"America and France have always had a special relationship. In fact, it would not be an exaggeration to say that the two have enjoyed a love affair of sorts, with all the love/hate dynamics that suggests. From Benjamin Franklin charming Louis XVI to Jackie Kennedy enchanting Charles de Gaulle, the two peoples have fascinated and repelled each other. Mary Blume has cultivated her own love affair with this often inscrutable land - France."--BOOK JACKET.

"Quintessentially American, she has managed that fine trick of not assimilating, and yet coming to know, in the fullest sense, the place and the people in all their often sublime and sometimes ridiculous complexity. In the pieces themselves, whether she turns her penetrating lens on Frenchmen or their money or their socks, whether a bearded lady or simone de Beauvoir, street performers or members of the Academie Francaise, whether the newest chic potato or the eternally chic St.

Germain de Pres, whether the events of May '68 or the last presidential elections, she sees what would pass unseen - were she not there to notice it."--BOOK JACKET.