Charles Ferdinand Ramuz

A haunting, allegorical Swiss masterpiece centered around a posse of villagers as they brave dark elements to ascend a mountain, thicketed with lore Teeming with tension, this immersive, rhapsodic story transports readers to the Swiss mountainside, bringing to mind the writing of Thomas Mann while offering character studies as vivid and bracing as Eudora Welty's. Feed is running low in a rural village in Switzerland. The town council meets to decide whether or not to ascend a chimerical mountain in order to access the open pastures that have enough grass to "feed seventy animals all summer long." The elders of the town protest, warning of the dangers and the dreadful lore that enfolds the mountain passageways like thick fog. They've seen it all before, reckoning with the loss of animals and men who have tried to reach the pastures nearly twenty years ago. The younger men don't listen, making plans to set off on their journey despite all warnings. Strange things happen. Spirits wrestle with headstrong young men. As the terror of life on the mountain builds, Ramuz's writing captures the rural dialog and mindsets of the men. One of the most talented translators working today, Bill Johnston captures the careful and sublime twists and turns of the original in his breathtaking translation.

Ce 31 juillet 1918, Caille, un colporteur biblique, longe le lac et arrive au village...« et partout les Signes se levaient autour de lui La guerre...la grippe espagnole commence toucher les jeunes, les vieux et m me le docteur...deux, quatre, cinq morts...la gr ve des ouvriers de la verrerie...l'orage qui gronde...l'Apocalypse...la fin. C' tait seulement un gros orage. En Champagne, les Alli s ont avanc de 7 kilom tres, fait 25000 prisonniers. Caille va reprendre la route, car le Seigneur a encore t mis ricordieux...

Ceux qui sont de l'autre c t du col s' taient empar s d'un beau morceau de p turage. Pour se venger, Firmin, un berger romand, enl ve Frieda, une jeune al manique. Mathias le colporteur fait, en secret, la liaison entre la prisonni re et Hans son fianc . Durant l'hiver, Frieda manipule aussi bien Firmin que Manu, l'idiot du village et la fonte des neiges, les Al maniques entrent dans le village incendi par Manu, pendent le berger et repartent avec Frieda.

Ce livre aborde les souvenirs d'enfance de Charles Ferdinand Ramuz pour d crire sa participation la saison des vendanges Yvorne, dans le Chablais vaudois, vers 1890...

Dans ce recueil, on retrouve des nouvelles qui font cohabiter la nature, les paysages changeants et ph m res avec la dure r alit de la vie et des corps. Par exemple, « Un vieux de campagne retrace le vieillissement p nible d'un paysan qui ne peut plus participer aux travaux de sa ferme et qui doit compter sur les autres.

The old man Sage taught Maurice Farinet many things and one of them was the location of a secret vein of gold. After Sage died, Farinet began to make coins. Based on a true story, Ramuz tells an extraordinary tale of mountains and villages, of independence and the price of freedom.

A mountain falls down and an alpine village is frozen in its summer state. When a ghostly figure appears beyond the last house, the villagers are terrorised. Is it a soul trapped in limbo, come to make his baleful complaint? Only one of them recognises him as a survivor, her husband in flesh and blood. The village rejoices, but when the survivor declares his intention to return beneath the rubble, the old doubts resurface. Swiss writer Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz sets his masterful tale of love and loss against the tectonic indifference of the high Alps.