2006-10-28 19:35:54 · 6 answers · asked by Anonymous in Arts & Humanities ➔ History
It has always seemed to me that French culture is largely synthetic. They filched ideas from their neighbors and because of their centrality and the facility with which their delightful language can be learned, they became a sort of cultural entrepot. At least this has been so since the destructive years of the "Sun King," the hayday of France's muscle, that passed with Louis around 1715.
We associate the enlightment with France, but the ideas came from English and German thinkers. There is Voltaire, a wit, but there is no Newton nor any one like Liebnitz. It was Bacon far more than Decartes who fed that movement.
It is the same with the great Romantic movement. Look to Goethe, not Hugo or Faubert. The "Lake Poets" and Blake of England did more to stimulate and direct that movement than any French.
Even the wonderful French Impressionist movement in painting traces its origins to the palet of John Constable and concern with light and movment of Turner among other English painter.
At the beginning of the WWII, the French language enjoyed a universality among the refined and educated of this globe much as American English does now. But after that horrific conflice, in which the French played such humiliating role under Laval and Petain, American English drove French from its place.
The French Chamber revealed its pettiness in outlawing the use of English words in the French press. They can make it a crime to use Weekend in a newspaper, but it does nothing to improve self-concept.
And yet, it is very unlikely that that the America colonies could have gained thier independence without the assistance of France. It's a funny thing: Americans love France, but they do not like it and cannot admire it.
2006-10-29 04:02:50 · answer #1 · answered by john s 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The French have the most hubris of any country in the world, despite that they have had sucky performance in every war since 1815. Go to Paris and ask if France will ever regain its pride.
2006-10-29 10:08:15 · answer #2 · answered by ebillar 1 · 0⤊ 1⤋
France has never lost their Pride.
France takes great pride in being rude.
France takes great pride in having severe body odor!!! (Enough to make a camel move upwind)
France takes great pride in being able to say "I Surrender" in every known language on this planet and 52 "dead" languages.
Viva la France. Look out the Germans are coming !!!!
2006-10-29 09:27:22 · answer #3 · answered by JohnRingold 4 · 0⤊ 2⤋
Why does it need to? Pride comes before a fall as the americans are finding out
2006-10-29 01:43:05 · answer #4 · answered by brainstorm 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
France never lost its pride.
2006-10-29 01:45:15 · answer #5 · answered by picopico 5 · 2⤊ 1⤋
They are french. Their pride not need evidence, only attitude.
And NO.
2006-10-29 02:17:09 · answer #6 · answered by browning_1911 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋