Today July 14 is celebrated in France as Bastille Day. That date celebrates an event part of the French Revolution.
On that day the Citadel known as the Bastille was stormed by the people of Paris.
The Bastille was a jail where beside petty criminals anybody, without any justification, could be confined simply by a Royal Decree and be held as long as the Sovereign wished without any recourse or due process. Among the people held there over the Centuries was the Masque de Fer and Voltaire among others. Writting of any seditious pamphlets or articles critical of the King and his cottery was an assured ticket/
Today nothing remains of the Citadel except the outline of the building traced by granite pavers on the ground of the Place de la Bastille near the Opera and a few rubbles on an adjacent park
It is a day of celebration, parades, dance in the streets and firework.
It is a day of celebration of la Liberté. A world covering two concepts: Liberty and Freedom who strangely are covered by the same word in the French language.
Liberté is recognized in France as a thing to value and protect because it is one things that has been taken away innumerable times during the tumultuous history of France.
The country has seen invasions from the beginning of recorded history including the Roman, Goth, Visigoth, Moors, Vikings, Cossacks and off course the German army among innumerable others.
Bastille day has a special meaning for me, on that date my mind always go back to one day early in the Sixties, when during a visit at Saint Denis, a suburb of Paris where is the Church where the Kings of France were crowned, Liberté took a very personal meaning.
Like most town in France, Saint Denis has a municipal museum. In that museum on small room is dedicated to the civilian people of the town who lost their life in the process of Occupation and Liberation of World War Two. Some where hostages summarily rounded up and shot in retaliation for Resistance activities , other where member of the Resistance who paid the ultimate price for it.
In one of the glass cabinet was a letter, fifty and some years later I can still see it clearly. It was the last letter to his wife from a man who was going to face the firing squad in the morning. The letter was written on a single piece of paper teared out of a notebook. The paper was slowly turning light brown but you could still see the blue parallel line and the red perpendicular line marking the margin, the missive was written in pencil, in an impeccable handwriting, following the lines and respecting the margin.
That letter did not contain a single word of bitterness or hate; it was a very tender goodbye to a loved one. That men who in a few hour would be rounded up like cattle with other companion then herded to the killing field was only thinking to console his loved one and their children. He used an expression that has been etched in my mind for ever: he asked his wife to explain to the children that their Dad loved them very much and that his sacrifice would help to achieve “des lendemains qui chantent”: that you can translate as ” singing tomorrows”.
I do not remember the name of this men, the note beside the letter said that he was “un ouvrier a l’Usine de Javel” a worker at the Citroen Automobile Plant of Javel and a member of the Resistance, but every 14 of July, every time I see the Statue of Liberty, every time I hear the words Liberté, Liberty or Freedom I see this letter. If there is a God, that men deserved a special place close to him. Happy Bastille day.
On that day the Citadel known as the Bastille was stormed by the people of Paris.
The Bastille was a jail where beside petty criminals anybody, without any justification, could be confined simply by a Royal Decree and be held as long as the Sovereign wished without any recourse or due process. Among the people held there over the Centuries was the Masque de Fer and Voltaire among others. Writting of any seditious pamphlets or articles critical of the King and his cottery was an assured ticket/
Today nothing remains of the Citadel except the outline of the building traced by granite pavers on the ground of the Place de la Bastille near the Opera and a few rubbles on an adjacent park
It is a day of celebration, parades, dance in the streets and firework.
It is a day of celebration of la Liberté. A world covering two concepts: Liberty and Freedom who strangely are covered by the same word in the French language.
Liberté is recognized in France as a thing to value and protect because it is one things that has been taken away innumerable times during the tumultuous history of France.
The country has seen invasions from the beginning of recorded history including the Roman, Goth, Visigoth, Moors, Vikings, Cossacks and off course the German army among innumerable others.
Bastille day has a special meaning for me, on that date my mind always go back to one day early in the Sixties, when during a visit at Saint Denis, a suburb of Paris where is the Church where the Kings of France were crowned, Liberté took a very personal meaning.
Like most town in France, Saint Denis has a municipal museum. In that museum on small room is dedicated to the civilian people of the town who lost their life in the process of Occupation and Liberation of World War Two. Some where hostages summarily rounded up and shot in retaliation for Resistance activities , other where member of the Resistance who paid the ultimate price for it.
In one of the glass cabinet was a letter, fifty and some years later I can still see it clearly. It was the last letter to his wife from a man who was going to face the firing squad in the morning. The letter was written on a single piece of paper teared out of a notebook. The paper was slowly turning light brown but you could still see the blue parallel line and the red perpendicular line marking the margin, the missive was written in pencil, in an impeccable handwriting, following the lines and respecting the margin.
That letter did not contain a single word of bitterness or hate; it was a very tender goodbye to a loved one. That men who in a few hour would be rounded up like cattle with other companion then herded to the killing field was only thinking to console his loved one and their children. He used an expression that has been etched in my mind for ever: he asked his wife to explain to the children that their Dad loved them very much and that his sacrifice would help to achieve “des lendemains qui chantent”: that you can translate as ” singing tomorrows”.
I do not remember the name of this men, the note beside the letter said that he was “un ouvrier a l’Usine de Javel” a worker at the Citroen Automobile Plant of Javel and a member of the Resistance, but every 14 of July, every time I see the Statue of Liberty, every time I hear the words Liberté, Liberty or Freedom I see this letter. If there is a God, that men deserved a special place close to him. Happy Bastille day.
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