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After riots in Paris, the smoke is clearing over the city

One of the few consolations left to Parisians since the lockdown (“le confinement”), which began on 17 March, is that for most of April the days have been sunny and bright. In the southern part of...

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Paris’s post-lockdown blues

Even before the phased end to lockdown was announced on 11 May, the severe restrictions in France had been loosening. The true day of “liberation” came, however, on Tuesday 2 June: this was when after...

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Macron and the Muslim world

The moment the coffin of Samuel Paty was carried by republican guards into the Cour d’Honneur of the Sorbonne in the early evening of 21 October was especially poignant. Paty, a history and geography...

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Life without liberty: how Covid turned Paris into a city of fear

In the early evening of Wednesday 20 January, as I was locking up my office in a neighbourhood in southern Paris, I walked straight into a group of four heavily armed soldiers who were coming down the...

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France’s silent majority: How a political class was left behind

In Paris, most non-essential businesses and café terrasses reopened in mid-May and you can now eat, drink or shop wherever you like. People are no longer required to wear masks in outdoor spaces and...

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Éric Zemmour: the “TV-friendly fascist” who thinks he can be France’s next...

In 2011 Éric Zemmour, the author, broadcaster and provocateur, was found guilty of inciting racial hatred, and in 2018 guilty of inciting hate against Muslims. Another court case is pending over his...

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Michel Houellebecq and the soul of France

It is hard to think of any writer in the English-speaking world equivalent to the cultural and political phenomenon that is the French novelist and provocateur Michel Houellebecq. When Houellebecq...

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The evolution of Marine Le Pen

I watched the first-round results of the French presidential election come in on Sunday night (10 April) in an Algerian-owned bar in southern Paris. The prelude had been the thrilling Premier League...

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Emmanuel Macron’s win can’t hide a fractured France

Although the outcome was entirely predictable, by the time the decisive results were announced at 8pm on Sunday 24 April, the re-election of President Emmanuel Macron was still a historic event. This...

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France and the fatwa

The near-fatal stabbing of Salman Rushdie in the US on 12 August dominated the headlines in France as soon as the news broke. From the television networks, major newspapers and magazines to local...

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How France’s provocateur-in-chief became part of the establishment

Recent events in France have seemed inexplicable to observers outside the country. The rise of the “gilets jaunes” movement has proved difficult to define or understand, partly because of the shocking...

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The making of a messiah

Until now, Isidore Isou has largely been forgotten or ignored by historians of culture. This is partly because he believed something which was absurd and impossible. He was a fanatic who believed that...

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The French elites against the working class

A standard taxi ride from my flat in southern Paris to Place de la République in the north usually takes no more than 20 minutes. But on this unexceptional early summer morning every corner and...

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The last true Gaullist: how Jacques Chirac charmed France

The death of the former French president Jacques Chirac on 26 September has hardly shocked France. He was 86 and had been absent from public life for some time. Depending on your sources, he was...

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The new Spanish civil wars

A few months ago I took a high-speed train from Madrid to Córdoba, and then travelled by bus through the mountains to Granada. My ultimate destination was the Alhambra, the exquisitely designed fort...

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Emmanuel Carrère: “I need to be honest about myself. Otherwise, why write?

One of the most persistent themes in the writings of Emmanuel Carrère is the elusive strangeness that lies never too far below the surface of everyday life. One of the best examples of this is...

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Paris is an open prison

These recent weeks have been the strangest in the nearly two decades I have lived and worked in Paris. This includes the terrible year of 2015, which began with the massacre at the offices of the...

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How a bestselling novel reveals French sympathy for Putin

One of the more extraordinary literary successes in France last year was a debut novel called Le Mage du Kremlin (“The Wizard of the Kremlin”) by the political scientist Giuliano da Empoli. The book...

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Letter from Marseille: the lawless metropolis

The best place to take in Marseille is from the esplanade of the Notre-Damae de la Garde basilica. The church, crowned by a golden statue of the Virgin Mary, stands nearly 500ft high on a limestone...

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The rotten heart of the French republic

The atmosphere in Paris on Sunday 2 July was subdued. It was a serious contrast to the previous five nights, when escalating violence and disorder spread across the country following the 27 June...

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