TOPICS:
I. What makes France distinct?
II. An unsuspected city: touristic sites revisited and others introduced. The trade route associated with royalty where every segment reveals the past (rue Saint-Denis) is an example.
III. Vitality on the other side of the tracks: creativity of "Gauls" and immigrants,
especially on the part-African neighborhood of La Goutte d'Or.
IV. Why is a place without natural beauty so grand? The forgotten gift of kings.
V. A city of revolt and massacre: the 19th-century insurrections, their permanent impact on the city and how they are viewed (or not).
VI. La Commune, whose young members left a blueprint for a genuinely democratic society before they were ferociously repressed.
VII &VIII: "The future springs up from the past:" The overlooked 13th district, site of La Commune's most desperate fighting, epicenter of industrialisation and misery, now a place of excellent social services and pivot of innovative arts.
IX. Epilogue
Each page makes a separate point. "Contents" lets you click on individual pages, "Menu" into chapters or sections. Both let you click and scroll down the main points, but don't go so fast that the ideas merge.
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| Harald Wolff |
Scrolling stops when the pages become too heavy to load so you end up clicking anyway, as you do for subsections. Clicking on the pages is the best way to use this blook, and scrolling quickly via the menu to return to particular information or pictures.
Palais-Royal, where the ideas of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity took wing.
2.2.2. A left-bank oasis evokes the recent past
Entry of Louis XI to Paris by Francis Tattegrain, 1889-90 / zoom
A 19th-century reconstruction. For images from the time, please click.
 | Execution of the Templars (cut), anonymous, 15th century / Heritage pictures, zoom
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Most medieval illustrations of ordeals show the presence of authorities, often with kings riding the symbolic white horse.
2.3.3. Erasing rebel neighborhoods
2.3.5. Louis XIV's arc looms over the route
Claude Abron
2.5. VISITS WITH KIDS (OR WITHOUT THEM)
Europe's main center for young men's casual clothes harks back to the Middle Ages.
Philip of France in Costume of Antiquity by Jean Nocret, toward 1650 / zoom
Louis XIV's younger brother dressed as a Roman general.
The backers' private salon is decorated by an orgy. Guides skip it. Few visitors notice.
A giant puppet in a parade on the northern fringe
An enclave / autonomy /inspiration of royal squares / a historical
panel that skips what counts
"Porte" (gate) de Choisy / The Arc of Fraternity / cultures intertwine
The other artery / Crossroad
French residents observe a Chinese New Year celebration.
2.4.4.c. First steps in another land
Making oneself a composition, an art that immigrants invent.
2.4.4.h. Social services, key to the mix
African elders ignore a trendy boutique. /
A street musician of La Goutte d'Or
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A history book for children, 1931
| Louis XIV's royal entry trumpets tougher monarchy by passing innovations.
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Claude Abron: photo taken from a helicopter
The line that stretches from palace to horizon symbolizes endless power.
Louis XIV in the courtyard of the Louvre, and an omnipresent giant ad
V. How fear of insurrection broadened the beauty the kings began
A passage that let the army invade working-class territory
The Barricade of Rue de la Mortellerie, June 1848 by Ernest Meissonnier / zoom
Painting from a sketch made on the spot.
La Commune acclaimed at City Hall
"The Call" by André Devambez, 1906, based on the memories of his father and survivors / zoom
Women meet during La Commune
The long, wide, straight street was built after the insurrection of June 1848 so that troops move arrive quickly to quell a future revolt. It also draws the eye to a church, which preached obedience in what was then the city's poorest district.
Plaque commemorating the site where a fighter for the Liberation of Paris was killed.
Leftist posters at the Olympiades métro, 13th.
Paris's May Day parade begins in front of the 13th's City Hall.
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shows how placing events in their economic contexts can transform their meanings and gives a reason for the omissions mentioned here. |
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1 comment:
Your breath of subject matter is well, breath taking! I am puzzling over your market for your life time of learning and critical thinking. This is not for the causual visitor to France. I do see that any serious student of France should find a place on their self for this work. Tour guide with a Ph.D. in history from Columbia....you are a most unusual tour guide; you are a guide to deeper thought and pondering. I move on to the next section, intrigued. Are you sure you did not major in economics?
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