Author: THE HOBBLEDEHOY

Michael Stevenson, aka Dai Bando, Johnny Foreigner, Monsieur Pas De Merde, is a blogger of French and British culture. His blogs "Pas De Merde" and "The Hobbledehoy" have been called "marvelous" by some, and "meh" by others.

Man of our times: Why Albert Camus matters today – The Debate

He’s been gone six decades but after 2020, it feels like French literary great Albert Camus matters more than ever. The year began with tributes for the 60th anniversary of the French existentialist icon’s premature death in a car crash. Then came Covid-19. And readers locked down the world over dusted off that go-to guide, “The Plague”, to make sense of the randomly unexpected. We ask our panel about the re-reading of a novel set in Camus’s native Algeria in the wake of World War II. But it’s not just “The Plague” that is timeless.

In all of the Nobel literature laureate’s plays, essays and novels, protagonists struggle to understand where they belong in times of upheaval. Just look at today. We live in an age of alienation, identity politics, the loss of a sense of self. A bit like in “The Stranger” – also set in colonial Algeria.

What would Camus have made of 2020 and the age of digital discourse, where powered by tribal echo chambers, we judge and sometimes sentence our peers? When Covid-19 is long behind us, “The Fall” will still be worth re-reading. We tell you why.

Produced by Alessandro Xenos, Juliette Laurain and Imen Melllaz

Source FRANCE 24: Man of our times: Why Albert Camus matters today – The Debate

Francis Cabrel in concert in Paris and on tour in 2021

As part of the publication at the end of 2020 of his brand new disc titled “At the Returning Dawn” (opus featuring the hit “Te Ressembler”, among others …), the ever popular Francis Cabrel will perform live during eagerly awaited concerts at the Folies Bergère (Paris) from January 13 to 19, 2021 at 7 p.m. then will be on a French tour indoors in early 2021 then in festivals during the summer of 2021: Festival Pause Guitare, Festival de Nîmes, Festival de Carcassonne etc. .

All the live appointments with Francis Cabrel scheduled for 2021 are listed on his artist sheet, accessible via the link below …

List of titles of the album “At the coming dawn”:
The beautiful moments are too short
Look like you
The melted candles
To the poles
Fort Alamour
Rockstars of the Middle Ages
People of the fountains
Let’s talk
At the coming dawn
Song for Jacques
I was listening to Sweet Baby James
Hard to believe
Ode to courtly love

:Source: Francis Cabrel in concert in Paris and on tour in 2021

The wine that has its own special day

Most French wines can be drunk any time (although breakfast wine is frowned upon) but there is one that has its own special day.

The third Thursday in November is a special day in the wine calendar – the day that the year’s Beaujolais nouveau wines become available.

Beaujolais nouveau is a primeur, a ‘young’ wine that is produced quickly and hits the shelves just a couple of months after the grapes are picked.

There are many types of primeur, but only Beaujolas nouveau gets its own special day – and this is due to nothing more elevated than a marketing campaign from the 1980s set up to popularise and promote this type of wine.

Beaujolais nouveau can be shipped earlier, but only goes on sale around the world on the third Thursday of November, and most years there are festivals to promote it with local events and ‘wine races’.

Hugely popular in the 1908s, especially in the UK, Beaujolais nouveau suffered a backlash from wine purists who labelled it an imbuvable (undrinkable) wine that tasted of bananas.

While it’s true that a lot of distinctly dodgy bottles were on sale during its heyday, especially abroad, these days many small producers in the Beaujolais region are working hard to ensure that their better-quality products get the recognition they deserve.

Within the Beaujolais area of eastern France, around a third of the grapes go to producing Beaujolais nouveau, while the rest produce wines with a longer and more traditional production time. However many prefer to be known by the name of the village or commune where they are produced, rather than Beaujolais.

Source: French figures: The wine that has its own special day – The Local