From Publishers Weekly
Novelist Barnes's latest collection of haute musings on France and things French is rather like a ride in a creaky Citro n: at first, it kicks and gurgles in a scattered path, but once it gets started, it's a charming and nostalgic way to view la belle France. Barnes, author of nine novels (Love, Etc., etc.), a book of stories and a collection of essays, offers here an amalgamation of pieces, many previously published in the Times Literary Supplement and the New York Review of Books. The collection begins with meandering yet tellingly accurate critiques of popular culture phenomena, such as the Tour de France, the films of Truffaut and Godard, and singer Jacques Brel. Barnes's assessment of culinary writer Elizabeth David's thoughts on nouvelle cuisine (it means "lighter food, less of it, costing more") are at once witty and dead-on. After sharing these lighter, whimsical thoughts, Barnes shifts into a higher gear and delves into a study of the French and Francophile literary establishment, from Edith Wharton and Ford Madox Ford to Henry James and George Sand. He saves many of the book's later chapters for his favorite subject, Gustave Flaubert. Throughout, Barnes integrates his commentary with detailed, intriguing bits of history. Devotees of Madame Bovary will thrill to read his ruminations on the masterpiece (e.g., what if it had been written for the screen rather than as a book?). Serious yet self-deprecating, Barnes's prose is perfectly tuned to its subject. Photos not seen by PW. (Oct. 7) Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
What do you get when you combine a passion for France, a rapier wit, and an immense writing vocabulary? You get Barnes, a one-time lexicographer for the Oxford English Dictionary, a declared Francophile, and a much-published writer of nonfiction and fiction (e.g., Staring at the Sun). This collection of essays on France includes some of Barnes's best work published in the United States (the New York Review of Books, The New Yorker) and England (Times Literary Supplement) between 1982 and 2000. A fascinating essay on the Tour de Franc, for example, includes a detailed portrait of Lance Armstrong's 2000 victory and gives insight into how the Tour has changed over time. Edith Wharton and Henry James figure prominently in an essay on travel in France at the turn of the century. Flaubert appears in several essays, reflecting Barnes's lifelong involvement in Flaubertiana: we meet his colleagues Turgenev, Baudelaire, Mallarm‚, and, of course, his mistress Louise Colet. Going beyond the literary, Barnes includes essays on cooking, contemporary film, and pop singers. All in all, this eclectic commentary on all things French is a very satisfying read-just keep your unabridged dictionary nearby! Definitely recommended for larger collections on French culture, civilization, and travel.Olga B. Wise, Hewlett-Packard, Austin, TXCopyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
*Starred Review* The author of this collection of enthusiastic essays is a distinguished British writer. Why then his absorption in things French? The opening line of his preface helps the reader understand: "I first went to France in the summer of 1959 at the age of thirteen," and in so doing launched a lifelong sensitivity to French culture. "Is my view of France partial?" he wonders. "Certainly," he says, in answer to his own question. "Knowing a second country means choosing what you want from it." In the essays that follow, Barnes elucidates and ruminates on the various aspects of France that he has chosen to satisfy his "French tooth." Occupying his Gallic-tuned mind are such topics as British historian Richard Cobb's fascination with France, three Francophone singers (Boris Vian, Jacques Brel, and Georges Brassens), his self-education in French cinema, the always-exciting Tour de France, and his writer-hero Flaubert. (No reader, by the way, will object to the great number of pages given over to the miraculous Flaubert, for some of Barnes' best writing is on that particular subject.) Barnes' book becomes, then, his own Tour de France--and a tour de force. Brad Hooper
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Review
?An exceptionally accomplished and ingenious stylist.? ? The New York Review of Books

?France and England square off on almost every issue, from cuisine . . . to currency, but Barnes inhabits both worlds with ease. As a journalistic subject, France is best approached from an oblique angle, and this collection accomplishes that brilliantly. . . . . Barnes remains entertaining and insightful. This is a rich journey for the tourist, and a welcome antidote to Mayle for the French.? -- Don Gilmour, The Globe and Mail

?[Barnes is] an indefatigable sleuth . . . and a superlative reporter, not just of what he?s meant to watch, but also, like a dog picking up bat-hums in the ether, of the mental processes of reporting, whether about the Tour de France, a painting, or Flaubert?s letters . . . . He is brilliant on the writer?s craft and the experience of writing . . . . Barnes is a devotee of the absolutely accurate description . . .? -- National Post

?As an essayist, . . . he is the most congenial of hosts. Even when his subjects are grand, his way with them is entertaining: he can be pungently amusing, iconoclastic, wry or tender, but he is always rewarding.? -- Financial Times (U.K.)

?These essays are an expansive, astute and increasingly magisterial salute to French sophistication in all departments, from cinema to cycling, singing and writing above all.? -- Daily Telegraph

?. . . twenty-one energetic essays . . .? -- TLS

"It's the fiction-lovers who've had most of the treats since Barnes published his first book in 1981.... But now, with Something to Declare, the essay-lovers are back in the driver's seat -- and they have much to celebrate.... Barnes is wise to disarm his critics by quoting a remark Kingsley Amis made to a mutual friend: "I wish he'd shut up about Flaubert" -- but by the time we reach the quote, we know there is no need for Barnes to shut up about Flaubert or anyone else.... biting intelligence... Barnes has written a profoundly unstupid collection of essays about the land that makes him dream." -- The Sunday Times

"Whether he is discussing Simenon, Baudelaire or Louise Colet, Barnes illuminates their lives with brilliant metaphoric encapsulation. But it is Flaubert and his 'groaning search for perfection' who brings out the best in him.... Like all the best critics, Barnes persuades you to take his evidence and verdict on trust.... These essays remind you, as he says of Flaubert, that it is 'perfectly possible...for high intelligence, piercing insight and scrupulous concentration to be combined with extreme lucidity of expression.'" -- The Guardian

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"Julian Barnes's long and passionate relationship with la belle France began more than forty years ago, and in these essays on the country and the culture he combines a keen appreciation, a seemingly infinite sphere of reference, and prose as stylish as classic haute couture." "Barnes's vision of France - "The Land Without Brussels Sprouts" - embraces its vanishing peasantry; its vanished hyper-literate pop singers, Georges Brassens, Boris Vian, and Jacques Brel ("[he] sang at the world as if it ... could be saved from its follies and brutalities by his vocal embrace"); and the gleeful iconoclasm of its nouvelle vague cinema ("'The Underpass in Modern French Film' is a thesis waiting to be written"). He describes the elegant tour of France that Henry James and Edith Wharton made in 1907, and the orgy of drugs and suffering of the Tour de France in our own time. An unparalleled connoisseur of French writing and writers, Barnes gives us his thoughts on the prolific and priapic Simenon, on Sand, Baudelaire, and Mallarme ("If literature is a spectrum, and Hugo hogs the rainbow, then Mallarme is working in ultra-voilet")." "In several excursions into the prickly genius of Flaubert, Barnes discusses his letters; his lover Louise Colet; and his biographers (Sartre's The Family Idiot, "an intense, unfinished, three-volume growl at Flaubert, is mad, of course"). He delves into Flaubert's friendship with Turgenev; looks at the "faithful betrayal" of Claude Chabrol's film version of Madame Bovary; and reveals the importance of the pharmacist's assistant, the most major minor character in Flaubert's great novel: "If Madame Bovary were a mansion, Justin would be the handle to the back door; but great architects have the design of door-furniture in mind even as they lay out the west wing."" For lovers of France and all things French - and of Julian Barnes's singular wit and intelligence - Something to Declare is an unadulterated joy to read.

FROM THE CRITICS

Book Magazine

Dazzling, clever and immensely knowledgeable, Barnes is best known for his novels, including the highly inventive Flaubert's Parrot . The author's latest book documents his long love affair with France, collecting twenty years of essays on French subjects. Barnes discusses the songs of Boris Vian, Jacques Brel and Georges Brassens; the history of and controversy surrounding the Tour de France; the films of Fran￯﾿ﾽois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard; and the literary lives of Charles Baudela￯﾿ﾽre, St￯﾿ﾽphane Mallarm￯﾿ﾽ, Georges Simenon and George Sand. Many of the essays are devoted to Gustav Flaubert, whom Barnes considers "the writer's writer par excellence, the saint and martyr of literature￯﾿ﾽthe creator of the modern novel with Madame Bovary ." These pieces on the great nineteenth-century novelist offer ample rewards for the curious and interested. In fact, the final essay, an exquisite and precise analysis of a minor character in Madame Bovary , is one of the most engaging and useful literary pieces I've ever read. In his nonfiction as in his novels, Barnes is always a masterful host and performer, a writer with a lively mind who can be skeptical yet appreciative. ￯﾿ﾽJames Schiff

Book Magazine - James Schiff

Dazzling, clever and immensely knowledgeable, Barnes is best known for his novels, including the highly inventive Flaubert's Parrot. The author's latest book documents his long love affair with France, collecting twenty years of essays on French subjects. Barnes discusses the songs of Boris Vian, Jacques Brel and Georges Brassens; the history of and controversy surrounding the Tour de France; the films of Fran￯﾿ﾽois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard; and the literary lives of Charles Baudelaíre, Stéphane Mallarmé, Georges Simenon and George Sand. Many of the essays are devoted to Gustav Flaubert, whom Barnes considers "the writer's writer par excellence, the saint and martyr of literature—the creator of the modern novel with Madame Bovary." These pieces on the great nineteenth-century novelist offer ample rewards for the curious and interested. In fact, the final essay, an exquisite and precise analysis of a minor character in Madame Bovary, is one of the most engaging and useful literary pieces I've ever read. In his nonfiction as in his novels, Barnes is always a masterful host and performer, a writer with a lively mind who can be skeptical yet appreciative.

Publishers Weekly

Novelist Barnes's latest collection of haute musings on France and things French is rather like a ride in a creaky Citro n: at first, it kicks and gurgles in a scattered path, but once it gets started, it's a charming and nostalgic way to view la belle France. Barnes, author of nine novels (Love, Etc., etc.), a book of stories and a collection of essays, offers here an amalgamation of pieces, many previously published in the Times Literary Supplement and the New York Review of Books. The collection begins with meandering yet tellingly accurate critiques of popular culture phenomena, such as the Tour de France, the films of Truffaut and Godard, and singer Jacques Brel. Barnes's assessment of culinary writer Elizabeth David's thoughts on nouvelle cuisine (it means "lighter food, less of it, costing more") are at once witty and dead-on. After sharing these lighter, whimsical thoughts, Barnes shifts into a higher gear and delves into a study of the French and Francophile literary establishment, from Edith Wharton and Ford Madox Ford to Henry James and George Sand. He saves many of the book's later chapters for his favorite subject, Gustave Flaubert. Throughout, Barnes integrates his commentary with detailed, intriguing bits of history. Devotees of Madame Bovary will thrill to read his ruminations on the masterpiece (e.g., what if it had been written for the screen rather than as a book?). Serious yet self-deprecating, Barnes's prose is perfectly tuned to its subject. Photos not seen by PW. (Oct. 7) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal