You don't have to be a great cleric to discover the “dirty kid”, the rebel who, month after month, year after year, disturbs and will disturb the more or less prestigious future that his parents created for him. In the cover photo taken at Havana airport in Cuba – he was working for an oil company at the time – the dashing young jack of all trades of an adventurer who dares anything. Paul Mirat is never tempted by the usual pathos of a slew of autofictions that bore us before annoying us.
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On the contrary, his style is alert, nervous, light, unpretentious. He doesn't want to compete with anyone. He simply talks about his past and present life. He laughs at himself and makes us smile and laugh when he offers us his English, American or South American tribulations.
In Zigzags, Paul Mirat recounts his adventures across the vast world.
Repro PP
The adventurous soul
Because Paul has a passion for aviation, you have to read his lines about the Wright Brothers to be convinced. He traveled to train his youth which we can only admire. He always brings back some incredible story. He has an adventurous soul, coming and going, breathing in the air of London, Buenos Aires or San Francisco.
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He doesn't know how to stay still (I know another one!) “April 1974, I am eighteen years old and languishing in high school (ah, what worse enemy than boredom!) when, out of the blue, Giscard gives me the majority […] It is therefore with a hasty step that I head towards the offices of the Bernadotte barracks, determined to win my ticket to Tahiti. » There he goes, over there, “to the cape of the world” (1). He will never stop decamping. He loves the fresh air of magnificent horizons. Today, still, with his “car”, he travels through Béarn, Basque Country, Landes, Gers.
Lightness itself
Its zigzags are fluid erudition, vivid memory, delicate memories, surprises and enchantments. I repeat, Paul Mirat likes to laugh. Of course, like everyone else, he can have his sadness, his pain, but it doesn't matter to him, he wanders with his beret and his pen. His stories are lightness itself. The celebrities we meet often lose their splendor. As they say in Béarn: “Qu’èm chic de causa!” » (2) And don't let anyone tell me that he is a local author. It doesn't exist. “The universal is the local without walls” as Miguel Torga so well wrote.
Paul Mirat, Zigzags, Éditions Monhélios, p. 143.14 euros.
(1) At the end of the world.
(2) We are little.
Meeting at the Parvis
The name Mirat is very well known in Béarn. Grandson of the painter whose author bears the same name, Paul Mirat had an initial career in the export of wines from the South West to England before retraining in printing and publishing then working on communication at Pau town hall. He is the author of works relating to local history. He is a full member of the Académie de Béarn.
He will come to meet his readers this Tuesday, November 12 at 6 p.m. at the Parvis -Espace culturelle Leclerc in Pau. Free entry, reservations recommended on 05 59 80 80 89 or by email: [email protected].
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