le blog

I have been waiting months for December 25, 2012 to arrive. No, not because it was Christmas and I couldn't wait for Santa, but because it was the release of Les Misérables ! It has been out for four days now, and I have already seen it twice. Of course, I plan to go at least one more time. And yes, I know. I'm ridiculously obsessed. I just accept that fact about myself, and so should you. Critics have panned it as being too long, too big, and too over the top. Forgive my blunt delivery here, but they are morons who have clearly never seen the stage version of Les Mis , and/or who clearly do not understand the history and period behind the story. Regarding the too long, I must point out that Victor Hugo's novel upon which the musical is based is over 1,200 pages. Tolkein's  The Hobbit is about 275 pages, yet the movie runs 10 minutes longer than Les Mis - and that is just the first of the pending trilogy! There is nothing that could be removed from the film versi...

"An Historic Group: British and German Soldiers Photographed Together"  The Daily Mirror Every year I show my students the award-winning film, Joyeux Noël . I would estimate that over the years, I've seen the movie about three dozen times. Despite the ridiculous number of times I have watched it, I never grow tired of it (not to mention the fact that I get choked up every time!) Joyeux Noël  (see the trailer below) is a film about the impromptu/unofficial Christmas Truce of 1914 when soldiers along the Western Front laid down their rifles on Christmas Eve in a gesture of peace and good will. According to The New York Times, it is estimated that about 100,000 men, predominately German and British, (but also some French) were part of this Christmas miracle.   It truly is miraculous when you consider that mere hours before this temporary truce occurred, these men were literally murdering one another. Then, almost as if a magical spell had been cast, the spirit of ...

Mike Espinosa, Magda Herzberger and Moi I know that the purpose of my blog is predominately to focus on anything to do with France.  Today, however, I must make one of my rare exceptions as I have met an exceptional woman about whom I want the world to know.  In September, a wonderful woman from the Office of Jewish Life at neighboring Bucknell University emailed me to let me know she had a speaker coming in November and might I be interested in having her visit my high school? She informed me that the woman's name was Magda Herzberger and that she was a Holocaust survivor. Naturally, I jumped at the chance to create such an amazing opportunity for my students. Little did I know that I was about to meet my new hero. I have immense respect for all survivors of the Shoah, and especially toward those I have met or about whom I have read. I know that none of them would feel comfortable being called a hero for surviving what six million other Jewish people did not. Verbose...

There is a joke that everyone in France was in the Résistance. Many people criticize the French as exaggerating facts, but I would like to defend the French (shocker, I know). I'm not saying that there were no collaborators. That would just be silly and historically inaccurate. But there were more French than not who resisted the enemy. While not everyone who claimed they were in the Résistance was in the formal, organized group, there were countless French who helped in many ways to, in one way or another, resist the Nazis. Whether they were on sabotage missions or simply did not denounce a neighbor, there were a number of ways to defy the occupier. Those who contributed to anti-Nazi propaganda, fed or sheltered a Résistance member or downed Allied pilot, leaked information, made false IDs, or helped Jews in any way technically were resisting the Nazis. Of course the actual organization was important, but it could not have functioned as it did without the collective help of the...

It is no great secret that I have what you might call a "literary crush" on Ernest Hemingway. I am completely vested in the romantic notion of Hemingway in Interwar Paris as the ruggedly handsome struggling young writer of the Lost Generation. After all, what is not to love about a man who writes, "If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast"?  This summer, I finally had the time to read The Paris Wife by Paula McLain - the story of Ernest Hemingway and his first wife, Hadley. I was a bit apprehensive as I cracked open the book. My mother warned me in a shocked and horrified tone that her friend from book club had read The Paris Wife and now hates Hemingway because he was such a cad. I had to remind myself that not everyone is as obsessed about Paris during the Jazz Age as I am. I knew the history, so I was not going in blindly. But after my mom...

To say I cannot wait for my trip to Paris in January is a gross understatement.  I am looking forward to being in the city I love and experience it with Bill and other teachers, but above all else, I am bubbling over with excitement to share it for the first time with my children. As I was engaged in one of my daydreams about Paris, I noticed an emerging pattern. I do think about Paris numerous times a day, but there are some parts of Paris that manage to nudge their way into my nostalgic, obsessive thoughts more than others. Of course I will share, for what is the purpose of this Blog if not to wax poetic about all things Paris?! So here is my gift to you - the top ten things I daydream about most when I am not in my beloved Paris: The Eiffel Tower. Or as pronounced by my nine-year-old, the “Ite-full Tower.” Yes, it is cliché, but I do adore the 1,063 foot-tall iron structure that has come to symbolize Paris. Each time I imagine my future Paris apartment, I walk o...