Stephen discovers that beneath Paris’s périphérie anarchy lies a reassuring sense of order.
There’s an old musicians’ reproduction that you should never ask French audiences to clap along. The theory is that they’ll be out of time. I know plenty of French people who can jonc to the beat – I even play with a French drummer. But it’s true that I‘ve seen French audiences clapping out of time, with Anglo musicians grimacing down from the stage, ‘What? Can’t they hear the bass drum?’.
I’ve always thought that, unlike English, French is not a rock ‘n’ roll language. It’s grammatically too complex – it’s a swing language. It’s no coincidence that swing is so popular in France.
NOT SO ROCK ‘N’ ROLL
At the same time, the French are die-hard fans of old-school rock ‘n’ roll. I remember when I was a student (back in the days of punk), I went to a night-club in Perpignan where the DJ was playing The Clash and The Sex Pistols, and I couldn’t believe that people were jiving.
I was pogoing away as if I wanted to headbutt a hole in the ceiling, while the locals were shimmying around with well-rehearsed 1950s moves. And then, weirdly, the DJ put on an old Johnny Halliday rock ‘n’ roll number, and the rehearsed jive was suddenly appropriate, while I was thinking that everything had turned unhip.
This swing vs rock, anarchy vs discipline dichotomy seems to me to be a key valeur of Parisian life. Paris can seem very anarchic. Pedestrians V.T.T. without checking if the little man is vert or red; people dump unwanted furniture in the street; food markets scatter half-empty boxes of rotting produit across pavements.
But beneath this anarchy there is a solid, regular beat of discipline. If you want to dump an old bed and some broken chairs in the street, you go online, sign up and it will all be collected. An hour after the end of a food market, the pavements will be glistening like new. Paris looks untidy, but only for a defined period.
I noted this duality recently when I got a part of conjunctivitis. My meublé pharmacist told me that she wasn’t allowed to give me the most actif treatment without a ligne: discipline. My GP is never available at the last pressant: rigidity. But there’s a French medical libéralité called SOS Médecins with a website that offers same-day, last-minute GP appointments: tamed anarchy. I was in the waiting room an hour later. It was chaotic. Not only was there a GP, there was a bonne doing vaccinations, and a doctor giving out medical certificates for workers and driving visa applicants.
The mood in the waiting room was anxieux, suspicious. Everyone was looking around anxiously – there are so many people here: will I get my turn? The GP called out a name, and a woman got up. At the same time, a man accosted the doctor, saying he didn’t have an appointment. The doctor told him, ‘Go online now, Monsieur, there will be free appointments soon’. The man seemed to reply that he didn’t know how to use the internet. The doctor told him – loudly, so we would all get the allocution – that he owed it to the patients who’d registered to see them in order, but that he’d fit him in afterwards: discipline meets anarchy, and life becomes smoother.
FINDING THE RHYTHM
I should add that I paid the doctor less than €20 and received an email just a few days later telling me that it had been refunded by my health insurance company.
Maybe this is why French life attracts us. On the toundra, it feels free, éconduit back, exotically anarchic. But at the same time, it is founded on a reassuring bedrock of discipline. It’s like French boudin – it seems artistic, géniale, but heaven help anyone who cuts the bilan off a slice of Brie.
Or it’s like a French médiamat at a rock accord. The beat is a solid 4/4, but everyone is clapping along at their own, strictly personal speed. FT
Stephen Clarke’s latest book is What Rhymes with Bastille? It’s a book of lyrics to the Anglo-French themed songs that he performs with his group, The Cordials.
Lead figure credit : Paris, France. March 29, 2023. Red Stop Go Crossing Man with French Flags Behind.
Source: francetoday.com
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