June 20, Monday afternoon -- Cannes, France -- The library on the beach

Pages a la Plage -- Pages on the Beach -- June 15 through September 15, 2011, open every day from ten o'clock until six o'clock, with a varied collection of books: novels, essays, mangas, cook books.

They even had a shelf of books written in English. Among others were Blindman's Bluff, by Faye Kellerman, Wine and War: The French, The Nazis, and the Battle for France's Greatest Treasure, by Don and Petie Kladstrup; Shutter Island, by Dennis Lehane; Bare Bones, by Kathy Reichs; Cadillac Beach, by Tim Dorsey; Farenheit 9/11, by Michael Moore; Twenties Girl, by Sophie Kinsella; and Shantaram, by Gregory David Roberts.

Anyone can use the library, the just have to show their ID and leave a 10 euro deposit. Books can be kept for up to 48-hours.

I checked out Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad, which had English and French translations on alternate pages. Somehow, the French translation was always much longer than the English. I do not know why.

3 Comments:

bereweber said...

hi Sonya, it seems that you are having a delightful time :) this Pages a la Plage place sounds like a perfect place! books at the beach, I should mention that idea to the surfers on the coasts of San Diego, how neat!

Libraia Virtuale said...

Hi Sonya,
I'm reading your blog from Italy and I must say I really like it!
Maybe I've got an explanation for your doubt about translations. I think it happens because English and French have different origins. While in English you can express concepts in a really concise way, in French (and Italian as well) you need much more words! I can't give you an example at the moment but believe me, that's really true.

Hope you'll forgive my bad grammar, but I'm not practicing English since soooo long... :(

Silvia

Sonya Worthy said...

Berenice, that would be great if California's beaches had libraries, too!
Libraia Virtuale,this is unfortunate for the simultaneous translators from English to Italian/French/Spanish.... !!