MAYBE THEY SHOULD HOST A WORLD CUP INSTEAD

France forgets its pains in an old-fashioned love affair (Matthew Campbell, The Sunday Times, June 4th, 2006)

Besieged by social and economic woes, the French are finding little cause for cheer in their everyday lives. So they are escaping into the past, revelling in more glorious chapters of history when they were proud, courageous and strong.

While pundits bemoan the country’s decline and loss of status, the public seems to have only scorn for politicians, turning instead to historic figures such as Napoleon and the once reviled Marie Antoinette to bolster the sense of national identity.

More than two centuries after the revolution that sent her to the guillotine, Marie Antoinette has become a national obsession, the subject of books, magazine articles and films revealing a personality more sympathetic and complex than the heartless monster suggested by “Let them eat cake”, the comment widely — but probably wrongly — attributed to her by history.

As for Napoleon, France has never tired of paying homage to the self-proclaimed emperor, and the excitement surrounding the latest crop of films and books about the diminutive Corsican bears all the hallmarks of a personality cult.

Much as we feel their pain, we have our doubts that pining away for Europe’s first modern mass-murdering tyrant and most feckless aristocrat will jump-start a national renewal.