P.S. A MEMOIR Pierre Salinger St.Martin's Press, 1995




It is worth reading first his obituary in The Daily Telegraph which provides a brief but interesting and broad overview of the times of this man and his astonishing life

I mostly read fiction. Unless the subject of a non-fiction title, (like wine and food, or the history of publishers/publishing houses eg), is of particular interest then I am unlikely pick it up.

Unlike my prolifically read friends Roger Hall and Gordon McLauchlan I am rarely tempted to read biography or memoir.

However staying here at Poppy Salinger's beautiful home in the gorgeous Luberon area of Provence I came across the book in her library and started reading. I could hardly bear to put it down, even when we were venturing out to visit the glorious Roman engineering masterpiece that is the Pont du Gard or the fascinating town of Aigues-Mortes (about which more later).

Now I have finished it and I was so engrossed, enchanted, saddened and delighted by it that I have just ordered a second-hand copy from online US bookseller Abe Books which should be in my pst box back in New Zealand by the time we are home later in July.




I was rivetted by the fascinating insight into the Kennedy years from the election campaign of JFK, his term as President,The Bay of Pigs fiasco, the Cuban Missile Crisis and assasination, the LBJ presidency that followed, the assasination of Bobby Kennedy and the subsequent loss of the White House to the Republicans.

Salinger was part of the inner group. Here, in part, is Teddy White on Salinger in his 1960 book, The Making of the President:
"Also there, for the first time admitted to the in-group, was Pierre Salinger, then thirty four, a man of French descent, a man of dark, round face and braod cheeks, might with 10 or 15 more years of age, be mayor of any Burgundian village - large in manner, full of gusto, a wine drinker and brandy bibber, his mind, in the French manner, is at once jovial and quick, shrewd, practical".

After his years as Press Secretary with both JFK and LBJ he returned to his earlier field of journalism and worked for many years in a variety of roles for the ABC Bureau in Paris where he was both Chief Foreign Correspondent and Bureau Chief at different times. He also worked for magazines and fronted numerous television docos.

But what a life this man had, no wonder he was sometimes called Lucky Pierre!
Cruising the Med with Aristotle & Jackie, conducting what proved to be the last interview of Princess Grace, and enjoying friendships with Frank Sinatra, Paul Newman, James Goldsmith, Al-Fayed, Nikita Krushchev, Francoise Mitterand and many other interesting people.

Other especially compelling sections of the book (and there were no dull parts) include pieces on the first Gulf War,the "troubles" in Ireland, a comparison of the Kennedy and Clinton presidencies and a section on the suicide of his adult son Marc, which had tears streaming down my face.

He was even on the judging panel for the Cannes Film Festival in 1972 when the brilliant French actress Jeanne Moreau was the chairman!

And there is no lack of personal background. His fourth wife, they met in 1983 and married in 1989, proved to be the love of his life.
She of course is Poppy, our charming and gregarious host here at La Bastide Rose.

Here he introduces her to the reader near the end of the book:

"In November 1983, I met an incredible woman who changed my life.
She was named Nicole Beauvillain de Menthon and she was about to become the communications director for Guy Laroche, the famous designer. Earlier, she had been a journalist, and had worked for Time magazine and NBC before getting into communications and public relations with the huge French firm of L'Oreal".

And later:

"I pursued her relentlessly, madly, offering to marry her dozens of times. She kept refusing, mainly for the hard-to-argue-with reason that, while legally separated, we both still had spouses.I backed off from the proposals but I did get Nicole to agree to live with me. In March 1985, we began to cohabit a tiny apartment on the Rue Faustin Helie".

This is a personal, insightful, thoughtful, illuminating, entertaining and well-researched and documented memoir.

I wish I had known the man, hard to imagine a more charming or interesting dinner companion. He loved and supported the arts - visual, opera, film, was a great reader and a fine pianist.

Alas he died here in France aged 79 in October 2004.

Have a look at this photographic montage put together by Poppy after his death.