This Quarter
THE
CRISIS IN
FRANCE
As
Athens was called by the ancients the 'eye'
of Greece, in the sense that there centered die
supreme consciousness of Greek civilization, so
Paris might be called the 'eye' of modern European civilization. For
a century the history of France was the history of European politics:
from the great revolution of 1789 to the 1848 'year of revolutions',
the proto-fascist reaction of 'Napoleon the Little,' and finally the Pa–
ris
Commune of 1871, which sketched out a whole new theory of
revolution, to be realized in 1917. ("Well and good, gentlemen,'' wrote
Engels, "do you want to know what this dictatorship looks like? Look
at the Paris Commune. That was the Dictatorship of the Proletariat.")
So, too, in arts and letters. The current of modern art, from Cezanne
to Picasso, has been channelled deep in Paris. And it was to Paris,
not to Berlin or London or Rome, that our own literary expatriates
of the twenties went to write their novels and publish their independ–
ent 'little' magazines. In that benign and quickening air, the expres–
sion of the best integrated culture of modern times, the
avant-garde–
the very term is French-in art and literature has found
it
least im–
possible to survive.
Now all this is threatened. The eye of Western culture is dim–
ming. For months now, the newspaper correspondents have beeri
filling in, bit by bit, the now sadly familiar image of a nation that
is
preparing to. take leave of democratic government. We know well
bv now what hanoens to intellec:tual life under a totalitarian
re.~ime.
If
France goes fascist, we shall be saying goodbye to Western culture
in
all seriousness and for a long time to come.
But the battle is not yet lost. It is true that two and a half
vears of the disastrous 'People's Front' policy has led to the Munich
Pact and the openly reactionary Daladier government, and that
the morale of the masses is being sapped by the same events that
are strengthening the will to power of the two hundred families. But
French fascism is, as yet, weak as an organized movement, and the
direction of the Daladier government appears to be reactionary
rather. than fascist.
As
our Paris correspondent, Mr. Sean Niall,
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