That Time of Year...

Provence has a sense of history--

A travers le côté Tartarin et le le côté Daumier du pays si drôle, où les bonnes gens ont l'accent que te sais, il y a tant de grec déjà, et il y sa la Vénus d'Arles comme celle de Lesbos et on sent encore cette jeunesse-là malgré tout,

J n'en doute pas le moins du monde qu'un jour toi aussi tu connaîtras le Midi.

==

Through all the Tartarin and Daumier part of this queer country, where good folk have the accent that you recognize, there is still a good deal of Greece; there is a Venus of Arles just as there is a Venus of Lesbos, and one feels again one's youth in spite of all.

I haven't the slightest doubt that someday you too will know the Midi.

That's Vincent van Gogh to his brother Theo, Arles, September 1888. It's quoted as sthe epigraph of Ceasar's Vast Ghost: Aspects of Provence (1990). An English version of the whole letter is here. When he says "Tartarin," I assume he is thinking of this guy. I should have thought tht "Daumier" was the artist; perhaps it is really this.