Basketball

The boy next door (17-ish) has been shooting baskets in the backyard for hours. Soothing sound, pock pock pock clatter pock pock pock clatter. Also the train whistle: we live now between two suburban stations, and it whistles, old fashioned train whistle coming and going. Should I mention the suicides? Maybe not. Pock pock pock clatter. People jogging along a creek. Mothers jogging with babies in jogging strollers, mothers biking, pulling babies behind in little carts. Pock pock pock clatter. It'll be dark soon.

CNN

The CNN coverage of the Paris attacks is obscene. In a half-hour segment last time while I was at the gym, their personable journalists played the latest home-video of the shooting over and over, without once engaging in a serious debate about anything. And there are several intelligent debates going on here, not least in the Comments/Reactions section of Le Monde. What seems to slip under the radar of US media is the long history of European anti-clericalism.

Nous

means "I" (further to previous post).

One of the interesting sidebars to the story of Charlie Hebdo is what mainstream newspapers, like Le Monde, The Guardian and The New York Times are saying and showing. Le Monde (Libération etc.) have the whole story. The NYT somewhat self-righteously (I thought) said right after the attacks that they weren't going to print those crude cartoons which, for the newspaper of reference, is quite a statement, as even their own lawyer said, according to an article a day or two after the attacks. I don't know if The Guardian published pictures of the controversial cartoons because I've been in transit, but today there are articles in both papers about this week's cover: The Guardian shows it, The New York Times does not--in a video of today's CH press conference about the new cover, the Times coquettishly shows only a corner of it, like a bit of--not much--leg. But they do pornography different in France too. 

My gut feeling is freedom of speech should be stood up for. Thanks, Guardian, thanks Le Monde, thanks to perhaps the mainstream European press in general. I'd like to hear about the NYT's editorial discussions on the subject.  

Ok, maybe it's fine they aren't getting involved. Probably better they weren't over-present in Paris on Sunday. 

BTW, how--in 50 words--did we get here? It's easy to see what went wrong in the 2000s, but without going back to the beginning of the 20th century, or to the colonial period, or the Bible, what happened in the 90s (Clinton's presidency) to bring on 9/11? 

Nous sommes Charlie

What can you say that hasn't been said, mostly with utter banality, before? 'Horrible, terrible, shocking, barbarity'? I am embarrassed to used those words. They are too much and not enough. More seemly to just shut up. Or be there--somewhere--with a pen or a sign. Charlie Hebdo represents a few centuries of fighting for and achieving freedom of speech--it's not some symbol of late capitalism. It's a right, it's human. It's something we can agree on without feeling squeamish. We can say 'we' without wanting to add 'but.' 

'Nous Sommes Charlie,' the Air France pilot said on the intercom, touching down at San Francisco International yesterday afternoon, after he hoped we'd had a good flight.

Packing

To get out the suitcases or not to get out the suitcases, that is the question. Wait till the last minute, which is tomorrow, and put off thinking about leaving for another day, or stumble over suitcases for an extra 24 hours, but pack more slowly?

Normally we'd only have hand luggage. But we are moving to a new-to-us condo and thought we might take: a few sheets and towels, books, sofa cushions, books, salad bowl, tea towels, books, napkins, pot holders, books, placemats, books, a winter coat, books...ie, some of all the things (books) that are more than we need in one place. The model sailboat my son built. Books.

Here's another Christmas photograph. The village is La Roque Alric, looking towards the Dentelles de Montmirail, a great climbing spot. We walk there several times a week, 3.5 km of fairly steep up and down. In autumn there are vineyards with grapes to glean. In winter the mistral can be fierce, but the Place de l'Eglise, when you get there, is sunny and sheltered. In fact, you never want to leave. On this day a woman came along with a key to the church and we were able, for the first time, to go inside. She was taking away some of the Christmas flowers.

Photos by François Brahic

Michael Hofmann in the LRB

My December 18 LRB turned up a little late, but just dove into Michael Hofmann's review of Flanagan's The Narrow Road to the Deep North. What a pleasure to read even if, like me, you know nothing about the book. Case made. Thanks.

I happened to be working on a review of something myself, which I almost binned, but settled for deleting all the adjectives.

Paris, Malaucène

Went to the Bibliothèque Nationale yesterday to see an exhibit of rare books, including some of Apollinaire's handwritten revisions of the first or second proof of 'Le poète assasiné.' And Mallarmé's extensive revisions on proof of 'Le coup de dès,' Proust's dedication of the first edition of "La Recherche' to a friend with whom he was less and less on good terms ("Chère Madame..."), a copy of a book Picasso illustrated and that he gave to Dora Maar, whom he portrayed as a harpie. Looking at the revisions of manuscripts and manuscript proof made me feel how improvised everything is, how open to change, how imperfect in its author's mind as it goes to press. Afterthoughts, afterthoughts, and then they come down to us as if engraved in marble.

Photo by François Brahic

The picture on the right was taken in the village of Malaucène, at the foot of the Mont Ventoux. It was Christmas Eve, about 6:30 pm, according to the clock up top, by the moon. Shops were closing. We'd stopped off after a hike on one of the Mont Ventoux trails (the GR4) to buy some last-minute gifts in a little bookstore, and some eau de lavande at the pharmacy.

Malaucène is one of the places cyclists begin or end their ascent of the Mont Ventoux, and it is also where Petrarch set off on his "Ascent of the Mont Ventoux" in (I think) 1336. The pharmacy is behind us in the photograph beside a mossy fountain, a butcher shop and a bike store; the bookstore is beyond the lit archway (the sign points to to it) in one of the narrow streets. Also behind us, on the main street, a supermarket, where we buy groceries.

The Persimmon Tree and the Family Tree

photo by François Brahic

I can't sum up two weeks offline. Besides my blog philosophy is that it should be short and full of particulars. I could have kept it going by a) sitting on the steps of the village library in freezing temperature and whiplash mistral; b) sitting on my brother-in-law's doorstep in ditto. In fact, the weather was so cold and blustery, though mostly sunny, last week that we had to force ourselves out of the house after lunch for walks. We made it halfway up the Mont Ventoux at least three times and nabbed some persimmons on the way. This involved a long conversation with the custodian of the tree, whose father had planted it, about seventy years ago, when the present "owner" (if trees are owned) was ten years old. He climbed a ladder, we held up a box he also provided. It turned out he and my husband were cousins, after they exchanged family trees--the persimmon tree and the family tree.

Back to Paris last night. I finished my almost-finished Knaussgaard (too fat to transport, besides I had Ferrante, whose more conventionally-organised narrative makes it easier to read when there are a number of other people in the house, all doing their things: slow-cooking a leg of boar shot by our next-door neighbour and offered with great ceremony to us; playing "bananagrams," a speed version of Scrabble, in case, like me,  you didn't know; playing the flute; slow-cooking pork; vacuuming; moving beds; making exquisitely folded paper objects; photo-shopping the day's photos...).

I think I'll add a few photos to this, if i can get my son to send them over from the next room. Stayed tuned.