15 h 2 minAudiobook8 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if the real hero of a journey through Europe is the car itself?
In La 628-E8, Octave Mirbeau takes to the road with his wife, his chauffeur and his Charron motor car. Across France, Belgium, Holland and Germany, rough roads turn a long drive into an adventure. The car’s registration number gives this restless travel book its name.
Mirbeau offers no tidy itinerary. His thoughts roam through landscapes, towns, inns and museums, mixing complaints and jokes with sudden wonder. Speed changes what he sees and how he feels. Encounters with innkeepers, villagers, officials and fellow drivers give his sharp eye for society plenty to work on.
What you’ll discover
- The car as hero Discover how a motor car becomes more than transport: a new way of seeing.
- The thrill of speed Feel the wind and blur of trees as pleasure shares the road with danger.
- People along the road Meet the strangers who draw out Mirbeau’s curiosity, irritation and sharp sense of comedy.
- An art critic’s eye Look at landscapes and museums with a writer whose love of painting shapes his attention.
- Room for sudden wonder Follow a wandering mind that moves from grumbling to delight without following a neat plan.
Is it for you?
This book suits readers who enjoy travel writing with a strong, grumpy, funny voice, and anyone curious about early motoring or France before the First World War. If you want a tidy route and a plain guidebook, its rambling, opinionated style may frustrate you.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- The car gives a new way of seeing
- Travel is a trip without a plan
- Roadside people reveal their nations
- Speed brings joy and also danger
- Art teaches the eye to look
- A restless book that still has bite
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- Large print hardcover
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La 628-E8
by Octave Mirbeau· 1907
A journey by motor car prompts reflections on European society.
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Language: English
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1 of 6
The car gives a new way of seeing
Mirbeau begins from a simple claim. The motor car does not just carry a traveler from one town to the next. It changes the traveler's eyes. On a train, he argues, you are shut in a box and delivered to a platform. In a car you move through the land itself, and the land comes to meet you in a steady unrolling of fields, hills, rivers and rooftops.
The book is built on this feeling of freedom. Mirbeau can stop where he likes, turn where he likes and leave when a place disappoints him. He does not have to follow the timetable or the guidebook. The journey becomes a series of small decisions made by mood and curiosity, and the prose follows the same loose, wandering pattern.
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The author
Octave Mirbeau
1848–1917 · French novelist and art critic
French writer, art critic and journalist.
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What is La 628-E8 about?
It is Octave Mirbeau's account of motor trips through Belgium, Holland, Germany and France in his Charron car. It mixes landscape, art, people met on the road, humor and complaint, and reflects on what the automobile does to the way we see.
What does the title La 628-E8 mean?
It is the registration number of Mirbeau's car, a Charron. By naming the book after the plate, he makes the machine the central companion of the journey and the symbol of the new freedom of motoring.
When was La 628-E8 written and is it a true story?
It was published in 1907 and is based on real car journeys Mirbeau made. It is written as a personal, opinionated travel narrative, so it mixes fact with the author's moods, jokes and exaggerations.
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