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A review by crankylibrarian
France: A History: from Gaul to de Gaulle by John Julius Norwich
3.0
It requires a foolhardy self-confidence to condense 2000 years of history into a mere 400 pages; to do so with clarity, charm and a slightly salacious sense of humor borders on genius. Norwich's quip worthy “political history” is a mad dash through France’s Greatest Hits: Charlemagne, Joan of Arc, Francis I, Henri IV and his one mass, a succession of Louis, The Revolution, Napoleon, Dreyfus, The Somme, Vichy, De Gaulle, and The Resistance. While he offers helpful guidance on the fractious political squabbles among Valois and Bourbons, Jacobins and Royalists, and pro and anti Dreyfusards; he is far more interested in personalities than politics. Hence his focus on the two larger than life rulers who defined French cultural dominance:
But civilization, must in the long run, be more important than economics...No civilization obviously can be ascribed to a single man or even to a single cause but the fact that France’s two highest points to date coincides with its two most dazzling rulers, Francis I and Louis XIV surely suggests that there may be some connection; that the effulgence of a great monarch may somehow fertilise and irradiate the genius of his subjects. (p. 174)
Perhaps...although the epilogue’s racist lament for culturally improving colonialism gives one pause, as do the multitudinous and admiring asides about royal mistresses, making this the rare historical monograph with R rated footnotes. You will learn a lot from this book, but as with such Gallic delicacies as snails and raw oysters, it leaves one feeling a bit queasy.
"I drove along the the West African coast from Abidjan to Lagos. Though Independence had come it was still very much the colonial world..The difference between Ghana and Nigeria (formerly British) and the others (formerly French) was astonishing. In Abidjan and Lome (Togo) I had delicious lunches of truite aux amandes the trout having been flown in from Marseilles the night before; there were delightful cafes populated largely by the French who had stayed on sipping Pernods and Camparis in their immaculately cut shirts and shorts. And how well I remember my spirits dipping as I approached the Nigerian frontier, staffed by an enormous Nigerian lady in bulging khaki uniform, sitting at a rickety wooden table ringed with circles left by brimming tankards--she was halfway through one herself-- and doing the football pools. Oh, dear, I thought , oh dear."
But civilization, must in the long run, be more important than economics...No civilization obviously can be ascribed to a single man or even to a single cause but the fact that France’s two highest points to date coincides with its two most dazzling rulers, Francis I and Louis XIV surely suggests that there may be some connection; that the effulgence of a great monarch may somehow fertilise and irradiate the genius of his subjects. (p. 174)
Perhaps...although the epilogue’s racist lament for culturally improving colonialism gives one pause, as do the multitudinous and admiring asides about royal mistresses, making this the rare historical monograph with R rated footnotes. You will learn a lot from this book, but as with such Gallic delicacies as snails and raw oysters, it leaves one feeling a bit queasy.
"I drove along the the West African coast from Abidjan to Lagos. Though Independence had come it was still very much the colonial world..The difference between Ghana and Nigeria (formerly British) and the others (formerly French) was astonishing. In Abidjan and Lome (Togo) I had delicious lunches of truite aux amandes the trout having been flown in from Marseilles the night before; there were delightful cafes populated largely by the French who had stayed on sipping Pernods and Camparis in their immaculately cut shirts and shorts. And how well I remember my spirits dipping as I approached the Nigerian frontier, staffed by an enormous Nigerian lady in bulging khaki uniform, sitting at a rickety wooden table ringed with circles left by brimming tankards--she was halfway through one herself-- and doing the football pools. Oh, dear, I thought , oh dear."