A Financial Times 'Book to Read in 2023' In 1835 Lord Brougham founded Cannes introducing
bathing and the manicured lawn to the wilds of the Mediterranean coast. Today much of that
shore has become a concrete mass from which escape is an exclusive dream. In the intervening
years the stretch of seaboard from the red mountains of the Esterel to the Italian border
hosted a cultural phenomenon well in excess of its tiny size. A mere handful of towns and
resorts created by foreign visitors - notably English Russian and American - attracted the
talented rich and famous as well as those who wanted to be. For nearly two centuries of
creativity luxury excess scandal war and corruption the dark and sparkling world of the
Riviera was a temptation for everybody who was anybody. Often frivolous it was also a potent
cultural matrix that inspired the likes of Picasso Matisse Coco Chanel Scott Fitzgerald
Cole Porter James Baldwin Catherine Mansfield the Rolling Stones Sartre and Stravinsky. In
Once Upon a Time World Jonathan Miles presents the remarkable story of the small strip of
French coast that lured the world to its shores. It is a wild and unforgettable tale that
follows the Riviera's transformation from paradise and wilderness to a pollution imperilled
concrete jungle.
