DOMINIQUE SCHNAPPER
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French people do not know German . When you meet a German you
always speak English together.
Edith Kurzweil:
I think Dominique said part of what I wanted to say;
I think you're right. However, I would emphasize that the history of
France is totally different from that of Germany; the underlying
ideas and aims are different. The Germans know they can't reunify
with Eastern Germany - but there are the hopes and the myths.
They say they are two different nations, but they are also one; they
cannot go against their brothers in Eastern Germany; they don't
want to have a war; they are afraid of a nuclear bomb - it's going to
hit them, rather than anyone else . These are the things that German
intellectuals consider when they then go off into theories that are
very hard to understand, and frequently they get so theoretical that
you have to start translating back into everyday language. Also,
there is the language barrier. And there has been the specter of war
for many years . French and German society are historically ori–
ented-which Americans are not, and usually don't understand.
Dominique Schnapper:
French people haven't forgotten the war. My
country house is in a southern village . Many Germans come to buy
houses and are richer than we are. And the people there are ex–
tremely anti-German. They remember the war. In spite of every–
thing, we have these feelings .
Harold Kaplan:
It's a dose of good old-fashioned xenophobia?
Dominique Schnapper:
They don't have the same reaction towards the
Italians, for instance , or the British, or the Americans.
It's the
Ger–
mans.
We don't like them, take it as a fact.
Harold Brodkey:
Can you characterize this pro-Americanism in a little
detail? Beside the fact that they come to teach at our colleges .
Dominique Schnapper:
That's very important: French academics, who
are relatively poor, come to Ainericatl urtiversities because they need
the money. They also adore American inovies . When I came with
my daughter ,four years ago she thoughi: she knew Americans, be–
cause she had looked at films all her life, and she was recognizing
things which she had never seen before.
Harold Brodkey:
What movies do they like?
Dominique Schnapper:
They like John Wayne: he is a hero in France. I
know that American intellectuals can't understand that.
William Phillips:
I do.
Dominique Schnapper:
We are, more or less , in a kind of American
culture . American culture has become part of our culture .
