Along the Coast (1958)

Anne Olivier: Récitante, Narrator

Quotes 

• Récitante : Heaven was a beach and a pine cone. But the nostalgia of Eden is a garden. It is no longer the Côte d'Azur, but a transplanted garden. It is the idea of a garden with flowers, grass and columns.

• Récitante : [Closing lines]  The fake Eden is not for us, neither is Eden. And worse, the summer season comes to an end.

• Récitant : [Opening lines]  An uneven coastline, and azure...

  Récitante : Azure, azure, azure...

  Récitant : Constitute the Côte d'Azur, the French Riviera.

• Récitant : The English have invented a few landmarks on the coast: The Promenade des Anglais.

  Récitante : Nice.

  Récitant : The Hôtel des Anglais.

  Récitante : Menton.

  Récitant : The Eglise anglaise, also called English Church and the Pharmacie anglaise, British Pharmacy.

• Récitant : The first tourist was maybe the Cardinal Maurice of Savoy, who, despite his 50 years of age, took off his habit in order to marry his niece, Princess Marie-Louise. She was 14. Their honeymoon took place in a room still visited today.

  Récitante : 2 rue Jules Gilly, Nice.

  Récitant : They spent the winter there. Inventing "swallow tourism": the possibility to find, in any season, not only the sun, but also the wild palm tree, the mimosa, the cypress, the cypresses, the maritime pine, the pink laurel, the Indian fig opuntia, which Moroccans call the Christian fig tree, and the agave which lives for 100 years, grows flowers once and dies.

• Récitant : For want of seeing Matisse, they come to see his grave. Alive or dead, famous people have an audience, like Cro-Magnon, the first famous man, and the oldest dead, receiving the tribute of the visitors before they go see the Trophée d'Auguste...

  Récitante : La Turbie.

  Récitant : the Roman aqueduct...

  Récitante : Fréjus.

  Récitant : and the 13 moth-eaten marble blocks intended for the August temple in Narbonne, engulfed during a storm.

  Récitante : Saint-Tropez.