A Week in Provence, Reflections upon Peter Mayles’ A Year in Provence

by David Sclar
Anyone who has read Peter Mayle's A Year in Provence will appreciate the anticipation that consumed me when I had the opportunity to spend the last week of August attempting to live the author's Provencal life in southern France's Luberon Valley. Though I was only to spend a week, my family and I would rent a car and a house in the countryside. In our backyard, rows of grape vines were weighed down with heavy bunches ready for collection. In the front of the house grew fig trees that bore fruit so sweet that by journey's end figs had become a favorite food of mine. Having read A...