after spending 5 years in Paris as the bureau chief for the New York Times, Elaine Sciolino is about to move to a new post and last week filed her leaving piece, called A Guide to the French, about things she learned in the City of Lights. Even though she seems appreciative of her time there, the article doesn't exude too much warmth warm, toward the country or its inhabitants. From harping on France's obsession with history, to underscoring French women's evergreen sexiness, the list reads more like a jumble of slightly amusing observations than a true attempt at describing what makes the French so, well, French.
Where New Yorker correspondent Adam Gopnik had managed to make light of the tons of small annoyances one encounters when living in France in such a breezy and enjoyable way in his book Paris To The Moon, Mrs Sciolino sounds mostly like an outsider who never really figured out how to adapt to the charms and frustrations of this old country. It's far from bad, and she actually nails some of the details about life in France that generally take some time to understand (for instance the air-kiss thing, one of the big mysteries to Americans when they move to France), but there is unfortunately no sense that she understood the country beyond those details. Not to say it's an easy thing, in fact it's not one I'd necessarily try to describe myself even after spending nearly 10 years there, but if you're going to try, moving beyond the cliches might be a good start. Stating that no one says "bon appetit" before a meal make me wonder what type of French people she encountered during her stay. Methinks a lot of Varenne-St Germain-Montorgueil types and perhaps not too many of the 99.5% of those she's trying to describe. I might be incredibly dismissive here, but that's the feeling I got from reading her article.
In the end the reader's response to this piece will depend on their initial opinion of the French. Which means that publishing it will have had no positive impact whatsoever. And that, unfortunately, is fast becoming the norm when it comes to the traditional news media's cultural relevance.
Where New Yorker correspondent Adam Gopnik had managed to make light of the tons of small annoyances one encounters when living in France in such a breezy and enjoyable way in his book Paris To The Moon, Mrs Sciolino sounds mostly like an outsider who never really figured out how to adapt to the charms and frustrations of this old country. It's far from bad, and she actually nails some of the details about life in France that generally take some time to understand (for instance the air-kiss thing, one of the big mysteries to Americans when they move to France), but there is unfortunately no sense that she understood the country beyond those details. Not to say it's an easy thing, in fact it's not one I'd necessarily try to describe myself even after spending nearly 10 years there, but if you're going to try, moving beyond the cliches might be a good start. Stating that no one says "bon appetit" before a meal make me wonder what type of French people she encountered during her stay. Methinks a lot of Varenne-St Germain-Montorgueil types and perhaps not too many of the 99.5% of those she's trying to describe. I might be incredibly dismissive here, but that's the feeling I got from reading her article.
In the end the reader's response to this piece will depend on their initial opinion of the French. Which means that publishing it will have had no positive impact whatsoever. And that, unfortunately, is fast becoming the norm when it comes to the traditional news media's cultural relevance.
1 comment:
the list reads more like a jumble of slightly amusing observations than a true attempt at describing what makes the French so, well, French
And it just sort of ends abruptly, with no warning, and even less of a conclusion.
Peut mieux faire, I would say...
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