The Route of Writers :

GEORGE SAND’S HOUSE AT NOHANT

The legendary George Sand, the first “modern woman”… The greatest artistic geniuses of her time would flock to Nohant, Flaubert, Balzac, Turgenev, Alexandre Dumas fils (son), Delacroix, Liszt and obviously Chopin, to meet the woman who was called in the Berry "the good lady of Nohant". You can follow in her footsteps and discover the Black Valley, Saint-Chartier, La Châtre and Gargilesse.

Find out more: www.monum.fr/

 Le Lion d’Or à Romorantin

THE COUNTRY OF THE GRAND MEAULNES

No-one better than Alain-Fournier in Le Grand Meaulnes to capture the spirit of a land, a land of mists and dreams, a country which slips away from you as you round the corner and whose real substance is difficult to grasp. This land is to be found between Berry and Sologne, from the school of Epineuil le Fleuriel (where you can still matriculate for a very special day and come away with your leaving certificate!) to Nançay and the grocer’s shop of Uncle Florentin taking in the Chapelle d’Angillon on the way.

Find out more: http://www.legrandmeaulnes.com/, grandmeaulnes.free.fr, www.litterature-lieux.com

 Le Lion d’Or à Romorantin

HENRY DE MONFREID IN INGRANDES

Who would have predicted that this writer who went “wherever the wind blew him” would bring his talent to this little village of the Brenne which now has a museum in his honour. As chance would have it, the writer’s house is ironically only a few kilometres from a lake known as “the Red Sea”…

Find out more: www.terresdecrivains.com, www.henrydemonfreid.com

 Le Lion d’Or à Romorantin
 Château de Curzay à Curzay

THE COLETTE MUSEUM IN SAINT-SAUVEUR-EN-PUISAYE

After having resided in a number of French provinces, Colette finally came home to her native village of Saint-Sauveur en Puisaye when, paradoxically, the Colette Museum which has been installed in the village chateau has recreated the interior of the Palais-Royal apartment which she lived in when she was called "La Grande Colette". If you want to discover naughty little Claudine at School, all you have to do is wend your way down the steep village streets to the School and the deserted lanes of Puisaye.

Find out more: www.colette.org, www.centre-colette.com

 Le Lion d’Or à Romorantin

BALZAC IN SACHÉ

The Touraine was the inspiration for a good number of the novels of Balzac who, around 1830, took up residence in the Château de Saché, in the delightful valley of the Indre. A dozen of the best works of the Human Comedy including Lily of the Valley were either written or rewritten here, a place which today is furnished and decorated in the same way as it was when Balzac actually lived there. There is a huge collection of objects, portraits and cartoons, first editions, letters, manuscripts and corrected proofs.

Find out more: www.terresdecrivains.com, www.37-online.net

LA DEVINIÈRE, THE HOUSE WHERE RABELAIS AND RABELAISIE WERE BORN

There is nothing like visiting Rabelaisie to understand how this area of the Chinonnais with its hillsides covered in vines could have so deeply influenced Rabelais’ personal utopia. "Do what you want", the founding motto of the Abbey of Thélème created by Rabelais is much more revolutionary than it appears; it does not just apply to gastronomy. La Devinière, the house where François Rabelais was born, and point of departure for the Picrocholines wars tour, gives you a superb pretext to explore the heart of southern Touraine.

Find out more: www.cg37.fr, mapage.noos.fr/crosin000v/, www.litterature-lieux.com

JOACHIM DU BELLAY MUSEUM IN LIRÉ

"Happy is he who, like Ulysses, hath made a goodly journey”. All schoolchildren know this verse but are unlikely to recall that it was penned by the sublime Joachim Du Bellay. This museum, situated in the town where he was born, plunges you back into the France of the Renaissance and the "goodly journey" takes you from the gentle banks of the Loire near Angers to Paris and from Paris to a mythical Rome passing through, on the way, all the literary and artistic gems of the Pléiade group of poets.

Find out more: www.museedubellay.com, www.anthologie.free.fr

 Château de Noirieux à Briollay

JULES VERNE MUSEUM IN NANTES

Jules Verne, when asked about his taste for tales in which the imagination is given “free rein”, replied: “the fact is that I was born in Nantes where my childhood was moulded by the maritime swirl of a big trading city which was the hub of many long distance journeys”. From the museum, perched on a hillside overlooking the river Loire you can, as Jules Verne would have wished, watch “the river flow by” and let you imagination travel from the banks of the Loire to the outer banks of fiction.

Find out more: www.nantes.fr/, www.jules-verne.net

 Château de Noirieux à Briollay
 La Bretesche à Missillac

The Route of Writers : nearby Relais & Chateaux properties