Letters from My Windmill (French: Lettres de mon moulin) is a collection of short stories by Alphonse Daudet

Alphonse Daudet

Alphonse Daudet was a French novelist. He was the father of Léon Daudet and Lucien Daudet.- Early life :Alphonse Daudet was born in Nîmes, France. His family, on both sides, belonged to the bourgeoisie. The father, Vincent Daudet, was a silk manufacturer — a man dogged through life by misfortune...

 first published in its entirety in 1869. Some of the stories had been published earlier in newspapers or journals such as Le Figaro

Le Figaro

Le Figaro is a French daily newspaper founded in 1826 and published in Paris. It is one of three French newspapers of record, with Le Monde and Libération, and is the oldest newspaper in France. It is also the second-largest national newspaper in France after Le Parisien and before Le Monde, but...

and L'Evénement as early as 1865.

The stories are all told by the author in the first person, typically addressing a Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

ian reader. The author, having relocated his home from Paris, recounts short bucolic tales about his new life in Provence

Provence

Provence ; Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of south eastern France on the Mediterranean adjacent to Italy. It is part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur...

 as well as his trips to Corsica and French Algeria. Considered to be light-hearted, and often a bit tongue-in-cheek, the stories vary from day-to-day events in southern France to Provençal folk-tales, and often feature professions and faunal references characteristic of Provence.

Letters From My Windmill is sometimes considered to be Daudet's most important work. It is cherished by many French, particularly in the South, for the picture it paints of the local culture.

A French-language movie was made in 1954 by Marcel Pagnol

Marcel Pagnol

Marcel Pagnol was a French novelist, playwright, and filmmaker. In 1946, he became the first filmmaker elected to the Académie Française.-Biography:...

 composed of three stories: "The Three Low Masses", "The Elixir of Father Gaucher" and "The Secret Of Master Cornille".

Trivia

The Belgian comic author Mitteï made a comic adaptation of the book in three volumes between 1979-1985, which were released in Dutch, French and the French dialect of Liège.

External links

• Letters from My Mill at Internet Archive
  Internet Archive
  The Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It offers permanent storage and access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, music, moving images, and nearly 3 million public domain books. The Internet Archive...
  
  (scanned books original editions illustrated color)
• Les Lettres de Mon Moulin (1954), movie review, New York Times, December 19, 1955. Letters From My Windmill, audio version : beginning and final part Translated by Harmelin and Adams
• Lettres de mon moulin, comic adaptation by Mitteï