The Last Word

The Last Word is the final chapter of Conseils a un Jeune Francais Partant Pour L’Angleterre by Andre Maurois, Editions Bernard Grasset, 1938.  constable_cornfield_600pixIf you want to read this short book from the beginning, scroll down to the first post and read upwards.  It’s the modern way.

 

Above all, be joyful about the way England looks. 

You will love the countryside that seems to have been drawn by Constable or Gainsborough. 

You will love the hills, the valleys and the dunes. 

You will love the amiably wild gardens and the mown and ordered lawns. 

You will love London, which in its grey and gold fog, with the red stains of buses and the black stains of policemen, looks like an immense Turner. 

You will love the theatres with their comfortable seats, their indifferent audiences and their short intervals. 

You will love the bookshops, each one like an exotic fruit stall full of tempting surprises, and you will love above all the English version of what it means to be human.

Though don’t say so too loudly.  You’ll only embarrass them.