tends to describe people in absolute terms, i.e., they are either good or bad, but she does substantiate her views on their characters.

[Tamsin Austin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well written and compelling account of peasant life in early 20th century French Alps. Emilie Carles is born into a poor, peasant family and a life of hardship and through educating herself, becomes a teacher, pacifist and activist and gives her life back to the community into which she was born. We holidayed very close to the Valley de Claree where this is set and it is one of the most beautiful, remote and unspoilt areas of the French Alps, thanks to Emilie Carles activism to prevent a superhighway being built to connect Grenoble to Turin through the valley.

[Val · Rating 4 out of 5]

An autobiography of a woman born in the early 20th century in the Haute Alpes in Provence. The book provides a perspective on life in rural France at this time. Emilie Carles was a courageous woman and she honestly shares her perspective and life story. The book became more political at the end. While not to my taste, I could understand how what led the author to pursue her political activism.

[Vicky · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of it was fascinating, giving as it did insight into life in the mountain villages. The end did veer into flights of fancy which I found irritating. The other irritation was her habit of sometimes calling her husband by his first name and sometimes by his second; I found this confusing as I had to keep checking she was talking about the same person. Still all on all a book worth reading I think.

[Lauren Mcgill · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm desperate to visit this little village now! An incredible story (I've since read there is some controversy over whether it was all truth- we sometimes forget we each have our own truth) of Emilie and her life growing up as a peasant farmer, getting her education and fighting to keep her valley simple and pure. I particularly loved her last two pages. What a little gem x

[Sabrina Marnet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un livre sur lequel je suis tombée par hasard lors de mes vacances dans le Gresivaudan . Je ne regrette pas l avoir acheté sur un coup de tête. Cette autobiographie décrit la vie des paysans montagnards sur une bonne partie du XXe siècle autant que le courage d'une femme pour faire bouger les choses....et les gens.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not a great work of literature...but direct report from early 20th century "peasant" France ..the hardship, unrelenting physical labor, acts of cruelty and kindness...from a vanished European world...riveting

[Jolieg G · Rating 5 out of 5]

Een prachtig boek, het leven van een bijzondere vrouw.
Ze stelt anderen op de eerste plaats.
Mooie gedachten en de manier waar op zıj (en haar man) met het leven omgaan vind ik bewonderenswaardig.
Wat pascifisme inhoudt wordt in dit boek duidelijk beschreven.

[Sammi Brock · Rating 4 out of 5]

Elegant and eloquent: a book with charm, intelligence, insight, and reflection. A life well lived and one to model. A French Glass Castle of sorts, well framed in the turmoil of the 20th century and yet focused and well structured.

[Charleston · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought this was a lovely book. It is full of sincerity and compassion even through the hardest parts. We all have things to learn from peasants, anarchists, and pacifists, but especially from teachers who associate with their ideas.

[☆ · Rating 4 out of 5]

so amazing… Carles way of giving an account of peasant life through the 20th century and connecting it back to Martin Guerre…. really so wonderful to get a first account of life through the Alps where one breaks from tradition