A journey through the history, cultures, and societies of Marseille.
There are many Marseilles, or at least many versions of Marseille:
seaside village, haven of gangsters, gateway to the East, city of
immigrants and outcasts. It is by turns the dull bourgeois provincial
town where nothing ever happens and the mysterious unknowable city of
the Mediterranean. In Marseille Mix, William Firebrace explores the
many Marseilles, the invented and the actual. Leading readers down
narrow streets, through undulating terrain that seems at once, or
serially, Italian, Greek, Levantine, and North African, Firebrace traces
the history and culture of Marseille through landscapes, buildings,
food, films, literature, and criminology.
In seven chapters, in writing that is by turns essay, narrative,
description, list, recipe, glossary, and conversation, Firebrace
investigates the city's defining mix. He tells stories of famous
Marseillais, including Marcel Pagnol and Antonin Artaud, and famous
visitors, including the dying Arthur Rimbaud and Walter Benjamin (who
wrote about one visit in "Hashish in Marseille"). He describes the brief
period when Marseille was the point of departure for European refugees
fleeing the Nazis and the city's mixture of desperation and decadence
during the Vichy regime. He visits the basilica of Notre Dame de la
Garde and gazes down from its terrace at the panoramic view: an
agglomeration of neighborhoods and landscapes that became a city.
