France
France is nervous about welcoming a wave of Afghan refugees
Emmanuel Macron has once more infuriated many in France, but this time it has nothing to do with Covid passports…
Liberté, égalité, vacciné: France’s Covid passport revolt is just beginning
France’s revolt against Covid passports is just beginning
From ferreter to animal-rights champion
I was sitting quite still at the typewriter when a plump mouse emerged from under the fridge and crossed the…
Macron's vaccine passport is uniting French anti-fascists and nationalists
Saturday was what is known in France as the Chassé-croisé, the busiest day of the year on the roads, when…
Turning the tide: how to deal with Britain’s new migrant crisis
How Britain can stem the stream of illegal arrivals
Foucault was shielded from scandal by French reverence for intellectuals
Consider the hare and the hyena. The hare, Clement of Alexandria told readers of his 2nd-century sexual self-help manual Paedagogus,…
Macron's war on Covid meets resistance
A manager of an attraction park in France was reportedly assaulted on Sunday after he denied entry to a customer.…
Emmanuel Macron’s dangerous infantilisation of the French
From St Tropez to La Rochelle to Deauville, there is a familiar sight this summer in many of France’s most…
Macron’s vaccine passports are a betrayal of French values
What a celebration of diversity I witnessed in Paris on Saturday as tens of thousands of demonstrators marched through the…
The wine that made me change my mind about rosé
Some time ago, I wrote that rosé should only be drunk south of Lyon, but one could start on the…
How Macron was outfoxed by a dead Napoleonic general
Skeletons don’t always lurk in cupboards, some of them hide under dance floors waiting for a particularly rousing party to…
Macron's Covid crackdown is a risky bet
Will the French accept compulsory vaccination against Covid? Health passports to get on a plane or train? Children of 12…
It’s the end of lockdown – and the village has gone wild
The village square is a long and pedestrianised oblong shaded along its length by massive pollarded plane trees. It’s known…
The growing extremism of France's Green party
On Sunday evening I met three left-leaning French friends for a picnic in a Parisian park. We’d hardly begun the…
Is Marine Le Pen’s presidential bid doomed?
Nothing went as predicted in France’s regional elections. Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National did not win a single region and…
The electoral humiliation of Macron and Le Pen
Five years ago, Emmanuel Macron was ‘en marche’ to his improbable ascent to the presidency of France. Last night, having…
Boris is in danger of becoming Britain's François Hollande
Last week’s by-election result in Chesham and Amersham was a slap in the face for Boris Johnson. Fortunately it was…
French democracy is in trouble – and the EU is to blame
France’s airwaves have been crackling with indignation this week, as politicians wring their hands at the record abstention in the first…
France's silent majority has rejected Macron – and Le Pen
I popped down to the Salle du Peuple on Sunday to see how the voting was going in the departmental…
Euros 2021: England are easily the most boring side in the tournament
England 0 Scotland 0 Hungary 1 (Fiola) France 1 (Griezmann) The wonderful Hungarians almost took my mind off England’s lamentable…
How to drink in the delights of France (without leaving the country)
It is hard to decide which is more depressing, the extension of the lockdown or the public support for this…
Jason Ricci is my mentor, guru and anointed one
A second week recovering in bed in this pleasant south-facing bedroom. If I sit up, my back resting against whitewashed…
How Les Bleus united France by not taking the knee
For those who lean to the right and live in France, Tuesday nightwas magnificent. Not only did LesBleus open their…
France is divided on 'taking the knee'
Until this month ‘taking a knee’ has not been a French phenomenon. When the Black Lives Matter movement spilled out of…
The art of negotiating with French nurses
‘Ça va, Monsieur Clarke?’ said a nurse when he noticed I was stirring. It was an effort to speak. ‘Thirsty,’…
