A few weeks ago I visited La Bibliothèque Nationale to see an exhibition of early photography. Here’s a tip: you’re not allowed into the impossibly inspiring domed reading room without a reader’s ticket, but you can peek through the windows and if, as a voyeur like me, you get a thrill from sneaking unseen glances at people deep in thought through small high windows, architecture aside, you’ll find it worth the detour.
The labels next to the exhibits brought my attention to a French term which gives an insight into the French psyche. The photographs of fruit, grouped wine bottles, dead pike and such on a table, were all referred to as ‘nature morte’. These details of daily life (cut flowers, a cup just abandoned by the absentee user) are conceived as dead nature in French; the moment recorded is gone and withered, a romantic reminder that we are all heading in that same direction, whereas, ‘still life’ in English suggests a shared pause, a bridge between one moment in another time when the scene was recorded by the artist, and a moment taken now by the viewer to enter into the picture. For me this clear difference in the choice of description, is an indicator of the comparative pessimism and optimism of the French and English.
During my first year here in Paris I have witnessed displays of public crying no fewer than 10 times: Woken by a woman’s wailing in the street in the early hours: 3. Silent weeping on the metro: 2. Sniffy weeping on the metro: 1. Walking along crying openly in distress: 3. Standing by the tabac having a lovers' break up on a mobile phone, pleading with him not to leave, all red ringed eyes and uncontrollable snot: 1. As Lucy Wadham says in her book ‘The Secret Life of France’ the French want life to be constantly beautiful, therefore they cannot help but be disappointed. I, in my Anglo- Saxon way know that life is pretty ugly most of the time, so I am occasionally pleasantly surprised.
Because we English expect life to be miserable, we don’t have the taste for the ‘visual perfection’ kind of desserts that the French pâtissiers display like crafted jewels. We’re not interested in revering a damanding gâteau, some of which can cost a working man’s days wage, or a coquettish and high maintenance mille-feuille, which is lean and spiteful when you get under it’s corset! No, instead we go for the big, busty comforters, the girls we know and love, like a puffed up bread and butter pudding or a damson cobbler. These are puddings that hug you to them like a generous mother and indulge you in their comfortable familiarity, so that you leave them feeling well loved and happy, not toyed with, teased and spent.
Don’t get me wrong, I can wolf down six macaroons with a glass of Champagne in the afternoon as well as anyone, but however you flirt with it, a macaroon knows in its own bones that it ain’t no pudding. Watch them trying too hard, posing in their latest mode. Gold plated, or designer colour coordinated, a macaroon is still flighty, promising much but crumbling in the box or soggy by dawn.
If you want to cheer a French person up there is only one way to do it in my book. The wholesome, tooth licking love of a proper English pudding is hard to resist. Let them have a glass of Champagne, allow them to cry like rain on a dark day, then dab their eyes and sit them down to a bowl of warm Sticky Toffee Pudding with real Channel Island cream and watch their faces light up in the realisation that what you’ve been telling them all this time is true: Life really isn’t so bad after all.
The labels next to the exhibits brought my attention to a French term which gives an insight into the French psyche. The photographs of fruit, grouped wine bottles, dead pike and such on a table, were all referred to as ‘nature morte’. These details of daily life (cut flowers, a cup just abandoned by the absentee user) are conceived as dead nature in French; the moment recorded is gone and withered, a romantic reminder that we are all heading in that same direction, whereas, ‘still life’ in English suggests a shared pause, a bridge between one moment in another time when the scene was recorded by the artist, and a moment taken now by the viewer to enter into the picture. For me this clear difference in the choice of description, is an indicator of the comparative pessimism and optimism of the French and English.
During my first year here in Paris I have witnessed displays of public crying no fewer than 10 times: Woken by a woman’s wailing in the street in the early hours: 3. Silent weeping on the metro: 2. Sniffy weeping on the metro: 1. Walking along crying openly in distress: 3. Standing by the tabac having a lovers' break up on a mobile phone, pleading with him not to leave, all red ringed eyes and uncontrollable snot: 1. As Lucy Wadham says in her book ‘The Secret Life of France’ the French want life to be constantly beautiful, therefore they cannot help but be disappointed. I, in my Anglo- Saxon way know that life is pretty ugly most of the time, so I am occasionally pleasantly surprised.
Because we English expect life to be miserable, we don’t have the taste for the ‘visual perfection’ kind of desserts that the French pâtissiers display like crafted jewels. We’re not interested in revering a damanding gâteau, some of which can cost a working man’s days wage, or a coquettish and high maintenance mille-feuille, which is lean and spiteful when you get under it’s corset! No, instead we go for the big, busty comforters, the girls we know and love, like a puffed up bread and butter pudding or a damson cobbler. These are puddings that hug you to them like a generous mother and indulge you in their comfortable familiarity, so that you leave them feeling well loved and happy, not toyed with, teased and spent.
Don’t get me wrong, I can wolf down six macaroons with a glass of Champagne in the afternoon as well as anyone, but however you flirt with it, a macaroon knows in its own bones that it ain’t no pudding. Watch them trying too hard, posing in their latest mode. Gold plated, or designer colour coordinated, a macaroon is still flighty, promising much but crumbling in the box or soggy by dawn.
If you want to cheer a French person up there is only one way to do it in my book. The wholesome, tooth licking love of a proper English pudding is hard to resist. Let them have a glass of Champagne, allow them to cry like rain on a dark day, then dab their eyes and sit them down to a bowl of warm Sticky Toffee Pudding with real Channel Island cream and watch their faces light up in the realisation that what you’ve been telling them all this time is true: Life really isn’t so bad after all.