The falsification of history is more often the result of ignorance than of malice. After having been invited by students to give a lecture at a business school, the historian Thierry Lentz has been asked, this week, not to come on the ground that the direction did not wish to " enhance the legacy of napoleon in this period." The indignation, many have been political. France was once more attacked by his own children ! Alas, it is the worst, the officials of this cancellation have probably acted with sincerity, believed to render a service to the morals, the decency, the dignity. Their reaction was the result of their foolishness. The collapse of the knowledge has led to this strange thing, a desolate and disheartening : the opinions are now worth reflection. Gold is angry, does not exist ; to express does not mean to think ; to say does not mean to live.
The knowledge was anesthetized by what we might call the projection, on the one hand, and the efforts it involves, on the other hand. In other words, all forces must be concentrated ever more quickly towards a future still more distant. Exhausted by the race, focused on a horizon invisible, nobody thinks to look behind. This perpetual motion and repeated consequences. The brevity and the temporary take precedence over the attention and sustainability. This triumph does not imply the defeat of thought, but of the past. Which cannot be regained without that efforts be made to go to him, that is to say in rear. Gold order was given to deplete the energy storage tanks for the front. The past, or rather pasts are not virtuous by nature ; some are nice, others disgusting. No worship is due. The affection or hatred that their front door is obviously selective. And it is very good. The beheading of Louis XVI to the victory of the popular Front, days of August, 1792 those of may 1968, through the triumphs of napoleon's armies at Austerlitz in 1805 and the Paris Commune, the history of France, gives examples of everything for everyone.
also Read "In the fall, students will discover a little better Napoleon"
The story is a part When they write, historians, in the same way that any writer, create.
in books, In tv shows, and even in families coexist with imperialism and progressivism, the antimodernisme and postmodernity, socialism and liberalism. The homeland is not an ideal, but a field on which the clash of the antagonisms of which the number and diversity prove the cultural superiority of France, this country where the citizens can build, destroy, love, hate, with an enthusiasm whose sincerity is matched only by bad faith. By some miracle, this temperament has become a style that is admired around the world. These clashes intellectuals remind the ignorant that the knowledge domain is as serious as that of the growth rate. Regardless of the ideological nature of beliefs, they must be defended as redoubts beyond which the utilitarian will not pass.
The story is a part When they write, historians, in the same way that any writer, create. Their job is not to transcribe information found in a library, but to write sentences, to imagine a coherent pattern both aesthetically and intellectually, a book. Henri-Irénée Marrou was repeated : "The historical work is a work of art ; the historian should be a writer. "Georges Duby followed by taking the story to" an art, an art that literally essentially ". Their task is free of charge, in the strongest sense of the word ; as to their passion, it is of course incomprehensible to the proponents of a world in which is organized the destruction scrupulous and methodical intellectuals. It is believed this company impensée and natural ? It was wrong. The culture benefits the uneducated ; and they are more organized than we think. Their hatred of the knowledge comes from what they are excluded. For some strange reasons, namely that people dedicate their lives to a business little lucrative the to lose his temper. Spreads a nihilism that is the result of a relativism of knowledge. The intellectuals could be replaced by bretteurs and talkative. The reciprocal is however not true. A-t-on ever seen a historian say to the doctor ? A poet, assert that he could become a chef of a gourmet restaurant ? A mathematician claiming the right to extract teeth ? Yes, knowledge is a profession ; literature is an art ; and it all involves effort. Which justify a prestige.
The history of France scares those who do not know. It is not beautiful because she is virtuous, but because it is exciting. Because it is the origin of books as yet unheard of beauty, address, courage, that obviously can't suspect those who have not read.
Reference book :
Georges Duby, edition established by Pierre Nora, preface to Felipe Brandi, Works, Paris, Gallimard, " La Pléiade ", 2019.
*Arthur Chevallier is the publisher in the Past compounds. His last essay, "Napoleon without napoleon Bonaparte" (editions du Cerf), is published in January 2019. The 12 September is out "The Taste of Napoleon" (editions Le Petit Mercure), a collection of texts on the Emperor.
