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Tag: France

How France uncovered the mystery of the forbidden photos of Nazi-occupied Paris – NPR

“There was a small group of people who worked together and knew there was a kind of resistance through the pictures,” he says. But he says among the resistants at the store, there must have been at least one traitor, because in early 1943, someone denounced both Raoul and Marthe Minot in an anonymous letter to the police. […]

Broussard’s four-year investigation appeared as a series of articles in Le Monde in September. His stories recounting his sometimes frustrating search raised Minot out of obscurity. The late camera-slinging department store employee has now been officially recognized by the French government as a “résistant” — a high national honor — who died for France, bearing witness to the reality of Nazi Occupation.

France, history, photography, WW2

13/03/2025
Elegance and hustle – Aeon Essays

“Every newspaper, from the first line to the last, is nothing but a tissue of horrors. Wars, crimes, thefts, licentiousness, torture, crimes of princes, crimes of nations, individual crimes, an intoxicating spree of universal atrocity. And it’s this disgusting aperitif that the civilised man consumes at breakfast each morning … I do not understand how a pure hand can touch a newspaper without a convulsion of disgust.” […]

But French writers’ loathing of journalism was underlain by a fundamental tension: those who criticised the press most vehemently were themselves journalists, and their novels of journalism were typically published in the same newspapers they excoriated. Journalism and literature were so deeply entwined that newspapers became ‘the laboratory of literature’ throughout the long 19th century, generating new literary forms, such as prose poetry and the serial novel.

books, design, France, history, journalism, literature, media

20/01/2025
A miracle: Notre-Dame’s astonishing rebirth from the ashes – The New York Times

And wood rafters, protected by modern fire suppression systems, could last virtually forever. The original trusses had lasted for the better part of a millennium, the very definition of sustainable architecture. Restoring the roof would also enlist skilled carpenters, stone workers and artisans trained in ancestral techniques with roots in French and European history. Notre-Dame could help rejuvenate these fragile but precious crafts.

After Macron’s announcement, a French organization of artisans called the Compagnons du Devoir, dating back to the 12th century, began receiving thousands of applications. “In France, as in America,” one of its former leaders, Jean-Claude Bellanger, told me at the time, “those who go into manual trades today tend to be considered failures by the elites. Notre-Dame has reminded everyone that such work is a path to dignity and excellence.”

architecture, art, design, France, restoration

06/12/2024