Rue Rude

Beginning of World War I, a hundred years ago

Americans don't really pay much attention to World War I. We came in late to the war and lost few men compared to the other countries. But World War I was a great tragedy for Europe, and put an end to an optimistic era of belief in the unstoppable progress of civilization. European colonies saw their imperialist rulers tear themselves to pieces in the stupidest war in history, and knew they did not need to submit to this rule any longer. Germany and France and England lost a generation of young men. The English became pacifists. The French (most of World War I was fought in France) lost the will to fight for a generation. And the Germans, poor and suffering after the war like everyone else, but punished for starting it by crushing reparations in the Versailles treaty, began to accumulate resentments that culminated in Hitler and World War II. Here's a photo which someone realized included Hitler, celebrating the German declaration of war in Munich, in 1914: 

World War I: general mobilization in France, 1 August 2014

One hundred years ago today, France calls up all its young men. In the next four years, ten percent of the population of France died in World War One.

11th November 1918: "The sudden silence was the voice of God"

The great bell of Notre-Dame de Paris, Emmanuel, rang for eleven hours straight to proclaim the joy of the end to the First World War

I will come to a time in my backwards trip when November eleventh, accidentally my birthday, was a sacred day called Armistice Day. When I was a boy... all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month. It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the Voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind. Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not. So I will throw Veterans' Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don't want to throw away any sacred things.

  --Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) in Breakfast of Champions (1973)

The cowardice of the ... Americans

For once, I have nothing to say. I just find this too annoying, stupid, boring, and wrongheaded for words.
[Edited: Just to make it clear, I got tired of seeing this posted on Facebook as a "joke." No, it is not a real MSNBC screenshot. But you knew that!]

Considering how every further intrusion into Americans' privacy by the TSA, the Department of Homeland Security, and drones, is welcomed by Americans frightened of terrorism, and considering how the Civil War is still a subject of fascinated horror for American hobbyist historians because of its gruesome death toll*, and considering how no invaders have ever seriously threatened the mainland U.S.A. since the Revolution, I think it's pretty ridiculous for Americans to post obnoxious stuff about a country that fought three wars on its own soil in 70 years against a bigger, more populous neighboring country. Unlike Americans, older French people actually have experienced war in their homelands. Maybe that's why they're so rarely pro-war.

Next time you hear that nonsense, say something.

*less than one-fifth of the percentage of casualties suffered by the French in World War I

The dogface who changed his name

I met a man with a name that looked French, but it was pronounced completely differently. "What kind of name is that?" I asked.

"It's originally French," the man said. "It used to be pronounced [French pronunciation]. But my father was in D-Day and he was so disgusted with the French attitude that when he came home, he changed it to [the English way it is pronounced now]."

"What did the French do?" I asked. I was really surprised, because on the whole, even French people who don't like the U.S. acknowledge the heroism and importance of the D-Day invasion.

"They were just really, really unwelcoming," the man said. I wonder what more there was to this story.

A bomb from World War I

Did you know that Paris was bombed in World War I? I passed this on the street yesterday.  It says "Bomb from an airplane."

Armistice Day, 2011: the Great War Museum (Musée de la Grande Guerre) opens in Meaux

Nine million people died, twenty million were wounded, seventy million people were involved in the Great War, most of which was fought on French soil. France lost ten percent of its population. One million men died at Verdun. Lest we forget.

Update. A new World War museum, the Musée de la Grande Guerre, has just opened in the town of Meaux, an hour's drive east of Paris (close to Paris Disneyland). It comes from the large collection of a single man, Jean Pierre Verney, who became interested in the war back in the 1960s, when World War I artefacts were cheap. The collection was eventually bought by the government for 600,000 euros-- far less than it is worth; a foreign museum had offered 2,000,000 euros, but Verney wanted to keep it in France-- with the proviso that a museum would be built to house it. The museum opened on November 11, 2011 (11-11-11). According to the Parisien, the largest display window shows American troops.

As usual the intellos rushed to get their digs in. World War I historian Annette Becker called Mr Verney a handyman who collected bric-à-brac. Le Monde complained that the museum was old-fashioned, "a museographic curiosity that one would have thought was now in the past"  (it has scenes with mannequins and trenches, dioramas and real uniforms), and "is this the best way to show the horror of war?" The writer did not propose another way: possibly he thinks everyone should just read a book.

When Yankee Doodle learns to parlez-vous français

 
My Cajun, French-mother-tongue grandfather was one of the youngest American soldiers of World War I. When he found out I was moving to France, he said, "What do you want to go there for? It's a trashy place." He added that everyone wore wooden shoes.

He fought at Château-Thierry, was badly wounded, spent months in the hospital near Bordeaux, and corresponded for years with a French girlfriend, whose letters to him we found after his death, tied up with a ribbon and carefully preserved all those years. (I was asked to translate them for the family. Unfortunately, the girl's letters were not only quasi-illiterate but stupefyingly boring. She must have been very pretty.)

American society was permanently changed by the doughboys coming back from France. How you gonna keep them down on the farm, after they've seen Paree?

When Yankee Doodle came to Paris town
upon his face he wore a little frown
To those he'd meet upon the street,
he couldn't speak a word
To find a Miss that he could kiss
it seemed to be absurd.

But if this Yankee should stay there awhile
upon his face you're bound to see a smile.
Soon Yankee Doodle he left Paris town,
upon his face there was a coat of brown,
For every man of Uncle Sam was fighting in a trench,
between each shell, they learned quite well
to speak a little French.

When Yankee Doodle gets back to Paree,
he'll break a million hearts take it from me.
When Yankee Doodle learns to parlez-vous français,
parlez-vous français, in the proper way,
he will call each girlie "Ma Chérie."
To every Miss that wants a kiss
he'll say Oui, oui
on ze be, on ze bou,
on ze boule, boulevard.
With a girl, with a curl, you can see him promenade
when Yankee Doodle learns to parlez-vous français,
"Oo-là-là, sweet Papa"
he will teach them all to say.

  --Words from International Lyrics Playground

The Pioneers of the French Foreign Legion

The French Foreign Legion is one of the most legendary corps of soldiers in the world. It still accepts men from everywhere, and in the past was known for taking you no questions asked; men were even required to take a new identity. Its motto is Legio Patria Nostra, "the Legion is our country." After serving in good standing, they were eligible for French citizenship.

The Legion today is still far more flexible than anywhere else in the Western military. Its requirements now include psychological tests to make sure you're not a psychopath, and your teeth, eyes and general health must be in good condition. Felons are "generally" not allowed to serve, but motivation is considered and the "recruitment" section of the website says that candidates are interviewed to "learn if your past is acceptable in relation to the Legion." 

The Pioneers of the Legion lead the Legionnaires march in the Bastille Day parade (which by the way is never called Bastille Day in France: it's the Quatorze juillet) and their getup is extraordinary, as you can see here. They have beards, wear buffalo-leather aprons and carry an axe over their shoulders. They were the sappers, first into combat, and originally the leather apron served to protect them from splinters of wood as they hewed down the barriers of the foe. Don't mess with them!

What made me write this post was hearing their song on the radio this morning. I heard it while I was talking and thought "What?"

Tiens, voilà du boudin,voilà du boudin, voilà du boudin
pour les Alsaciens, les Suisses et les Lorrains,
-- pour les Belges y en a plus, pour les Belges y en a plus,
ce sont des tireurs au cul.*

Look, here's sausage, here's sausage, here's sausage
for the Alsatians, the Swiss and the Lorrains
--none for the Belgians, none for the Belgians
they're ass-savers."

You can hear the song here and another translation with an explanation is here. As the Radio France Info website puts it, "every French male has one day or another had occasion to sing it."

The real Papillon (translation of newspaper article)

Today there was an article in Le Parisien (my favorite newspaper!) about an old man who claims to be the real Papillon, inspiring the movie with Steve McQueen. I was a fan of the book, genre Escape From Devil's Island, so here goes! A real-life story that is like one from the movies.

The former convict who says he was Papillon

Domont (Val-d'Oise)

His hands gripping his wheelchair, Charles Brunier does not really understand why he is dressed up to come out of his room, yesterday morning, at the nursing home Orpa-Val-de-France in Domont (Val-d'Oise). This  ex-con has been in  peaceful retirement here for the past 12 years.  Solitary, the  old man of 104 has no more family and never receives any visitors. He affirms that he is the man who inspired Henri Charrière, author of the celebrated Papillon, who, he says, stole his identity. Yesterday, Léon Bertrand, the Minister of Tourism, came to see him. The minister wanted to bring up the memory of his grandfather, Bertrand Lucien, who was a convict in the prison of Cayenne in French Guyana. "Perhaps he knew him," says Léon Bertrand.

Charles Brunier was behind bars for fifteen years in the Cayenne prison, which closed its doors in 1953 after having taken in almost 70,000 prisoners in a hundred years. He does not remember the minister's grandfather. However, he has not forgotten the jails of Saint-Laurent-de-Maroni, the violent behavior of the prison guards, "and especially the mosquitoes." There he became acquainted with Henri Charrière, who became famous under the name of Papillon [butterfly], the title of his autobiographical bestseller of 1969.

But Charles Brunier, his old companion from prison, claims and has always claimed that all Charrière did was take Brunier's own story as his inspiration for the book. Brunier's story is rich in comebacks. Enlisted in the Navy at the age of 17, he succeeded, with some other men, in rescuing an encircled unit during the campaign in Syria. On that occasion he saved the life of a lieutenant before being wounded himself, deeds which earned him the Croix de Guerre. A few years later, he stumbled. In Troyes (Aube), after meeting a prostitute who proposed to work for him, he stabbed and wounded the girl's pimp, a certain Chopette, during a fight in a bar called the Mauvais Garçons [the Bad Boys]. Condemned to forced labor for life for the murder of an old lady in 1923, he was sent to the prison colony.

A tattoo on his shoulder

Charles Brunier, who called himself "Johnny King" in the prison colony, managed to escape three times. During the Second World War he enlisted as a fighter pilot in Mexico, where he had taken refuge after his second prison escape. For two years he hunted German submarines in the Caribbean, before continuing the war in Africa. After being decorated a second time in Brazzaville, in the Congo, by General De Gaulle in person, Charles Brunier took part in the Allied invasion of Italy. He finished the war as an adjutant-chef [roughly equivalent to a U.S. sergeant major or British warrant officer]. This did not keep him from being sent back to the prison colony in Guyana. It was not until June 12th, 1948, that the President of the Pardon Commission gave him a complete pardon "because of his skilled conduct during the course of the hostilities."

On his return to France, Charles Brunier settled in Domont, where he lived peacefully among neighbors who knew nothing of his past. During his free time, the former Convict 47355 built model ships, which he still keeps safe in his room at the nursing home. In spite of his 104 years, Charles still has a bright eye and can express himself, "but only when he feels like it," says the nursing-home staff.  Yesterday, he did not feel much like it. He found  it "incredible" that the grandson of a convict could be a minister-- he, without a family, who fought for many years in vain to clear his name, "to give an honest name" to the woman he loved. But he did not say a word about his own history.

The story of Henri Charrière, who died in 1973 at the age of 67, has been subject to controversy for a long time. In his book Papillon épinglé [Butterfly pinned down] (published in 1970 by Presses de la Cité), Gérard de Villiers, the creator of  SAS [a James-Bond-style detective-novel hero], noted anomalies. "Not everything is false, but most of the adventures happened to others, not to Papillon, and sometimes years earlier," he said. These accusations were confirmed by a former prison guard. In a 24-page report addressed to the Ministry of Justice in December 1969, he said, "On can affirm that Charrière credited himself with adventures he imagined or which happened to other people." Coincidence or not, Charles Brunier has many tattoos on his body, among them a butterfly, and his left index finger is atrophied. Two distinctive marks of the most famous of convicts.

        --by Eric Delporte and Olivier Sureau

FACTS

--May 31 1901. Charles Armand Brunier born in Paris, 16th arrondissement [tiens tiens!]

--1918.  Enlisted in the Navy, he is decorated with the Croix de Guerre for military deeds in Syria.

--July 17, 1923. Condemned to forced labor for life for murder, grand theft, blows and wounds. He is sent to the prison colony in Guyana.

--1925. First attempted escape. He tries again in 1926, then in 1928. With four other convicts, on a tiny boat, he reaches the coast of Venezuela. He is recaptured in Bogotá, Colombia, and sent to the Îles du Salut [Health Islands!], from which he tries to escape in 1936.

--June 18, 1940.  He listens to the appeal of General De Gaulle while in a Mexican tavern, where he had found refuge after a new escape in 1939 aboard a canoe. He enlists in a commando unit and becomes a fighter pilot.

--1942-1945. His conduct during the African campaign (Chad, Senegal, Mauritania...) earns him the honor of being decorated by General De Gaulle. Still being sought as an escaped convict, he is sent back to the prison colony.

--June 12, 1948. The Pardons Committee grants a pardon to Charles Brunier "because of his skillful conduct during the course of the hostilities."

--1969. Publication of the book Papillon, written by an ex-convict, Henri Charrière. The book sells 250,000 copies.

--1973. The film Papillon comes out, starring Steve McQueen. New triumph.

--December 1993.  Charles Brunier enters the nursing home Orpa-Val-de-France, in Domont.