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    A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy
    A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy
    A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy
    Ebook171 pages2 hours

    A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy

    By Laurence Sterne

    3.5/5

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    Written after several years of travelling through France and Italy, Laurence Sterne published this novel as a sentimental account of his experiences abroad, and ultimately established travel writing as the dominant literary genre of the second half of the 18th century. This book is sometimes seen as an epilogue to his previous work, "The Life and Opinions of Tristam Shandy, Gentleman", but was immensely popular of its own right because of its elegant, episodic style that had till then not been prevalent in travel literature. The story is narrated by the charming and sensitive young Reverend Mr. Yorick, and recounts his various adventures throughout France with his servant La Fleur. Sterne's emphasis of subjective, personal discussions, and of manners and morals over classical learning are delicately expressed in this imaginative work. After years of fighting consumption, Sterne passed away just weeks before the publication of this, one of his most successful and influential novels.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDigireads.com Publishing
    Release dateJan 1, 2011
    ISBN9781596258075
    Author

    Laurence Sterne

    Irish-born Laurence Sterne was an eighteenth century English author and Anglican clergyman. Though he is perhaps best known as a novelist, Sterne also wrote memoirs, articles on local politics, and a large number of sermons for which he was quite well known during his lifetime. Sterne’s works include The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy, and the satire A Political Romance (also known as The History of a Good Warm Watch-Coat). Sterne died in 1768 at the age of 54.

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    Reviews for A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy

    3.5/5

    213 ratings11 reviews

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    • 2/5
      This is the tale of a monk, Yorick, who embarks on a journey across the English Channel to Calais and on to Paris. He then sets out through France towards Italy, meeting a variety of characters and getting into tricky situations along the way, and that is as far as the story gets. Unfortunately the author, Laurence Sterne, succumbs to consumption before he has finished his book.The book was first published in 1768 so pre-dates the golden age of classic literature. The language is hard to grasp to begin with although the story begins to flow better as the book goes on. The book has some humour in it and is one of the earliest forms of travel writing by the leisurely tourist - perhaps Sterne was the Bill Bryson of his day.I can't say I enjoyed this book. I can see that it stands as an early example of travel writing and is of interest to anyone who enjoyed Sterne's other work, principally Tristram Shandy (which I haven't read) but, for me, it didn't stand up as a novel to be read for pleasure. It ends so abruptly that I wondered what the point was of reading it at all. I was looking forward to an insight into 18th century France and Italy and I didn't really get that.
    • 4/5
      Another great example of why you need to really think about what a book's trying to do before you judge it. This is nice and subtle- on the one hand, it tugs the heart-strings unashamedly; on the other hand, it makes ruthless fun of you for having your heart-string tugged. Great stuff- unless you're expecting well rounded three dimensional characters and believable plot turns and a coherent narrative and so on. Not here, friendo. Here you get intriguing reflections on the general goodness/evilness of humankind, and jokes at the expense of people who think you can make general reflections on morality in that way. I wish he'd been able to add a couple of volumes to it; the whole enterprise is so clever and so much less brow-beating than Tristram Shandy that it might've ended up being one of the best books I'd read. As is, it's pretty darn-tootin good.
    • 4/5
      Sterne wanders around talking to swindlers and fops and very nice peasant folk, and keeps getting terribly attracted to women who he tells us of COURSE he did nothing with! A nice bit o' life-loving fluff from the guy who brought us Tristram Shandy. Too bad he didn't get to get into it further before he died.
    • 2/5
      Within the genre of travelogues, two approaches can be distinguished. There are those authors who describe fore-mostly the places, and the habits of the people they visit, from an anthropological point of view, and there are those who describe the people they meet on their travels from a more humanistic point of view, as equals, so to speak. An example of the first type of travelogue would be Daniel Defoe's A tour through the whole island of Great Britain, which was published in 1724. Laurence Sterne's fictional A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy was published a few decades later in 1768. By this time, travel to the continent had become fashionable.In Sterne's A sentimental journey, his alter ego Yorick, which contemporary readers would know as a clergyman, travels to Paris, supposedly on his way to Italy. However, the story develops very slowly, and for the larger part the story is set in the environs of Paris, indicated but scantily.If the book is humourous or witty, it is not clear in which way. Supposedly, various sketches or situation would be humourous to contemporaries of Sterne but the humour is lost on contemporary readers. In fact, A sentimental journey seems a rather boring little book, and all pleasure to be had from it can only be found by studying the introduction carefully which explains where to look for it. Even then, the notes in the annotated Penguin edition merely clarified what should already be clear to the educated reader, while leaving many possible clues unexplained.
    • 3/5
      A Sentimental Journey is the story of a man traveling from England to France and back and his adventures, or should I say, his encounters during the trip. We don't get a lot of "travel" descriptions, but rather descriptions of the carriages he takes, how he hires them, his servant, and the ladies he meets and endeavors to get to know better on the journey. It is 'sentimental' in the sense of a journal of his sentiments towards the women, the servants, the places he goes. Fairly short.
    • 3/5
      Sometimes, you read a book that is widely acclaimed as a classic, a masterpiece, a part of the literary canon, and your reaction is "Eh", or possibly "Meh". That's my reaction to "A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy", which was a hit after it was published in 1768, and has been finding readers for almost 250 years. When something like this happens, I assume that the problem isn't with the novel, it's with me. I couldn't get involved in the book, but that may be because I depend too much on narrative tension, and not enough on just being there. Also, I couldn't figure out what was going on at times: again, I may be too literal. For those who like this sort of thing, this is clearly the sort of thing they like. Hats off to them: I am not up to it.
    • 5/5
      As I mentioned before about Laurence Sterne, after I have read his books I wish I could write like him!
    • 3/5
      A serialized "Tristam Shandy" made the rural vicar "passing rich" and the talk of London. He balanced these with The Sermons of Mr. Yorick, a title apparently drawn from the "fellow of infinite jest". In 1762-64 and 1765-66, Sterne traveled through France and Italy. We find here the pretty observations and naif adages of a man who understood that the real criminals in our society are the bores. One of the favorite apothegmas of everyone except a good many people, is: "God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb". I know, you thought it was Biblical....
    • 5/5
      The review refers to this edition:The Carlton Classics, 152pp, London : John Long Ltd., 1923A came across this little book by chance, an unassuming small 8vo hardback but carefully made, even a ribbon-marker sewed in, the smooth green and fairly ugly buckram brightened up by the publisher’s emblem in gold on the front that shows a snake curled around the letters J L and what presumably is an image of the tree of knowledge, holding a goblet in its mouth, tempting you, the reader, to drink from it.The edition is edited with a Biographical Introduction by Hannaford Bennett and been given an Index. This the editor must have added as none of the earlier editions I consulted include it; curiously, it lists only the Chapter headings and these in alphabetical order. Did Mr. Hannaford Bennett want to amuse himself and edit the edition in the playful spirit of Sterne? But an error: - the location for the chapter ‘The Riddle’ is given as Calais, it should be Paris - is repeated in the Index. His oversight? And at the end of ‘The Rose – Paris’, what reads in the 2nd edition of 1768: ‘Rien que pisser’ and two lines further on: ‘to let Madame de Rambouliet p...ss on.’, is given out of pudency as: ‘Rien que …’, and: ‘to let Madame Rambouliet …;’. This 2nd edition of 1768 (Vol. I, London: Becket & De Hondt) lists alphabetically the subscribers, 281 names in all, some with multiple subscriptions e.g. 20 sets to Mr. Crew, 5 sets to Mr. Ogilby etc., so perhaps 400 sets altogether. The first 2 volumes of A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy of what was planned to be a 4 volume work were published shortly before Sterne’s death in 1768. So it remains unfinished and the protagonist, Yorick, Sterne’s alter ego, never reaches Italy. It is one of the first travel books but quite unlike any that follows (but then, after all, Sterne wrote it). Yorick, after listing all classes of travellers, calls himself a ‘Sentimental Traveller’. What he means by this he explains in his own words:"It is for this reason, Monsieur le Comte, continued I, that I have not seen the Palais Royal nor the Luxembourg, - nor the Façade of the Louvre, - nor have attempted to swell the catalogues we have of pictures, statues, and churches. I conceive every fair being as a temple, and would rather enter in, and see the original drawings, and loose sketches, hung up in it, than the transfiguration of Raphael itself.The thirst of this, continued I, as impatient as that which inflames the breast of the connoisseur, has led me from my own home into France, and from France will lead me through Italy ;-‘tis a quiet journey of the heart in pursuit of Nature, and those affections which arise out of her, which make us love each other, - and the world, better than we do."So it is his encounters, not with famous landmarks, but with men and women, Yorick talks about, foremost with women, because each one stirs his heart. Sterne’s unique prose cannot be read in haste, it demands time and leisure and the taste of each sentence. What I like best is a hint shining through of Yorick/Sterne laughing about himself. I will re-read Tristram Shandy. (VI-VII-10)
    • 5/5
      Superb production!
    • 2/5
      Yeah, just not a fan. If it had been any longer, I wouldn't have finished it.

    Book preview

    A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy - Laurence Sterne

    A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY

    BY LAURENCE STERNE

    A Digireads.com Book

    Digireads.com Publishing

    Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-3843-2

    Ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-59625-807-5

    This edition copyright © 2011

    Please visit www.digireads.com

    CONTENTS

    A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY THROUGH FRANCE AND ITALY

    CALAIS

    THE MONK

    CALAIS

    THE MONK

    CALAIS

    THE MONK

    CALAIS

    THE DESOBLIGEANT

    CALAIS

    PREFACE

    IN THE DESOBLIGEANT

    CALAIS

    IN THE STREET

    CALAIS

    THE REMISE DOOR

    CALAIS

    THE REMISE DOOR

    CALAIS

    THE SNUFF BOX

    CALAIS

    THE REMISE DOOR

    CALAIS

    IN THE STREET

    CALAIS

    THE REMISE

    CALAIS

    THE REMISE

    CALAIS

    THE REMISE

    CALAIS

    IN THE STREET

    CALAIS

    MONTREUIL

    MONTREUIL

    MONTREUIL

    MONTREUIL

    A FRAGMENT

    MONTREUIL

    THE BIDET

    NAMPONT

    THE DEAD ASS

    NAMPONT

    THE POSTILION

    AMIENS

    THE LETTER

    AMIENS

    THE LETTER

    PARIS

    THE WIG

    PARIS

    THE PULSE

    PARIS

    THE HUSBAND

    PARIS

    THE GLOVES

    PARIS

    THE TRANSLATION

    PARIS

    THE DWARF

    PARIS

    THE ROSE

    PARIS

    THE FILLE DE CHAMBRE

    PARIS

    THE PASSPORT

    PARIS

    THE PASSPORT

    THE HOTEL AT PARIS

    THE CAPTIVE

    PARIS

    THE STARLING

    ROAD TO VERSAILLES

    THE ADDRESS

    VERSAILLES

    LE PATISSIER

    VERSAILLES

    THE SWORD

    RENNES

    THE PASSPORT

    VERSAILLES

    THE PASSPORT

    VERSAILLES

    THE PASSPORT

    VERSAILLES

    THE PASSPORT

    VERSAILLES

    CHARACTER

    VERSAILLES

    THE TEMPTATION

    PARIS

    THE CONQUEST

    THE MYSTERY

    PARIS

    THE CASE OF CONSCIENCE

    PARIS

    THE RIDDLE

    PARIS

    LE DIMANCHE

    PARIS

    THE FRAGMENT

    PARIS

    THE FRAGMENT

    PARIS

    THE FRAGMENT, AND THE BOUQUET.

    PARIS

    THE ACT OF CHARITY

    PARIS

    THE RIDDLE EXPLAINED

    PARIS

    PARIS.

    MARIA

    MOULINES

    MARIA

    MARIA

    MOULINES

    THE BOURBONNNOIS

    THE SUPPER

    THE GRACE

    THE CASE OF DELICACY

    A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY THROUGH FRANCE AND ITALY

    They order, said I, this matter better in France.—You have been in France? said my gentleman, turning quick upon me, with the most civil triumph in the world.—Strange! quoth I, debating the matter with myself, That one and twenty miles sailing, for 'tis absolutely no further from Dover to Calais, should give a man these rights:—I'll look into them: so, giving up the argument,—I went straight to my lodgings, put up half a dozen shirts and a black pair of silk breeches,—the coat I have on, said I, looking at the sleeve, will do;—took a place in the Dover stage; and the packet sailing at nine the next morning,—by three I had got sat down to my dinner upon a fricasseed chicken, so incontestably in France, that had I died that night of an indigestion, the whole world could not have suspended the effects of the Droits d'aubaine;—my shirts, and black pair of silk breeches,—portmanteau and all, must have gone to the King of France;—even the little picture which I have so long worn, and so often have told thee, Eliza, I would carry with me into my grave, would have been torn from my neck!—Ungenerous! to seize upon the wreck of an unwary passenger, whom your subjects had beckoned to their coast!—By heaven! Sire, it is not well done; and much does it grieve me, 'tis the monarch of a people so civilized and courteous, and so renowned for sentiment and fine feelings, that I have to reason with!—

    But I have scarce set a foot in your dominions.—

    CALAIS

    When I had fished my dinner, and drank the King of France's health, to satisfy my mind that I bore him no spleen, but, on the contrary, high honour for the humanity of his temper,—I rose up an inch taller for the accommodation.

    —No—said I—the Bourbon is by no means a cruel race: they may be misled, like other people; but there is a mildness in their blood. As I acknowledged this, I felt a suffusion of a finer kind upon my cheek—more warm and friendly to man, than what Burgundy (at least of two livres a bottle, which was such as I had been drinking) could have produced.

    —Just God! said I, kicking my portmanteau aside, what is there in this world's goods which should sharpen our spirits, and make so many kind-hearted brethren of us fall out so cruelly as we do by the way?

    When man is at peace with man, how much lighter than a feather is the heaviest of metals in his hand! he pulls out his purse, and holding it airily and uncompressed, looks round him, as if he sought for an object to share it with.—In doing this, I felt every vessel in my frame dilate,—the arteries beat all cheerily together, and every power which sustained life, performed it with so little friction, that 'twould have confounded the most physical précieuse in France; with all her materialism, she could scarce have called me a machine.—

    I'm confident, said I to myself, I should have overset her creed.

    The accession of that idea carried nature, at that time, as high as she could go;—I was at peace with the world before, and this finish'd the treaty with myself.—

    —Now, was I King of France, cried I—what a moment for an orphan to have begg'd his father's portmanteau of me!

    THE MONK

    CALAIS

    I had scarce uttered the words, when a poor monk of the order of St. Francis came into the room to beg something for a his convent. No man cares to have his virtues the sport of contingencies—or one man may be generous, as another is puissant;—sed non quo ad hanc—or be it as it may,—for there is no regular reasoning upon the ebbs and flows of our humours; they may depend upon the same causes, for aught I know, which influence the tides themselves: 'twould oft be no discredit to us, to suppose it was so: I'm sure at least for myself, that in many a case I should be more highly satisfied, to have it said by the world, I had had an affair with the moon, in which there was neither sin nor shame, than have it pass altogether as my own act and deed, wherein there was so much of both.

    —But, be this as it may,—the moment I cast my eyes upon him, I was predetermined not to give him a single sous; and, accordingly, I put my purse into my pocket—buttoned it—set myself a little more upon my centre, and advanced up gravely to him; there was something, I fear, forbidding in my look: I have his figure this moment before my eyes, and think there was that in it which deserved better.

    The monk, as I judged by the break in his tonsure, a few scattered white hairs upon his temples, being all that remained of it, might be about seventy;—but from his eyes, and that sort of fire which was in them, which seemed more temper'd by courtesy than years, could be no more than sixty:—Truth might lie between—He was certainly sixty-five; and the general air of his countenance, notwithstanding something seem'd to have been planting-wrinkles in it before their time, agreed to the account.

    It was one of those heads which Guido has often painted,—mild, pale—penetrating, free from all commonplace ideas of fat contented ignorance looking downwards upon the earth;—it look'd forwards; but look'd as if it look'd at something beyond this world.—How one of his order came by it, heaven above, who let it fall upon a monk's shoulders best knows: but it would have suited a Bramin, and had I met it upon the plains of Indostan, I had reverenced it.

    The rest of his outline may be given in a few strokes; one might put it into the hands of any one to design, for 'twas neither elegant nor otherwise, but as character and expression made it so: it was a thin, spare form, something above the common size, if it lost not the distinction by a bend forward in the figure,—but it was the attitude of Entreaty; and, as it now stands presented to my imagination, it gained more than it lost by it.

    When he had entered the room three paces, he stood still; and laying his left hand upon his breast (a slender white staff with which he journey'd being in his right)—when I had got close up to him, he introduced himself with the little story of the wants of his convent, and the poverty of his order;—and did it with so simple a grace,—and such an air of deprecation was there in the whole cast of his look and figure,—I was bewitch'd not to have been struck with it.

    —A better reason was, I had predetermined not to give him a single sous.

    THE MONK

    CALAIS

    —'Tis very true, said I, replying to a cast upwards with his eyes, with which he had concluded his address;—'tis very true,—and heaven be their resource who have no other but the charity of the world, the stock of which, I fear, is no way sufficient for the many great claims which are hourly made upon it.

    As I pronounced the words great claims, he gave a slight glance with his eye downwards upon the sleeve of his tunic:—I felt the full force of the appeal—I acknowledge it, said I:—a coarse habit, and that but once in three years with meagre diet,—are no great matters; and the true point of pity is, as they can be earn'd in the world with so little industry, that your order should wish to procure them by pressing upon a fund which is the property of the lame, the blind, the aged and the infirm;—the captive who lies down counting over and over again the days of his afflictions, languishes also for his share of it; and had you been of the order of mercy, instead of the order of St. Francis, poor as I am, continued I, pointing at my portmanteau, full cheerfully should it have been open'd to you, for the ransom of the unfortunate.—The monk made me a bow.—But of all others, resumed I, the unfortunate of our own country, surely, have the first rights; and I have left thousands in distress upon our own shore.—The monk gave a cordial wave with his head,—as much as to say, No doubt there is misery enough in every corner of the world, as well as within our convent—But we distinguish, said I, laying my hand upon the sleeve of his tunic, in return for his appeal—we distinguish, my good father! betwixt those who wish only to eat the bread of their own labour—and those who eat the bread of other people's, and have no other plan in life, but to get through it in sloth and ignorance, for the love of God.

    The poor Franciscan made no reply: a hectic of a moment pass'd across his cheek, but could not tarry—Nature seemed to have done with her resentments in him;—he showed none:—but letting his staff fall within his arms, he pressed both his hands with resignation upon his breast, and retired.

    THE MONK

    CALAIS

    My heart smote me the moment he shut the door—Psha! said I, with an air of carelessness, three several times—but it would not do: every ungracious syllable I had utter'd crowded back into my imagination: I reflected, I had no right over the poor Franciscan, but to deny him; and that the punishment of that was enough to the disappointed, without the addition of unkind language.—I consider'd his gray hairs—his courteous figure seem'd to re-enter and gently ask me what injury he had done me?—and why I could use him thus?—I would have given twenty livres for an advocate.—I have behaved very ill, said I within myself; but I have only just set out upon my travels; and shall learn better manners as I get along.

    THE DESOBLIGEANT

    CALAIS

    When a man is discontented with himself, it has one advantage however, that it puts him into an excellent frame of mind for making a bargain. Now there being no travelling through France and Italy without a chaise,—and nature generally prompting us to the thing we are fittest for, I walk'd out into the coach-yard to buy or hire something of that kind to

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