Author Archives: maristed
From Point-Noire to Paris and Beyond
Poetry Review: Writer Alain Mabanckou — Taking Life Both to Heart and in Stride November 30, 2021 1 Comment By Kai Maristed Take a dive into any of Alain Mabanckou’s works in English — and definitely score a copy of the new translation, As Long as Trees Take Root in the Earth, beautifully crafted and […]
The ’em’ Word, Self-Harming by the Left, and Tout-Paris’ New Must-Have.
Talking Trash or Talking Straight?‘Emmerder,’ loosely translated by the US media as ‘to piss off’, should certainly be voted January’s Mot du Moi, Word of the Month. Emmanuel Macron (e-m-… is there a conspiracy afoot here?) has been forever lambasted as an elitist out of touch with le Peuple. Not so! In a recent interview […]
Sleeping Beauty – la belle au bois dormant
Pointdevue returned to Paris this week after nearly two years in Covid exile without any conscious a priori expectations apart from major changes and signs of damage. What would be left after the repeated, months-long strict ‘confinement’ to living quarters? Torture enough to drive significant percentages of the population out of their minds, especially those […]
Quand les cartes postales se croisent (when postcards cross)
I I live in France, but am not now in France, my Boston-Paris flight having been postponed for a promising professional event which, like the flight, is now indefinitely on ice. But as across the world everyone’s physical and social range shrinks, constricted by fear and necessity––narrowing here in the waffling patchwork of US measures […]
Running in place from Place to Place
“Well, in our country,” said Alice, still panting a little, “You’d generally get to somewhere else—if you run very fast for a long time, as we’ve been doing.” “A slow sort of country!” said the Queen. “Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. […]
An Angry Shade of Blue in France’s (Real) Great Debate
Last year, reacting to the escalating turmoil of the Gilets Jaunes movement, Emmanuel Macron launched a campaign of Great Debates – country-spanning town meetings, if you will, led personally by the ‘who needs sleep?’ President. These were billed as invitations to the forgotten, especially those outside urban areas, to voice their ire and perhaps […]
Reading the Results – A Bulletin in Bullet Points on Europe
After days of staggered voting, the results are in today for both France and Europe. With some surprises: – At 50.13% participation in France far exceeded expectations. Hooray! – ‘Rural’, a category assumed to be more Euro-skeptic, turned out more strongly than ‘urban.’ – That said, the pro-European center can be considered to have held […]
POINT de VUE: PARIS 
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