Man of Steel (and Iron)

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Ah, Paris… The history! the art! the cafés! the romance of an evening stroll beside the Seine with the lights of the Tour Eiffel twinkling downstream! Unless, of course, you are among the artists, poets, and other French citizens of 1887 who were horrified to contemplete the erection of what one writer called “an odious column of bolted metal” that “even commercial America would not want on its soil,” and who together signed a paper protesting its construction.

Alexandre Gustave Eiffel (1832-1923) was born in Dijon, France, and after obtaining his baccalaureate came to Paris for further education. After the disappointment of rejection by the Polytechnique (take heart, aspiring applicants), he obtained a diploma in chemistry from the École Centrale de Paris and launched a career in metallurgy, a fortuitous choice at this exciting phase of the Industrial Revolution.

Eiffel was hired first to manage, then also to design, the construction of bridges. Within ten years he became an independent consultant and started his own company for the creation and construction of new large-scale iron and steel engineering projects. Because he was gifted as an engineer and construction manager, and the economy was booming, Eiffel was soon successful, rich, and in demand. He designed not only bridges but train stations, churches, lighthouses, palaces, and the armature for Bartholdi’s new Statue of Liberty. When a competition was held to design an iron tower for the Exposition Universelle de 1889, the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution, Eiffel’s design was chosen from the 107 entries. Despite the aforementioned protests, Modernists and Republicans (as opposed to Monarchists) viewed the project with enthusiasm.

Construction began in January 1887, and the increasing fascination of the steadily growing tower foreshadowed its future popularity. It was completed in twenty-six months without a single fatality, and as the newly tallest structure in the world immediately drew crowds of visitors. (Amazingly, the weight of the tower per square inch is no greater than that of a man sitting in a chair.)

Eiffel went on to design other projects, including an ill-fated Panama Canal venture in 1887 that, through no fault of his, collapsed due to financial mismanagement. Discouraged, he turned from construction to experimental research (another of his passions). Eiffel had planned in advance multiple functions for the new tower, and he began a series of aerodynamic, meteorological and radiotelegraphic experiments to be undertaken from its height. In 1898 an antenna was mounted for radio transmission.

Originally planned for removal after twenty years, by 1907 the tower had become far too useful and admired. A new generation of artists now celebrated the Eiffel Tower in paint and literature. Who can envision Paris without it? Of all Eiffel’s work, this tower that bears his name is probably the most beloved. Happy Birthday, Gustave Eiffel! What a gift you have given to painters, photographers, filmmakers and lovers.

This sketch is from our old neighborhood in Paris.

Veterans Day/Martinmas

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Today is Veterans’ Day, instituted first as Armistice Day after WWI, then Veterans’ Day after WWII (although my mother occasionally still called it Armistice Day) as a tribute to veterans of both world wars. It’s also the Feast of Martinmas, which is less well known in this country, although having been raised Catholic I grew up familar with the story of Saint Martin of Tours. It seems somehow fitting that Veterans Day is celebrated on the festival of a former Roman soldier.

Martin was born in the 4th century in what later became Hungary but what was then Pannonia, a province of the Roman Empire. His father, an important officer in the Roman army, naturally expected his son to follow in his footsteps (Martin had been named for Mars, the god of war, presumably to encourage that military spirit). But apparently young Martin was an easy-going, sociable fellow, more curious about strangers (and generous with handouts) than aggressive toward them, so to get him into the army his father arranged for his kidnapping and forcible enlistment by his soldiers, hoping that Martin would grow accustomed to military life through daily exposure. I bet Dad didn’t get many loving letters from the front. Today this method of recruitment is frowned upon.

However, there was Martin, a soldier at last, obliged to serve the Emperor for three years, outfitted with a Roman uniform and a sword. Even in the army, Martin was open-handed, and his military salary usually found its way into the hands of the unfortunate. His unit was sent to Gaul, as part of an ongoing attempt to civilize the native barbarians. Civilization in Gaul was eventually attained at a level far beyond their wildest dreams, but that’s another story.

One winter day, the story goes, Martin arrived at the gates of Amiens, where he encountered a poor ragged beggar shivering by the side of the road. Martin had already given away all his extra clothing, but, taking pity on the beggar, Martin unsheathed his sword and cut his warm woolen (army-issue, uh-oh) cloak in half and wrapped one half around him.

That night, Martin dreamed that Jesus appeared to him wrapped in Martin’s half-cloak saying, “Martin has covered me with this garment.” This made him determined to leave the army permanently, at the end of his term. When he attempted it, however (inconveniently during a barbarian invasion), he was accused of cowardice, in response to which he offered to advance alone against the enemy. Instead he was imprisoned. Eventually he was released at the conclusion of an armistice, and was finally able to pursue his vocation, settling in Gaul, founding an order, living very simply and developing a reputation for feeding the hungry and healing the sick.

Over the years our homeschooling group has celebrated Martinmas (sometimes in combination with Diwali, Festival of Light, which can occur at around the same time—this year it falls on the 12th) with storytelling, a night-time walk in the park carrying lanterns and singing songs about light, and afterward gathering to share dessert. Happy Martinmas! Happy Diwali! Happy Veterans Day, everyone!


Dans la rue

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Today is the birthday of Andre Malraux (1901-1976), writer, art historian, explorer of Indochina, anti-Franco fighter in the Spanish Civil War, member of the French Resistance, and France’s first Minister of Cultural Affairs, and it is in his honor that I post this sketch from his home town.

Youth is a religion from which one always ends up being converted.—Andre Malraux


Something there is that loves a wall

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I post this hastily drawn very poor sketch of my son in Paris in honor of King Philippe-Auguste of France (sorry, Your Majesty), whose birthday it is today.

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Years ago, when we lived in Paris, I encountered Philippe-Auguste (1165-1223) in a roundabout way, by means of the wall that he had constructed around the city for its protection between 1190 and 1215. The Gaulois had probably had a palisade around their village on the island of Lutetia (as Paris was formerly known), and a rampart certainly existed under Roman occupation of the Parisii as protection from barbarian invasion, but Philippe-Auguste’s wall was a great leap beyond these.

His wall, built of two outer walls of dressed stone and filled with rubble, grew to be twenty to twenty-five feet high and about ten feet thick at the base, with a walkway on the top, and along it were interspersed 77 towers and eleven gates (four more were added later). At the same time he built a fortress on the left bank of the Seine to defend from invasion by water. Little did Philippe know that one day eight million foreign invaders annually would traipse through his fortress (now greatly expanded in size and function) to stare at the Venus de Milo and the Mona Lisa.

People tended to build residences up against such city walls, making use of them for the back of the house. Voilà! one less wall to build! and a sturdy one besides!—trés commode. As the population grew, houses were also built up against the outside of the city wall (although citizens abandoned these homes and retreated within the walls during sieges). Eventually there were so many new people and structures that a new wall had to be built outside the old one. And so on.

Paris had a succession of these walls, a few reminders of which survive today. The Porte-Saint-Denis in the 10th arrondissement, for example, was built in 1672 to celebrate one of Louis XIV’s military victories. It actually replaced a medieval gate in the wall built by Charles V between 1364 and 1380 (one of the towers of which was the Bastille). But the medieval wall itself is long gone. Only Louis’ fancy newfangled gate remains to laud him and to recall the ghost wall. Some of the grand boulevards follow circuits of disappeared walls. But generally earlier walls were removed to make way for new construction.

But, because they tended to be incoporated into structures rather than replaced by roads, some fragments of Philippe’s 12th century wall survive. For some reason this wall has always fascinated me. Or, rather, what remains of it. Some is invisible, woven into the foundations of modern Paris (which exists above the level of the medieval city). But numerous fragments are visible, like this one on the rue Clovis, behind my son. Others can be found within buildings, down hallways, through shop windows. One lives in an underground parking garage, surrounded by Renaults and Peugeots. And a long stretch (now part of a lycée) stands on the rue des Jardins St.-Paul, and includes one of the 77 towers. There is a wonderful website with photos of these fragments.

Paris, like other continuously inhabited ancient cities of the world, is an architectural palimpsest, and perhaps that’s the source of fascination to one who grew up in an American suburb. Happy Birthday, Philippe-Auguste! You builded better than you knew.

St. Ronan

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There are probably a dozen St. Ronans, some Irish, some Scottish, all with different feast days. And the one I’m choosing actually had his feast day YESTERDAY, June 1, but that day was taken by John Masefield. So I’m noodging Ronan onto June 2nd. Being saintly, he surely won’t mind.

This St. Ronan was an Irish missionary who had left Ireland and lived in a forest overlooking the Bay of Douarnenez in Brittany, a location I would select myself if I were an Irish missionary. The story goes that his wife disliked his proselytizing among their Breton neighbors, so she accused him of being a werewolf. When you want to reform your husband, drastic action is required. But when Ronan was brought before the authorities, the nearby hunting dogs failed to attack him, thus proving his innocence. He went on to become a wandering healer of the sick and was buried in what is now Locronan.

What, you may ask, does this have to do with the picture above? Well…it’s a stretch, but the CD Lord Ronan’s Return (for which I painted this cover) was named for another wandering Ronan. And you can learn more about that one, as well as how to obtain this CD of lovely music by by Linn Barnes and Allison Hampton, by going to their website. Happy St. Ronan’s Day! (yesterday)

Memorial Day

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From my sketchbook. A visit to the gravesite in Epinal of my mother’s beloved, and only, brother, a pilot shot down over France in 1944.

Epinal

I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;
My county is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.

—William Butler Yeats
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One Small Step for l’Homme

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When I travel, I like to see what Mass is like in other places, especially in foreign countries, now that it’s no longer in Latin and I can listen to the local language. Even if I don’t speak the language, the structure of the service is familiar enough that I know what’s happening. I guess that’s part of the appeal of standardized religions. It’s like being a member of a club, and you get to participate as long as you follow the rules, learn the secret handshake, and wear the moose hat.

I did this sketch at a church in Epinal, France some years ago, and I post it here because it seemed suitable for today’s anniversary of the declaration of the Edict of Nantes in 1598. If this event does not leap out from the Renaissance history drawer of your brain, let me remind you.

In the 16th century, France was in the midst of its Wars of Religion. Just like many other nations whose boundaries we take for granted in our own lifetimes, “France” was an evolving entity torn by factions jostling for influence and supremacy, while ordinary peasants muddled along growing periodically-trampled cabbages as best they could. When the teachings of Martin Luther were introduced to France and were received with interest, even passion, by part of the population, it lit a fire in the hearts of others who (choose one):

a. were genuinely concerned about the immortal souls of these lost sheep.

b. feared the loss of power and riches that affiliation with the approved Catholic designation afforded them.

c. said, “Hey, here’s an opportunity to get rid of that rich relative/persistent creditor/tiresome spouse.”

d. foresaw that 36 years of people slaughtering each other and desecrating their forms of worship would be a jolly good way to spend their time.

(Answer is probably e.)

The Huguenots (French Protestants) and the French Catholics each spoke as if convinced of the one-true-faith-ness of their respective choices and sought not only to protect their own practices but to squash each others’ altogether. The neighbors were called in (Protestant England and Flanders; Catholic Spain and the Papal States) and arrived shouting, brandishing weapons, and eyeing the attractive lands near their borders. Numerous skirmishes, all-out battles, and horrible massacres alternated with periodic treaties and edicts which brought peace briefly and were then ignored.

Complicating this struggle was the irony that, not too far down the line of succession to the throne, was Henri of Navarre, a sword-wieldin’, skirt-chasin’, freedom-lovin’ mec* (worth an eventual post here) and a Huguenot himself. Catherine de Medici, mother of the young and unstable King Charles IX, was more practical than religious, and her principal aim was to keep control of France in her children’s hands. As what mother wouldn’t. She proposed a marriage between her beautiful daughter Marguerite and Henri of Navarre, and, despite disapproval from nearly everybody on both sides, the marriage took place in Paris. Followed immediately by the horrible St. Batholomew’s Day Massacre, the worst yet.

Henri was obliged to flee Paris, and when Charles IX died shortly thereafter, Henri had to fight his way back to Paris at the head of an army to be recognized as the new King Henri IV. He successfully conquered one region after another, but staunchly Catholic (or perhaps just relentlessly stubborn and contrary) Paris held out, eating rats du jour right through a siege, until Henri relented and decided to convert to Catholicism. This was not a big deal to him, as he had practiced both faiths while growing up depending on whether he was at court or at home. But it was a huge deal for the country, annoying both disappointed Protestants and skeptical Catholics.

Once he was ensconced, however, Henri showed the kingly stuff he was made of, launching a series of highly successful financial and agricultural reforms and huge public service projects. He then took the opportunity to enact what you, faithful reader (if you are still with me here), have followed this post so long to discover: THE EDICT OF NANTES, which authorized freedom of Protestant worship, the press, eligibility to public office (his brilliant finance minister was a Huguenot), and equal admission to schools, universities, and hospitals. It also authorized payment of Protestant ministers by the government. (This tolerance extended only to Protestants—forget Jews, Muslims, or atheists.) Simultaneously he allowed the previously exiled and troublesome Jesuits to return to France, taking one as his confessor. And he pardoned miscreants from both sides of the Wars of Religion. Thus Catholic and Protestant fanatics alike were infuriated.

But Henri’s intelligent policies and genial personality made him popular with ordinary folks, and France entered a new era of prosperity and relative tolerance that lasted until Louis XIV unwisely revoked the Edict of Nantes in 1685, resulting in a brain drain as thousands of Protestants took their skills and industry to friendlier locations. The 87-year period had been one step on the journey toward toleration of differences—a long and stumbling journey that, we must admit, is still in progress. Light a candle at dinner tonight in gratitude for each step.

*dude

Paris Memory

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This rather yellowed sketch is from a previous lifetime when my husband and I were first married and living in Paris, drawing, painting, sculpting. Before children. Before we became rather yellowed ourselves. I chose this particular walk down la rue des souvenirs, when we were temporary expatriates, in honor of Sylvia Beach (1887-1962), whose birthday it is today.

Beach was born in Baltimore, Maryland, and was actually christened Nancy, but she later changed it to a name she chose herself. There were generations of clergy and missionaries on both sides of her family, but Beach chose literary passion and Francophilia over religious fervor. Definitely similarities there though.

Perhaps she became a Francophile during her father’s assignment to the American Church in Paris when she was fourteen, because she returned to Paris later to pursue studies in French literature, and stayed for the rest of her life. Her research led her to a meeting, collaboration, and romance with Adrienne Monnier, who had in 1915 opened a bookshop-cum-lending library specializing in French translations of modern works. By 1921 Beach’s own shop, Shakespeare and Company, was installed across the street at 12, rue de l’Odéon, in the Latin Quarter, offering classical and modern literature and periodicals in English and English translations.

Shakespeare and Company quickly became one of the centers of the Paris literary world, with authors, poets, and readers wandering back and forth across the street between the two complementary shops (imagine!) to engage in discussion, exchange news, and borrow money (struggling writers being ever short-handed). But she was far more than a seller of books. Kind, cheerful, enthusiastic, and generous as well as learned, she took it upon herself to help aspiring writers succeed, introducing them to one another and to helpful contacts, taking them round to visit Gertrude Stein’s salon of poets and artists, organizing readings to bring their works before the public. She helped James Joyce and Henry Miller find publishers for their work, which was banned and unprintable in their native countries.

When the Germans invaded Paris in 1939, Beach was forced to close her shop and spent six months in an internment camp, afterwards hiding out with a friend (she was after all an enemy American) until the war’s end. The shop never reopened after the war, but a new version was launched in 1951 under the same name, with Beach’s permission, on rue de la Bûcherie (about which more in a later post).

Pretend you are a young, aspiring American writer on your first visit to Paris. Back on the farm they think you’re crazy. You wander into Shakespeare and Company and encounter Ernest Hemingway… F. Scott Fitzgerald… Ezra Pound. Miss Beach ropes you in to help edit press proofs. In the afternoon she takes you to the Steins’ to see the new work of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse and in the evening to admire Josephine Baker dancing at the Théatre des Champs-Elysées. Paris in the 1920s was a refuge from Puritanism, Prohibition, and Prejudice, and Sylvia Beach did her part to make it so. Happy Birthday, Patron Saint of the Independent Booksellers.

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