0.4. CONTENTS

EACH PAGE MAKES A SEPARATE POINT

"Menu" lets you see chapters and sections immediately. "Contents" is more complete and bolding makes it easier to read. Both let you click and scroll down, but don't go so fast that the ideas merge.

Harald Wolff

Scrolling stops when the pages become too heavy to load so you end up clicking anyway. Clicking at the pages' end is the best way to start. Scrolling quickly via the menu works for returning to particular information or pictures.

I.

WHAT MAKES FRANCE DISTINCT?

1.1. SETTING THE SCENE

1.1. THE PLAYERS, LEGENDARY OR UNSUNG 

1.1.1. Kings, at the heart of French civilization 

1.1.2. Women of the court who bequeathed their refinement 

1.1.3. The Church, inseparable from monarchy

1.1.4. Small farms: ferocious repressions and art de vivre

1.1.5. Rebels and their demand for social justice

1.1.6. Exiles and expats

1.1.7. The French language, imperialists' explosive gift

1.1.8. Immigrants, source of new energies

II.

AN UNSUSPECTED CITY

2.1. THE LOGIC OF THE LEGENDARY CORE

 

2.1.1. A spectral rampart: Sites of the Revolution and haven away 

from the street / A trace of the past and a sign of the future /

A rampart vestige in a parking lot 

 

2.1.2. Saint-Germain-des-Prés, rampart heir: Outlaws and Protestants 

live beyond the rampart / The Church and the Grandes Écoles 

 ("great schools") / Intellectuals, cafés and the Occupation / The 

Liberation and a brief golden age / Hollywood's take / Lasting change: 

Europe's capital of movies and jazz / Brands attacks, tradition holds / 

Art galleries' riches and traps / Other galleries that one can trust  

2.1.3. Lords step out from the shadows: Recollection / Trying 

to understand them /  Push open this door /  Farther on  / Plaques 

reveal this river bank's prestige / More antiquarians  / "A 

neighborhood of impressive appearance and noble dwellings"

 

2.1.4. Back to the rampart, on to the river: A pedestrian street for gourmets / Bastion of the Old Régime, the Institut de France / Epitaph

 

2.1.5. Palaces: glory and demise: Power takes off from the river /  

Fatal passion at the Louvre /  Palais-Royal, a world apart / "If your son 

marries my daughter I'll give you Palais-Royal" / Another way the past 

stepped in: the threat from other royals  /  Libertarian gardens where 

the modern world began  / Moving on 

  

 2.1.6. Palais-Royal now: Remembrance of things past  / Evolution /  

The ambiance of a Balzac novel  /  Remembrance of things past / 

A sumptuous covered passage remains /  The walk ends in a salon /

A restaurant whose elegance prolongs the mood 

 

 2.2. BRANDS TAKE OVER THE HISTORIC CENTER 

2.2.1. Ads hover over the river 

 

2.2.2. A left-bank oasis evokes the recent past: 

Gertrude Stein, classic movies, Picasso and no cars  / Beloved dinky toys, collectors' items  /  Fashion that was classic yet unique  / End 

of a Japanese landmark /  Metamorphosis / A bookstore where 

tradition remains  

 

2.2.3. Shun the grotesque profits: "real" Paris's affordable shopping

Wares at a neighborhood market / A street where (some) wholesalers 

sell retail / At last a brand to appreciate / Woolens for Heads of State /

Detour: knowledge of the past brings an extra dimension  /

Detour: the Boulevards, once luxury's planetary heart / If you absolutely  

must buy globalized brands 

         2.2.4. Willfully erasing the past: Marie-Antoinette's cell replaced 

by a tablet / Camouflage at the Louvre / The Opéra: hiding the donors' 

void  / Commerce does not explain such change

2.3. A TRADE ROUTE FOR PILGRIMS AND KINGS (rue Saint-Denis)

2.3.1. The street that proclaimed royal power: Parades that unite 

kings and  subjects  / Marching down rue Saint-Denis / Royal 

funerals take the route in reverse / The vanished gate  /  Beyond 

the gate, the gibbet  /  Public executions, rituals of power /  

Executioners, necessary pariahs / Now a street that is pleasant 

and pedestrian 

      Entry of Louis XI to Paris by Francois Tattegrain, 1889,  zoom 

 

2.3.2. Medieval spirits linger: The trade route divides into segments / 

Touristy shops and fast-foods at the trade route's start / A cemetery that  bewilders  / The "Court of Miracles" / That territory now / Detour: 

a prostitute who (almost) rose up from the street / The huge open 

space at the city's heart  / "Les Halles," above ground and below it / 

Specters emerge from the cemetery

Execution of the Templars (cropped), anonymous, 15th century / zoom

 

2.3.3. Erasing rebel neighborhoods 

 

2.3.4. A hinterland for criminals, nobles and the garment district:  

Poisons and black masses / Crime that shook the Sun King's court / 

Nobles take over / The garment district, heir of boulevards and 

nobles / A seedy neighborhood gentrifies with character

 

2.3.5. An arc built to honor Louis XIV looms over the route  

 

 

Claude Abron

2.3.6. Toward the horizon: Lepers on the trade route /  

Catholic nobles become saints and heroes / Nuns' coiffes 

communicate /  Congregations prosper, leave and return / 

Vanished jails     

 

2.3.7. Immigrants energize tradition: Traditional France on 

the trade route now / Here 72 languages are said to be spoken

2.4. VISITS WITH CHILDREN (OR WITHOUT THEM)

2.4.1. If you come with little boys (adapt to little girls)

2.4.2. Kids follow signs and pictures

2.4.3. A wood where children play 

2.4.4.  New horizons

2.4.5. The Louvre through their sharp eyes: The Mona Lisa, 

one masterpiece among a multitude / Art that tells stories / 

Finding your way through the huge museum / Rewards / Save the blockbusters for last / Outdoor ending 

2.5. THE VISIT FOR ADULTS: NOBLES, GODS AND HEROES 

2.5.1. The primacy of hereditary rank 

2.5.2. Everything aids the overclass 

2.5.3. Allegory: nobles vs. rising capitalists  

2.5.4. Real stories and political messages 

2.5.5. The Church gives the humble the bodies of gods 

2.5.6. Rubens's decor for a queen 

2.5.7. A plea for peace and a threat of revolt  

2.5.8. Detour: History — anecdotes or the economy? 

Philip of France in Costume of Antiquity by Jean Nocret, toward 1650 / zoom

2.6. THE GODS' MODERNITY

2.6.1. The first great work of defiance  

2.6.2. A goddess becomes a plebeian revolutionary

2.6.3. The goddess's descendants 

2.7. WHEN OBSERVATION AND THE USUAL STORY CLASH: 

WHAT OPERA TOURS WON'T SAY

2.7.1. A palace for a new elite: A design that highlights power /  

Where new and old money cross paths / "We too can mingle with 

the gods"  

 

2.7.2. Backers, sex and money: The abonnés finance 

performances /  Detour: ballet, an art of the French court /  

Millionaires and ballerinas / Degas's "Little dancer" / A ceiling 

decorated by an orgy

2.7.3. Blackout? Tycoons equal to an emperor / Masking the 

monument's purpose / Merch does not explain the change /  

Ignoring the obvious and getting away with it

 

2.7.4. From nymphs to Nazis, how opéra girls saved the city of love: 

Place Vendôme and the Occupation / Why Paris didn't burn

 III.

VITALITY ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE TRACKS 

3.1. EUROPE'S "CHINATOWN" 

      

3.1.1. A walk where cultures mix: "Porte"(gate) de Choisy /  

Come to "L'Arche de la Fraternité" / Cultures intertwine    

3.1.2. Colors of shops and street: The other artery / Crossroad 

shops / A street that seems ordinary at first 

 

3.1.3. High-rises ahead of their time: "The neighborhood needed cleaning up" / An enclave / Autonomy / The inspiration 

of royal squares  / A historical panel that skips what counts 

 

3.1.4. Asians broaden a French neighborhood: A street that is 

almost ordinary / Asians enliven Parisian sobriety / A park  

evokes Asians and kings / The Tang supermarkets / Small 

distinctive shops align 

 

3.1.5. Some of the restaurants: The multitude on avenue d'Ivry /  

A bustling Vietnamese canteen / Thai décor as refined as the cuisine  / A Chinese feast

 

3.1.6. Asians emerge from the shadows: The Chinese New Year 

celebration / A parade unique in Europe / Asians in ads, the 

ultimate acceptance 

 

3.2. THE EAST, WHERE NEW WORLDS EMERGE

3.2.1. Memories of insurrection: La Commune and some of its sites /  

Preliminary fracas: the mad "Descent from La  Courtille" / Toward the Belleville crossroad  / The area stays left  

 

 3.2.2. A place where the arts spring up: Ménilmontant, where walls 

turn into art galleries / Kitch and class / "To feel the real pulse of the 

city go east" / Bars and music  

 

3.3. A WALK THROUGH "REAL PARIS" 

3.4. "BARBÈS DON'T PANIC:"  

3.4.1. Back to the wine tax 

3.4.2. A dark forgotten past 

3.4.3. A métro station and a movie theater 

3.4.4. Toward La Goutte d'Or 

3.4.5. The media  

3.4.4. (Not very) threatening youth 

3.4.5. During Ramadan gourmet specialties line the tracks

3.4.6.Take another look 

3.5. THE UNHAILED ENERGIES OF LA GOUTTE D'OR

3.5.1. A setting of "Gauls:" Precious books / Monotheisms as their

founders intended / A shoemaker transmits his craft / A school for 

knitwear design and techniques  /  Odd socks' comeback / Framing for neighbors and museums / An immigrant nourishes the ultimate 

French tradition    

 

3.5.2. Arts known mainly to neighbors: Inventiveness that brightened 

an ordinary street / Art links the neighborhood and kings in Africa  / 

Signs on park railings / Photography as singular as its site / Theater 

that makes the street the stage / Sculpture hovers over a washroom

 

3.5.3. First steps in another land: The neighborhood on a sunny 

afternoon / Trucks / An ebullient market / Vigor strides by / 

Detour: "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" / Street vendors flee 

when cops arrive / Shops where display does not matter

  

3.5.4. Appearance, a way to communicate: Making oneself a 

composition / Barbershops and beauty salons line the street / 

Young men's exuberant hair styles / How those coiffures and 

beards began / Hairdresser salons' good humor / Shops that  

continue the attention  / Africans' humanistic advertising / 

Detour: reinventing dandies / Detour: politicizing Black men's fashion 

 

 

3.5.5. Textiles and tailors: "Wax," a symbol of Africa / Plebeian  

prints gain their letters of nobility / Stores for wax, almost as 

present as barber shops / Shops for notions follow / Young 

tailors' energy / Embroidery, a royal ornamentation / Detour: for 

everything linked to sewing...

 

3.5.6. A couturier for Kenzo and Paco Rabanne: With his perfect 

French... / Sources of inspiration / The workshop / You may pass 

the workshop and not see it

 

3.5.7. Gentrification with brakes: Empty lots and new building /

Unfortunate: A Moroccan restaurant changes hands  / Unfortunate: 

fast food replaces a convivial bar / Traditional and gourmet shops intertwine / Social services, key to the mix

 

3.5.8. "The emerging design hub of Paris:" "An Afro brand out to 

conquer the world" / Detour: African market signs / Detour: Ads 

with a different  message / An African concept store / Madame 

Touré's fashion / The Catholic fabrics of a "child of God" 

3.6. Suddenly visible Blacks: 

3.6.1. The city honors heroes of color

3.6.2. "Chocolat," the first Black star 

3.6.3. France has welcomed African- Americans since World War I..

3.6.4. The "Négritude" movement shows wider appreciation 

3.6.5. Offspring of immigrants acknowledged at last 

3.6.6. Ads reveal the shift 

3.6.7. Questioning ads' racial mix

 

3.7.  Africans' exuberant creativity: 

3.7.1. At the markets 

3.7.2. Foire d'Afrique  

3.7.3. A trade show 

3.7.4. Ignorance of The New York Times

 

 

3.8. Tomorrow's destination?   

3.8.1. A métro renovation for tourism? 

3.8.2. The Barbès hub 

3.8.3. The métro station itself 

3.8.4. 1920's movie theater at the Barbès station too  

3.8.5. The wash house that literature immortalized 

3.8.6. The Institute for the Cultures of Islam  

3.8.7. Detour: a reply to MAGA on Islam 

3.8.8. World and urban culture for the planet? 

3.8.9. A portal toward the music of the outskirts

 

3.9. A place that Gertrude Stein would have appreciated: 

3.9.1. A take out... 

3.9.2. A picnic in a park where sculpted figures play  

3.9.3. At a time when the public valued only classic works...

IV.
WHY IS A CITY WITHOUT NATURAL BEAUTY 

SO GRAND? 

4.1. MAJESTY ON A HUMAN SCALE, FORGOTTEN GIFT OF KINGS

4.1.1. A parade route changes course: From "joyous" to "royal" entry /  

The path that linked kings with their ancestors / The importance of 

the Saint-Denis Basilica / The church where "Gothic" architecture 

began / Detour: right-wing extremists use medieval imagery  / 

France's first straight street and point of focus / Drop the ancestors, 

hail power  / Revolt at La Bastille  / Detour: Love wins out  —  alas

Illustration by Maurice Leloir in Le Roy Soleil, a history book for children, 1931

 

4.1.2. The milestones and their meanings: Paris's first street and 

point of focus / The "place" that is ancestor of all / The successive 

statues of place des Vosges  / A church that changes the way 

to salvation / A royal statue for a bridge / The king among his people

 

4.1.3. A design inconceivable elsewhere: Demolishing the city wall 

announced hegemony / The Boulevards that replaced it gave access 

to Versailles / Louis builds an arc of triumph on the main gate's site /

It announces three centuries of calamity / Now the arches hover 

like ghosts over the traffic

 

Claude Abron

 

4.1.4. The royal imprint blossoms: Straight streets and monarchy /

Napoleon's tomb, built for Louis XIV / Royal places multiply / At the 

last royal place, change begins

4.1.5. The curtain falls on traditional monarchy: A queen breaks rules

that she does not understand  / "Ah yes, tell us about it, vicomte!"  /   

"Let them eat cake" / A bubblehead rises to the occasion /  

"Bonjour Sire!" /  The greeting that announces calamity / The 

 disastrous flight revisited: the guards' / yellow liveries / End of the  

1500 year old monarchy 

4.1.6. "I have no tears left to cry:"  Panic and massacre / "The Temple," 

a prison that could have been worse / Disasters / Marie-Antoinette

attains grandeur / Louis XVII, a story that has no end / The Obelisk 

announces a new era  / How France became a republic  / French 

Presidents, heirs of kings 

                                                                                       

4.1.7. A modern royal city: The Grand Axis as model / Perspectives,

key to the city's grandeur / "Places" stay royal / Detour: the violent 

imagery of victors on horseback  / Detour: heroes on white horses 

 

4.1.8. HAVE THE KINGS BECOME SUBVERSIVE?  A new society 

creeps in /  Goddesses hover over the city / Kings and globalization 

 

Pamela Spurdon

 

 V.

CRADLE OF UPHEAVAL:

HOW FEAR OF INSURRECTION

 EXTENDED THE BEAUTY THE KINGS BEGAN

 

5.1. History's tangible base :   

5.5.1. An account that makes no sense  

5.5.2. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity lets capitalism take wing 

5.5.3. The Revolution of 1830, capitalism's forgotten triumph 

5.2. 1830, the peopled fooled:  

5.2.1.Social classes whose goals diverge

5.2.3. Faceless poor and bourgeois heroes 

5.2.4. More on bourgeois heroes 

5.2.5. An intelligent ogre checks in 

5.2.5. Liberty's great painting, fervent and ambiguous  

5.2.6. The Arc de Triomphe's lame homage to the plebes 

5.2.7. The July Column, as evasive  

5.2.8. Victor Hugo's "Time of Riots"   

5.2.9. Algeria enters France's conflicts

 

5.3. 1848, the people fooled again 

          5.3.1.Insurrection by accident 

5.3.2. Schism looms  

5.3.3. Popular discipline terrifies 

5.3.4. The Parisian upheaval overwhelms Europe  

5.3.5. Feudal rulers emerge still stronger

5.4. Workers' first conscious revolt brings Europe's first great

massacre:  

          5.4.1. A republic for the happy few 

5.4.2. A workers' revolt announces the future 

5.4.3. The right changes too: Provincial nobles answer the call  

5.4.4. Young delinquents joyously join in 

5.4.5. Empathy from a countess alone   

5.4.6. The uprisinhg brings Europe's most authoritarian regime 

 

  The Barricade of rue de la Mortellerie, June 1848 by Ernest Meissonnier / zoom

5.5. The City Museum & the insurrections:     

5.5.1. A spectacular homage to elites  

5.5.2. A French Revolution that that is almost peaceful 

5.5.3. The 19th-century insurrections before the renovation  

5.5.4. 1830: Capitalism wins and elegant fighters replace plebeians...

 

 Musée Carnavalet

5.5.5. February 1848: Furniture replaces humble fighters

5.5.6. June 1848: a single sentence at the back of the floor

5.5.7. Barricades, a game for kids

5.6. FEAR, UNLIKELY PROMOTER OF URBAN GRANDEUR

       

5.6.1. The metamorphosis seen up close: "An ounce of 

prevention:" churches and a park / Open the town to the army / 

Three huge spaces to assemble troops / The fountain where 

the Emperor crushes Socialism / The new arteries' military 

purpose / A "masterly line" cuts through the working-class east / 

Blue-collar neighborhoods' vast open spaces / Huge "places" 

and power symbols / The exception across the river /  

At Notre-Dame Cathedral repression replaces eternity / Planning 

Latin Quarter  bombardment has happy results / The hospital garden 

5.6.2. Gifts of the repression: Adapting royal majesty /  

Other kinds of beauty / Progressives hijack streets and spaces /  

Space meant for an army is used for a market

VI.

THE CHANGES TURN OUT TO BE USELESS:

LA COMMUNE

6.1. EGALITARIANISM BREAKS THROUGH

          Proclamation of La Commune, March 26 1871, anonymous engraving / zoom

6.2. "The terrible year," 1870-1871 

 6.2.1. A war of choice brings disaster: "To Berlin!" cry Parisians /  

Hallucinations of an enclosed population / Treason? / Tensions 

rise / The Guard becomes a counter-power / Cannons the army neglects / 

 Prussians parade but guards steal the show / The  Assembly pours oil 

on the fire / The cannons on the hills  

 

6.2.2. Explosion: "Betrayed!"/ Love humanizes a an icon / Crowd 

and soldiers fraternize  / An unaware general steps into the fray /  

Commemorations of the right and the left / Thiers flees /  

A visionary future   

 

6.2.3. Civil war and carnage: The humble against the powerful /  

The slaughter of the wretched / Escape by socializing with the 

enemy /The Latin Quarter after victory / The fate of a political painter / 

 Soldiers whom officers mistrust / The officers' responsibility / 

The adversaries / Parisian sequels / The past sways pop culture: 

Piaf and Sinatra 

 

The Call by André Devambez, 1906, based on the memories of his father and survivors / zoom

6.2.4. Ruins, revenge and evolution: The inferno in context /  

The sacred hilltop /  The "Acropolis of the Revolution" / The church of vengeance / Changed threat, changed city / The Sacré-Coeur frightens,  

Sainte-Anne heals / The "chocolate façade"

6.2.5. Mystification, old-school and now: A firing squad that makes 

no sense / Versaillais propaganda that tells (part of) the truth / 

 "The hostages of rue Haxo," the other publicized killing / Catholic 

martyrs whom even the Church forgets / Whose violence? The comeback 

of the Versaillais myth / Schoolbooks buttress the individual to erase 

the group / The City Museum before renovation (in 2016-2022)... /  

And after it /  "To the victors / belong the spoils" /  Two historians fight back 

6.2.6. Fraternity that worked: Pariahs take charge of their lives / Leaders 

we wish we had / Victories of  La Commune / A rooted memory /  

"Friends of the Paris Commune"

Musée Carnavalet (not exhibited)

6.2.7. An omen and a turning point:  A foretaste of genocide / Toward the 

20th century

VII.
A COMMUNARD BASTION,

THE OVERLOOKED 13TH DISTRICT

7.1. The fight for the hilltop 

7.1.1.Frenzied combat  

7.1.2.Communard fighters

7.1.3. A panel does mention La Commune... 

7.1.4. The Communard spirit continues 

7.2. An epicenter of misery 

7.1.2. "A lost district at the city's edge"  

7.1.3. Disease, crime and revolt 

7.1.4. Vanished industry

7.1.5. A third-world revolutionaries' training ground

7.1.6. A walk through an outskirt that used to be chilling

 

 VIII.

A PAST THAT IS FORGOTTEN YET INDELIBLE

 

8.1. In the footsteps of "demons:" 

8.1.1. The church where the last battle was fought 

8.1.2. The passage by which survivors fled 

8.1.3. City-run residencesfor seniors and the handicapped

8.1.4. Sculptures. Bikes. Gyms. Gardens 

8.1.5. More social services, gardens and local engagement 

8.1.6. Electoral posters in a genuine (political) democracy

8.2. Small businesses that Communards would have valued 

8.3. Lost industry's traces: 

8.3.1. Gardens replace a sugar refinery 

8.3.2. A giant park on a gas-making site 

8.3.3. Posters on park railings

8.4. A cluster of unstandardized arts

8.4.1. Giant murals announce the 13th 

8.4.2. Messages cheer gray winters

8.4.3. Arts that City Hall promotes 

8.4.3. Arts discovered by chance

 

District web site

8.5. A district that leans left: 

8.5.1. Part of the Social-Democratic City /

8.5.2. Posters and signs / 

8.5.2. The May Day parade begins at the 13th's City Hall

8.6. Paris's latest festival, "Treizième" (Thirteenth"): 

8.6.1. A banquet under the aerial métro

8.6.2. Asians launch the fête

8.6.3. The arts through new techniques 

8.6.4. Silent movies in the park 

8.6.5. Ethnic dancers 

8.6.6. Drumming, dancing, Brazilian music, British jugglers 

8.6.7. Grand finale

     

8.7. More gifts from City Hall

8.8. A place to pitch your tent? 

  

IX. 

WHAT HAPPENED? THE WAR DID

9.1. "Better Hitler than Blum" (the Socialist Prime Minister of the 1930's)

9.2. Conservatives who joined the Resistance

9.3. "The future springs up from behind."

# # #

EPILOGUE

"DON'T YOU HAVE AN AGENDA?"

"YOU'RE TEACHING COMMUNISM TO THE POLICE!"

"YOU'RE MISLED BUT YOU'RE NOT BOUGHT.

JOIN US!"

*    *    *

The sequel, History from fresh perspectives,

 shows how placing events in their economic contexts

can transform their meanings

and gives a reason for the omissions mentioned here.

*    *    *

*    *    *

Next,

I.

What makes France unique?