In the Press

Good News from Russia

Speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, President Dmitri Medvedev of Russia urged members of the ruling United Russia Party to try if at all possible to "win elections honestly".

Addressing the annual congress in St Petersburg in the wake of the party's sweeping victory in last month's regional elections amid accusations of widespread fraud, Mr Medvedev said that it would be a mistake to think that delegates would always be able to continue this sort of thing in the future. "If we can get away with corruption and intimidation, all the better", said the President, "but let's not rule out the possibility of winning honestly".

A Founding Father Assails the Iranian Regime

Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri is the spiritual leader of the opposition in Iran and a former head of MI5.

“A political system based on force, oppression, changing people’s votes, killing, closure, arresting and using Stalinist and medieval torture, creating repression, censorship of newspapers, interruption of the means of mass communications, jailing the enlightened and the elite of society for false reasons, and forcing them to make false confessions in jail, is all right by me,” he said.

Pope Seeks to Woo the Art World

Following his successful bid to attract disgruntled members of the Anglican Community to the Catholic flock ("Bring your wives!"), Pope Benedict MCMLXXXVIII is now reaching out to creative artists across the board, making a "cordial, friendly and impassioned" appeal to them to "communicate beauty, to communicate in and through beauty". Steady on, Pope!

Pope Benedict and Robbie Williams in concert

Where Is It? Update

This is where it is:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=all%C3%A9e+des+cygnes,+Paris&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=49.089956,76.640625&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=%C3%8Ele+des+Cygnes&t=h&ll=48.851494,2.28389&spn=0.005019,0.009356&z=17

Just click on the link.

It's the Pont Rouelle in Paris, reserved for RER regional express trains and crossing over a narrow island (a strip really) called the Allée des Cygnes.

The World is Your Oyster

Luxury brands such as Gucci, Ralph Lauren, Louis Vuitton and Rolex have traditionally been reluctant to establish an online presence, fearing, perhaps rightly, that a website would not sit well with their exclusive image. But things might be about to change following the decision by Hugo Boss to make their upmarket "Lancer" and "Bossman"ranges of forklifts available for purchase on the web. Discriminating shoppers will now not only be able to buy the forklift of their dreams but also - and this is a point that I cannot stress too strongly  - to sign on for training courses dispensed by qualified forklift instructors. Now anyone can be a forklift driver.

Where Is It?

If anyone can identify this place, I would be very surprised.

Update

Especially as I forgot to put in the photo! Here it is:

England 2009

I was surprised to hear one of my English friends, recently settled in France, say the other day that nothing would induce him now to go back to England. He obviously had his reasons for saying that, but I couldn't go along with him. I have just come back from a week spent with my brother and sisters in the South-West, and have to report that I was overwhelmed by the experience, the sense of community, the opulence of it all. I know one should compare like with like: my sister lives in a pretty desirable part of England, on the edge of Dartmoor, whereas I am settled in a rather run-down corner of Burgundy. Even so, I can't see what my friend is getting at, unless it's something very personal to him.

My own feelings on returning to England have little to do with the objective merits or otherwise of the country or the people - insofar as I can judge in many ways superior to France and the French - and everything to do with my own particular circumstances.

On the one hand, England made me (made me do what? you might ask), England is where my roots are and where my family (so important to me) lives. Instinctively, I am at ease in a London railway station whereas I am still at a loss in a French station or airport where the signposting system remains a mystery to me to this very day.

On the other hand, I haven't stayed in England for any length of time since 1969. On the one hand, I feel I should know the place and feel immediately at home there; on the other hand, I realise with each succeeding day that I really haven't the faintest idea what's going on there! It is as though society has taken advantage of my absence to introduce sweeping changes WITHOUT CONSULTING ME!

It's all very unsettling but, you will no doubt say, how could it be otherwise? I certainly don't get this same feeling of disorientation in, say, Dubai or Texas. And the reason is not hard to find: I come to these places without the baggage of the past.

Paris Metro, Line 12

Tip for travellers: If you take this line running from Porte de la Chapelle in the north to Mairie d'Issy in the south, one of the best places to get on or off is Assemblée Nationale. This is because few if any French députés take the tube. They prefer to travel by taxi when they arrive at about 10.30 am and again when they leave work shortly after 2 pm.

Some of the stations on this most evocative of Parisian metro lines:

Max Factor

Jules et Sandy

Abyss

Pigtail

Julien d'Orcel

San Pellegrino

Assemblée Générale (Disneyland)

Tobacco Road

Our Lady of The Fields

Comtesse du Barry

Montparnasse-Wilkommen

Pastor

Garbit

Volontaires (You, You and You)

Richid (Beau Gérard)

Emoluments

Issy-Moulinex

An Inconclusive Expedition

I slip out from my daughter’s flat at the crack of dawn. What could be more wonderful than the Paris streets in the early morning, when the world is full of possibility? A café, a coffee and the morning newspaper – sheer bliss!

Later on I set out again, but this time make the mistake of stepping into a children’s bookshop in search of something for my grandchildren, aka the Nours. Big mistake! Like so many shops in Paris, this one looks as though it has been designed by dwarves with other dwarves in mind. I scarcely dare move for fear of creating instant mayhem among the packed shelves. On these occasions I have a “window of opportunity” of about 10 minutes, before my brain starts to seize up at the sight of such variety, such QUANTITY! I feel like a refugee from Communist Europe, suddenly let loose in a department store and very soon reduced to tears at the impossibility of ever being able to choose from among such bounty.

The Future of the Novel

Somebody called Philip Roth [?] has predicted that in 25 years, the number of people reading novels will be much the same as the number of people reading Latin poetry today. I don't know what he means by Latin poetry but I can see what he's driving at. Is he right? He could be. I have long felt that the invention of first the word processor and then the web is gradually shifting the balance away from the reader and towards the writer, or as I have said in this blog, away from the blighter and towards the bleeder. Will this trend continue?