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Courlande
La Courlande, pays de nulle part ? Longtemps occupée par les Soviétiques, interdite d’accès jusqu’en 1991, cette contrée des confins bordée par la mer Baltique surgit aujourd’hui intacte avec ses ciels
infinis, ses forêts, ses plages désertes et ses châteaux en ruine détenus naguère par les barons baltes, descendants des chevaliers Teutoniques.
Poursuivant une très ancienne histoire d’amour, Jean-Paul Kauffmann a succombé à l’attraction de cet ailleurs, dernière écluse entre le monde slave et le monde germanique.
Ce récit de voyage est aussi une enquête sur la disparition : il s’agit de retrouver la trace d’une jeune Courlandaise, d’un chercheur de tombes, d’un monarque français…
Retrouver aussi un pays, autrefois une anomalie historique, aujour-
d’hui à la recherche de son âme.
infinis, ses forêts, ses plages désertes et ses châteaux en ruine détenus naguère par les barons baltes, descendants des chevaliers Teutoniques.
Poursuivant une très ancienne histoire d’amour, Jean-Paul Kauffmann a succombé à l’attraction de cet ailleurs, dernière écluse entre le monde slave et le monde germanique.
Ce récit de voyage est aussi une enquête sur la disparition : il s’agit de retrouver la trace d’une jeune Courlandaise, d’un chercheur de tombes, d’un monarque français…
Retrouver aussi un pays, autrefois une anomalie historique, aujour-
d’hui à la recherche de son âme.
300 pages, Paperback
First published April 8, 2009
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43 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
December 23, 2019
A book I picked up on a whim at Five Leaves - it was probably the Maclehose spine that sold it, and the intriguing title.
I knew nothing about Courland, a province on the Latvian coast, but the history Kauffmann explores is long and fascinating. The book aspires to that Sebald territory (Rings of Saturn in particular) that mixes personal memoir and history, but although this is an easy read it is not as interesting as Sebald.
I knew nothing about Courland, a province on the Latvian coast, but the history Kauffmann explores is long and fascinating. The book aspires to that Sebald territory (Rings of Saturn in particular) that mixes personal memoir and history, but although this is an easy read it is not as interesting as Sebald.
October 7, 2012
I enjoyed this. I thought the approach of using the past relationship to gain an insight into the region was clever. Well worth reading.
April 25, 2016
Présent et passé, inévitablement et admirablement mêlés...
May 3, 2020
Plaisant récit de voyage ds une région méconnue aux confins de l'Europe où l'on croise Louis XVIII, des châteaux fantomatiques, des casernes russes abandonnées, des vétérans, l'ombre des chevaliers tectoniques et un resurrecteur
September 14, 2025
An extraordinary journey that is both physical and imaginative - through places, history and literature - looking at a place that never quite managed a real independence yet was utterly real, for a time, and which lingered on both in memory, and in memoirs, but most importantly in literature, in its own literature, even though written in the German tongue, which remains as unique and individual but, like all writers from places that cease to exist they belong and don't belong. Kauffmann is a writer of intense subtlety and is exactly the sort of writer to explore those complicated borderlands of overlapping cultures and languages that the twentieth century managed to erase and we in the twenty first look back on with regret and wonder at what was lost.
But Kauffmann is not sentimentalist does not wallow in nostalgia - if there is regret it is our own for the paucity of imagination that managed, and still manages, to erase complexities and differences.
Why should you read a book about a duchy that ceased to exist in the 18th century and whose complex history, like that of all the Baltic lands is so specialised as to barely qualify as a minority interest? Because it is rich, fascinating and diverse. The 'Baltic Barons', usually misidentified as Baltic Germans though many of them had Swedish roots, are one of those vanished historical groups, like the Anglo-Irish, who although utterly of the land of their birth ceased to be part of its history in the 20th century, or maybe before. Certainly by the time Eduard von Keyserling, Frank Thiess and Ernst von Salomon were writing they knew that they represented a literary fluorescence that was the prelude before extinction. But what a literary monument they left behind.
This is a wonderful book, an enjoyable combination of memoir, history and travelogue - I cannot remember the last time I enjoyed a book so much and one reason was that it was such an unexpected pleasure - if you enjoy books that are slightly off beat or eccentric then this is the book for you.
But Kauffmann is not sentimentalist does not wallow in nostalgia - if there is regret it is our own for the paucity of imagination that managed, and still manages, to erase complexities and differences.
Why should you read a book about a duchy that ceased to exist in the 18th century and whose complex history, like that of all the Baltic lands is so specialised as to barely qualify as a minority interest? Because it is rich, fascinating and diverse. The 'Baltic Barons', usually misidentified as Baltic Germans though many of them had Swedish roots, are one of those vanished historical groups, like the Anglo-Irish, who although utterly of the land of their birth ceased to be part of its history in the 20th century, or maybe before. Certainly by the time Eduard von Keyserling, Frank Thiess and Ernst von Salomon were writing they knew that they represented a literary fluorescence that was the prelude before extinction. But what a literary monument they left behind.
This is a wonderful book, an enjoyable combination of memoir, history and travelogue - I cannot remember the last time I enjoyed a book so much and one reason was that it was such an unexpected pleasure - if you enjoy books that are slightly off beat or eccentric then this is the book for you.
August 29, 2013
La Courlande fut un duché aux mains des descendants des chevaliers teutoniques. Aujourd'hui, c'est une province lettonne. Qu'y fait Jean-Paul Kauffmann, indépendamment de son goût pour les excursions improbables ? Il poursuit le fantôme d'un amour de jeunesse, cherche à joindre un homme qui pourrait retrouver la tombe d'un parent "malgré-nous", a promis un reportage à un grand journal qui, finalement, ne le publiera pas, ce qui est sans doute une des raisons de sa transformation en livre de longue haleine.
Du coup, est-ce un reportage de 250 pages ou un livre au sens littéraire du terme ? Un livre, parce qu'au delà des descriptions de châteaux et des rencontres avec les locaux, Kauffmann raconte la quête de personnages qui se dérobent, et qui sont les emblèmes de l'identité problématique, peut-être perdue, certainement à réinventer, de cette région mal située sur la carte et à l'existence politique fantomatique. Alors même que le récit est plutôt de type autobiographique, il se charge d'un véritable romanesque en creux, dont les fils se dénouent dans un étonnant épilogue. C'est donc à lire.
Du coup, est-ce un reportage de 250 pages ou un livre au sens littéraire du terme ? Un livre, parce qu'au delà des descriptions de châteaux et des rencontres avec les locaux, Kauffmann raconte la quête de personnages qui se dérobent, et qui sont les emblèmes de l'identité problématique, peut-être perdue, certainement à réinventer, de cette région mal située sur la carte et à l'existence politique fantomatique. Alors même que le récit est plutôt de type autobiographique, il se charge d'un véritable romanesque en creux, dont les fils se dénouent dans un étonnant épilogue. C'est donc à lire.
February 12, 2013
It starts off pretty well - with a "former girlfriend intrigue" that guides the author to this forsaken corner of Europe. I'm not too impartial, living in a neighbouring Estonia and keen to learn how foreigners see my home turf.
The first half of the book lives up to expectations - the frenchman's eyes see this land as a detached, bizarre, extremely quiet and lost - almost like an another planet.
But then he gets stuck in it, talking and contemplating about the same thing over and over again. You wonder why is he still there and not moving on. At some point it starts to feel like the waste of his time - and the reader's.
The first half of the book lives up to expectations - the frenchman's eyes see this land as a detached, bizarre, extremely quiet and lost - almost like an another planet.
But then he gets stuck in it, talking and contemplating about the same thing over and over again. You wonder why is he still there and not moving on. At some point it starts to feel like the waste of his time - and the reader's.
April 21, 2014
Excellent récit dela découverte d'une région méconnue dont le nom évoque pour un francophone on ne sait quel reflet romantique, sans trop savoir pourquoi.
Kauffmann retrace les raisons de son intérêt pour la Courlande et plusieurs voyages de découverte géographique, historique et humaine réalisés pour la rédaction d'un article qui ne sera finalement jamais publié.
Le récit est aussi un reportage passionant sur la genèse de cet article et surtout du livre lui-même.
Une découverte qui nous mène aussi vers de nouvelles lecture recommandées par l'auteur au fil de son récit et qui promettent d'être passionantes.
Kauffmann retrace les raisons de son intérêt pour la Courlande et plusieurs voyages de découverte géographique, historique et humaine réalisés pour la rédaction d'un article qui ne sera finalement jamais publié.
Le récit est aussi un reportage passionant sur la genèse de cet article et surtout du livre lui-même.
Une découverte qui nous mène aussi vers de nouvelles lecture recommandées par l'auteur au fil de son récit et qui promettent d'être passionantes.
June 19, 2014
Kaufmann likes remote places - previous subjects include St. Helena and Kerguélen - and this might be his masterpiece in the genre of obscure travelogues, exploring the homeland of a long-lost love, who triggered his obsession with a region ravished by war and totalitarianism, yet retaining some of the mystery and beauty the author associated with its mysterious name - and the girl he loved and lost decades before.
November 23, 2017
this flows nicely. its a travelogue / potted history kind of thing, a genre I enjoy. Kauffmann is a hypercrtical snob though but at least he seems to know it. whenever he tries to define things it gets a bit flat but most of the book is anecdotes and history / musings which are sparingly written and deep
May 22, 2014
This is an interesting and often moving exploration of Courland, a region in Latvia. The author throws in lots of fascinating history of the area. But he gets somewhat obsessed, not in a good way, with a fellow traveller, an erudite German.
September 21, 2012
You would have to be interested in the region, I think, to get the most out of it. But perhaps many would find it interesting just to get an insight into how travel books come into being.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews