JONATHAN MILES’ (AND MY) RIVIERA

LIESL SCHILLINGER QUOTES SOMERSET MAUGHM’s French Riviera as “A Sunny Place for Shady People” in her review of Jonathan Miles’ The Once Upon a Time World: The Dark and Sparkling Story of the French Riviera, in The New York Times Review of Books, October 1, 2023. Though I’m not shady (nor these days particularly conducive of even getting a tan), her article certainly evokes memories. Here are tidbits gleaned from the review accompanied by personal bits and pieces. 

The Once Upon a Time World: The Dark and Sparkling Story of the French Riviera, by Jonathan Miles, Pegasus Books, 2023.

Jonathan Miles had a nomadic childhood in the U.S., Canada, and the U.K. He studied at University College, London, and received a doctorate from Jesus College, Oxford. Miles lives in Paris.

A High Point: La Turbie. Schillinger writes, “In the town of La Turbie, the Trophy of the Alps, 35 meters high, went up in  6 B.C. commemorating Emperor Augustus’s victory over local peoples. (In the car chase in Hitchcock’s “To Catch a Thief,” Cary Grant and Grace Kelly whip through too fast to admire it.)”

Indeed, Grant experienced a hair-raising ride from Kelly in her Sunbeam Alpine. Nor was this the first enthusiastic motoring on the Grande Cornice. The Nice Speed Week was held March 25–29, 1901.  

Baron Henry de Rothchild’s Mercedes Simplex 35 HP at the Nice-La Turbie hillclimb featured advanced designs for  1901, among them a steering wheel in lieu of the conventional tiller.

France’s Jazz Age. Schillinger writes of “the Riviera’s jagged terrain, piney cliffs, pure air and ‘wonderful jade-and-amethyst’ waters (the description of the Lost Generation whisperer Gerald Murphy)….”

Ex-pats Gerald and Sara Murphy were introduced to the French Riviera by composer Cole Porter, all part of the 1920s’ Jazz Age in France.

Highjinks Galore. Schillinger says, “But even in those early days—before there even was a Monte Carlo, let alone a casino—the area abounded with scoundrels poised to prey upon wealthy newcomers. In 1810, for example, the ailing Marchioness of Bute obtained permission to travel through the South of France. While her carriage ascended a path in the hills near Menton, a gang of bandits attacked and made off with her diamonds and a bottle of what they presumed to be fine liqueur. Glugging it down, they fell asleep by the roadside and were ‘quickly apprehended,’ Miles writes. The bottle had contained an opium-laced sleeping potion.”

High Art. Schillinger describes a “high-stakes theft took place at a hotel restaurant in Saint-Paul-de-Vence. Its owner was known to accept paintings in lieu of payment—‘My kind of hotel,’ Picasso joked. In 1960, burglars broke in and stole 21 canvases, including a Braque, a Léger, a Mirò and a Modigliani. (The Picasso didn’t fit in the car.)”

I recall that Saint-Paul-de-Vence, inland and west of Nice, was the home of European automotive journalists extraordinaire, R&T contributor, and friend Paul Frère.

High-class Trippers. Schillinger writes, “When Queen Victoria arrived in Menton disguised as the ‘Countess of Balmoral’ (her French bodyguard conceded that she ‘did not deceive a soul’), the Russian Grand Duchess Anastasia was already established there and the two royal influencers magnified the allure of the Côte d’Azur. Queen Victoria’s libertine son ‘Bertie,’ the future King Edward VII, had preceded them, indulging in tennis, yachting, golf and baccarat in Cannes, and romping with courtesans in Monte Carlo.”

My Monte Carlo Romp. It’s difficult to work this into conversation, but darn if I’m not going to do so: In 1993, as part of an EV demonstration I drove a Monaco Lap of the circuit immediately before the Grand Prix.

Schillinger’s Summary. Reviewer Schillinger recounts the Riviera’s attraction to people of all sorts: “Reading this book, you know the answer. They want to touch that ‘sea like quilted silk’ that enraptured Katherine Mansfield; to see the ‘magical light’ that transfixed Claude Monet; to lay out their own towel in paradise.”

And to pilot a Fiat Cinquecento Elettra around the Monaco circuit. ds 

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com 2023