Jean Giono’s The Man Who Planted Trees tells of a shepherd’s single-handed effort to re-forest a desolate valley in the Alpine foothills of Provence in the early 20th century. If you haven’t read it, and lingered over illustrator Michael McCurdy’s atmospheric wood cuts, do yourself a favour and put that right.
Meanwhile there’s this. It’s my aim, one of ’em anyway, to use such time as is left to me to set out, with my habitual patience and saintliness of manner, precisely why capitalism is utterly and irremediably antithetical to the sentiment of both Giono’s lovely story and this proverb.
