{"product_id":"the-incorrigible-optimists-club","title":"The Incorrigible Optimists Club","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cu\u003eSecond-Hand\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eExcellent Condition\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eSet in the backstreets of Paris during the tumultuous sixties, The Incorrigible Optimists Club is a huge, exhilarating whirlwind of first love, radical art, colonial war, progressive politics, Chuck Berry and chain-smoking intellectuals.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eParis, 1959. As dusk settles over the immigrant quarter, 12-year-old Michel Marini - amateur photographer and compulsive reader - is drawn to the hum of the local bistro. From his usual position at the football table, he has a vantage point on a grown-up world - of rock 'n' roll and of the Algerian War. But as the sun sinks and the plastic players spin, Michel's concentration is not on the game, but on the huddle of men gathered in the shadows of a back room.\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cbr data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003ePast the bar, behind a partly drawn curtain, a group of eastern European men gather, where under a cirrus of smoke and over the squares of chess boards, they tell of their lives before France - of lovers and wives, children and ambitions, all exiled behind the Iron Curtain.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eListening to this band of survivors and raconteurs, Michel is introduced to a world beyond the boundaries of his childhood experience, a world of men made formidable in the face of history, ideas and politics: the world of the Incorrigible Optimists Club.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Jean-Michel Guenassia","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43043705258153,"sku":"","price":7.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0424\/9518\/0962\/files\/optim.webp?v=1682735270","url":"https:\/\/roseyravelstonbooks.com.au\/products\/the-incorrigible-optimists-club","provider":"RoseyRavelston Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}