We Greeks have a reputation for being insufferable nationalists, most of whom genuinely believe that Greek culture is superior to that of other nations and peoples. We were even anointed the most culturally chauvinistic Europeans in a recent Pew survey. …
Interrailing wasn’t all sex and sunshine
My school days were plagued by the annual July ritual of the French mistress asking each girl in turn, “Comment vas-tu passer tes vacances?” I grew up in Kent’s gin-and-Jag commuter belt, so Italy, Spain and France were favoured destinations. …
The long march of the French Left
In the hit French television series, Le Baron Noir, unifying the Left is the holy grail of the main protagonist, Philippe Rickwaert. His main obstacle is Michel Vidal, the vain and uncompromising founder of Debout le Peuple, determined to steal …
Macron’s tormented second term
Chartres, Eure-et-Loir
The young parliamentary candidate strides down the street looking for people who are local and over 50. I follow. We meet mostly Americans, Germans, Italians, Dutch, Britons.
“See, we have been invaded by foreigners,” jokes Ladislas Vergne, 30, …
The paranoia of French politics
In rural France there are strict rules about dinner party chat. No politics, no religion, no work. The safe topics are the production of artisan goat’s cheese, floods or droughts, and the career of Rafael Nadal, who, despite being born …
France is desperate for a king
When it comes to longevity of reign, one European monarch eclipses even Elizabeth II. Louis XIV took the throne in 1643 aged four and departed it 72 years later in 1715 (gangrene had ravaged his leg, thus beating various unmentionable …
Does France need a Prime Minister?
Two parliamentary candidates met the other day on the street of my nearest town in Normandy. Both first-time campaigners: one a politics student, aged 22, at the University of Caen; the other 61-years-old and already running the country.
I happened …
The failure of May 1968
“What defines our public life today is boredom”. That was a Le Monde front-page headline in March 1968. Two months later, a revolution would erupt that would shake the foundations of the Fifth Republic, divide France, and alter its history …
Can Mélenchon unite the French Left?
Every so often, the French like to scare themselves. They convince themselves that the political consensus of the past six decades is about to be torn apart. This year is no different.
A month ago, the opinion polls suggested that …
Humans are born to hunt
You are never closer to nature than when you pick it or kill it. I once spent a year living wild, eating only what I could hunt and gather on 40 acres of remote Herefordshire, where England ends in Wales. …
The man who could topple Macron
For a President who’d scored a decisive re-election in a country that supposedly wanted him out, out, OUT!, Emmanuel Macron’s Sunday night victory party on the Champ de Mars, in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, was not just low-key; …
Why Macron is invincible
The crowd that gathered last night on the Champ-de-Mars, underneath the Eiffel Tower, to celebrate Emmanuel Macron’s re-election as President were waving flags — not all of them French. Half of the guests held aloft the blue-and-yellow banner of the …
Macron is the leader France deserves
When Charles de Gaulle, the man who invented the French presidency and still casts a shadow over his country’s politics, was 15, the teacher at his Catholic private school asked him to write an essay. The year was 1905, and …
France’s gerontocratic nightmare
The results of the first round of the 2022 French presidential elections give a surprising impression of order. Three poles, each with its own fairly simple socio-demographic and geographical structure, seem to emerge: the Macron vote, the Le Pen vote …
The Left should not vote for Macron
On May 6, 2017, the day Emmanuel Macron was elected president of France after trouncing Marine Le Pen, he made a promise to the French people: that the country would never again see a “far-Right” candidate reach the second round …
