France

Letter From Lille: Echoes of '68

Marc Perelman

France has by far the most vibrant revolutionary left in Western Europe.
Fly Papers

Lorna Scott Fox : Fiction

An English translation of Lydie Salvayre's The Power of Flies demonstrates how this novelist and practicing psychiatrist has earned more nervous respect than love in France.

2007

Terra Incognita

Ruth Scurr : History

A mosaic of anecdotes and historical snapshots surveys the sociological diversity of France, past and present.
Beyond the Veil

Laila Lalami : Civil Rights & Liberties

A new book examines headscarf hysteria and the politics of identity in contemporary France.
In Transports of Horror and Delight

Alexander Cockburn : Great Britain

On airports Heathrow and De Gaulle, bicycles and trains.
Playtime

Mark Polizzotti : Poetry

The Surrealist dissident Raymond Queneau turned his writings into a lab for his experiments, and the results are still exhilarating.
Du Côté de Chez Madame Defarge

Alexander Cockburn : Native Americans

These days, even London and Paris seem a bit like North Korea.
Dark Paradise

Charles Taylor : Fiction

A trilogy of hard-boiled detective novels set in Marseilles contemplates the ethnic turmoil in modern-day France.
Had She Lived

Byron Dobell : World War II

A painter explores love and loss in the iconic settings of postwar Paris.
Sarko's Gift to the Wealthy

Jordan Stancil : Foreign Leaders & Political Figures

France's new president has launched an assault on the welfare state.
Sarko vs. Ségo in France

André Schiffrin

French politics have been pushed to the right thanks in part to the neo-Fascist politician Jean-Marie Le Pen.
The French Connection

Jordan Stancil : Foreign Affairs

A new Reaganomics is taking hold in Europe, with grave implications for progressive politics everywhere.
Savage Wars of Peace

Ruth Scurr : Non-Fiction

Ruth Scurr reviews The First Total War, a study of Napoleonic France that illuminates the causes of all-out war.

2006

Crisis at Libération

K.A. Dilday : Corporate Media & Consolidation

Beset with financial woes, a labor-management power struggle and an aging leftist readership, the legendary French newspaper is on the brink of extinction.
French Lessons

Sunil Khilnani : Non-Fiction

The history of twentieth-century France depicts a struggle between the republican ideal of a unitary state and the shifting concerns of a pluralistic society.
The Book of Daniels

Christine Smallwood : Fiction

Michel Houellebecq's The Possibility of an Island has at last landed on American shores, along with Pierre Mérot's Mammals.
For Reasons of State

Lynn Hunt : History

Two new books on the French Revolution examine Robespierre's role in advocating terror as an instrument of government, raising compelling questions about state-sponsored terror in our own time.
'We Will Not Be Thrown Away!'

Angelique Chrisafis : Youth

Young rebels in France are fighting not for change but for the same rights their parents tried to secure during the 1968 student revolution.

2005

War of Words in France

Françoise Mouly : Migration & Immigration

As media attention focused on rampaging youths setting afire the poor suburbs of France, verbal conflagrations raged among politicians and elected officials on how to respond to the threat.
Why Is France Burning?

Doug Ireland : Migration & Immigration

Fires and rioting in France are the result of thirty years of government neglect and the failure of the French political classes to make any serious effort to integrate Muslim and black populations into the French economy and culture.
Six Days in Paris

Harry Braverman : Nation History

As hundreds of riots rock the cities and towns of France, the government imposed a curfew Tuesday and the French tried to make sense of the random attacks and acts of arson erupting all over the country. France has not seen such "civil unrest" since 1968, when students occupied the Sorbonne and spilled out into the Latin Quarter to push for university reform and protest the liberal establishment. The students launched nationwide labor strikes, and hundreds of students and police officers were hospitalized.
Can It Happen Here?

Richard Alba & Nancy Foner : Islam & Muslims

With religious school vouchers and public displays of the Ten Commandments on government monuments, the United States is following Europe's path to a melding of Christianity and the state. That's no way to instill loyalty among Islamic immigrants.
A Win for EU Democracy

Gary Younge : European Union

Voters in France and the Netherlands were right to reject the European Constitution.
Grand Illusion

Stefan Collini : Public Figures & Intellectuals