This week I've been buried in Flight to Arras, a book so good it was banned in France and helped swing America behind an unpopular war. It's a terse read, one hundred and thirty pages with barely a wasted word, recording a futile mission over a burning town in an already defeated country.
We had reached the last days of May, 1940, a time of full retreat, of full disaster. Crew after crew was being offered up as a sacrifice. It was as if you dashed glassfuls of water into a forest fire in the hope of putting it out.
Read it here. Then buy the book anyway.
2 comments:
thanx for the tip... ran out of reading material a while ago, haven't felt like picking up a new book in ages, re-reading old favourites instead..
I love Saint-Exupéry, especially Night Flight and of course Le Petit Prince
I'll go and buy it, the online version is a bit too mangled to read.. wish my French was still good enough to appreciate the original :)
I'm just about to start on Night Flight. Read Le Petit Prince for the first time in Japan and finished Southern Mail last night.
He's great.
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