Mirèio

Written in Provencal by a poet determined to save his native tongue from oblivion, this twelve-canto epic tells a love story rooted in the sunburnt farmland of southern France. Mireille, the daughter of a prosperous landowner, loves Vincent, a poor basketmaker, and when her family forbids the match she flees across the scorching plain of the Crau toward the shrine of the Saintes-Maries. Around the lovers Mistral crowds the customs, labor, and legend of nineteenth-century Provence, from silkworm harvests to the songs of the fields. The poem revived Occitan as a literary language and helped earn its author the Nobel Prize. Harriet Waters Preston’s English verse translation is offered here as a free PDF and EPUB edition.