OTHER KINDS OF BEAUTY

 

THEIR BRUTAL ORIGIN HAS BEEN FORGOTTEN 

The emphatically secular French rarely think of 19th-century Catholicism's inculcation of docility, and appreciate the neo-Gothic churches that are a setting for daily life:

Sculpture at Notre-Dame de la Gare (built in 1858)

Homogeneous architecture gives the city its harmonious unity: Few remember that it comes from razing rebel neighborhoods.

Zoom

Covering over a canal to let troops invade brought an overpass that is now two kilometers of gardens...

...and although the statue that introduces them ignores the tragedy of countless grisettes, but in itself is delightful:

Preparing to bombard the Latin Quarter led to a left-bank panorama, and to a hospital that was beautifully rebuilt:

The fountain at place Saint-Michel that celebrates Socialism's defeat is a site for festivity:

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Imagining the violent origin

of much of what makes Paris splendid

is almost impossible.

But without the revolts and repressions

that are now carefully erased,

it would look like any other city.

*     *     *

Next,

Progressives hijack streets and spaces