Patrick Modiano - Ring Roads

Just now, as we were getting into the van, they gave us a bit of a beating. Our faces must look pretty comical. Like those two clowns that time at the Cirque Medrano . .

Surely one of the prettiest and most idyllically situated villages in Seine-et-Marne: on the fringes of the Forest of Fontainebleau. In the last century, it was the refuge of a group of painters. These days, tourists regularly visit and a number of Parisians have country houses here.

At the end of the main street, l’auberge du Clos-Foucré, built in the Anglo-Norman style. An air of propriety and rustic simplicity. Distinguished clientele. Towards midnight, you may find yourself alone with the barman clearing away bottles and emptying ashtrays. His name is Grève. He has worked here for thirty years. He is a man of few words, but if he takes a shine to you and you offer him a plum brandy from Meuse, he is prepared to recall certain memories. Oh, yes, he knew the people I mentioned. But how can a young man like me have heard of these people? ‘Oh, you know. .’ He empties the ashtrays into a square tin. Yes, that little gang used to come to the auberge a long time ago. Maud Gallas, Sylviane Quimphe. . he wonders what became of them. With women like that, you never know. He even has a photo. Look, the tall thin one there is Murraille. A magazine editor. Firing squad. The other one, behind him, who’s sticking out his chest and holding an orchid between his finger and thumb: Guy de Marcheret, known as Monsieur le Comte, used to be in the Legion. Maybe he went back to the colonies. Oh, that’s right, they are not around any more. . The fat one, sitting in the armchair, in front of them, he disappeared one day. ‘Baron’ something or other. .

He has seen dozens like them, propped at the bar, dreaming, who vanished later. Impossible to remember all the faces. After all. . sure. . if I want the photo, I can have it. But I’m so young, he says, I’d be better off thinking about the future.

PATRICK MODIANOwas born in Paris in 1945 in the immediate aftermath of World War Two and the Nazi occupation of France, a dark period which continues to haunt him. After passing his baccalauréat, he left full-time education and dedicated himself to writing, encouraged by the French writer Raymond Queneau. From his very first book to his most recent, Modiano has pursued a quest for identity and some form of reconciliation with the past. His books have been published in forty languages and among the many prizes they have won are the Grand Prix du Roman de l’Académie française (1972), the Prix Goncourt (1978) and the Austrian State Prize for European Literature (2012). In 2014 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.