Henri Dutilleux plaque outrage

[Nick Armstrong]

Victoire!

According to this update on the Petition, victory has been achieved.

"... The Paris Mayor's office accepts that there was an error of judgement and is announcing the imminent installation of a commemorative plaque..."

It's confirmed in a number of press reports e.g. http://www.lefigaro.fr/musique/2015/...son-erreur.php

[Beef Oven!]

Yay!!!

A poke in the eye of political correctness!

European PC merchants got it in the bum.

Let's mix metaphors in jubilation!

[Tevot]

Yay!!!


European PC merchants got it in the bum.

Indeed - Computer salesmen really get my goat too

[P. G. Tipps]

Yay!!!

A poke in the eye of political correctness!

European PC merchants got it in the bum.

Let's mix metaphors in jubilation!

Absolument!

Those who firmly believe that there should be no discrimination regarding 'political or religious orientation' in the Arts, and the only judgement should be on artistic merit, need such PC bigotries like a hole in the head.

I hope all these interfering, jobsworth, public-sector French busybodies are now sent packing with fleas in their ears.

A shot in the arm, indeed, not least for some ancestors of persecuted, benefit-seeking immigrants currently living even more unhappily in a EU-dominated UK, under the sinister, controlling jackboot of Angela Merkel! ()

[french frank]

Indeed - Computer salesmen really get my goat too

That makes more sense than the post you were replying to!

[Beef Oven!]

That makes more sense than the post you were replying to!

Harsh.

[french frank]

Harsh.

Really? It wasn't intended to be harsh. I wonder if I failed to make my point clearly enough to avoid the possibility of misunderstanding?

[ahinton]

Yay!!!

A poke in the eye of political correctness!

Political INcorrectness, surely? The sheer absurdity and offensiveness of the gratuitous insult meted out by the decision to decline the plaque was undoubtedly compounded by the fact that these clowns even got what they evidently thought were their facts entirely wrong!

But a welcome and necessary poke in the eye for bureaucratic French officialdom, to be sure!

What is now richly deserved, after all the plaque flack, is the renaming of the street in which he lived "Rue Henri Dutilleux" (for which at least one petitioner actually clamoured); that's surely the very least that said officialdom could do as part of its merciful climbdown?...

[ahinton]

Absolument!

Those who firmly believe that there should be no discrimination regarding 'political or religious orientation' in the Arts, and the only judgement should be on artistic merit, need such PC bigotries like a hole in the head.

But this wasn't mere "PC bigotry"; on top of the gratuitous insult itself was the fact that the fonctionnaires concerned got the facts entirely wrong - facts that they could easily have accessed instead of seeking to justify their action by lying.

I hope all these interfering, jobsworth, public-sector French busybodies are now sent packing with fleas in their ears.

Indeed - and also with the French equivalent of P45s, peut-être...

A shot in the arm, indeed, not least for some ancestors of persecuted, benefit-seeking immigrants currently living even more unhappily in a EU-dominated UK, under the sinister, controlling jackboot of Angela Merkel! ()

Perhaps I'm being dense, but I can see neither the joke itself nor its relevance here...

[french frank]

I signed the petition, I'm glad it succeeded, but I do think there's a lot of foaming-at-the-mouth righteous indignation for what seemed to me little more than an administrative error based on ignorance.

[ahinton]

I signed the petition, I'm glad it succeeded, but I do think there's a lot of foaming-at-the-mouth righteous indignation for what seemed to me little more than an administrative error based on ignorance.

I cannot agree. Thank you for signing the petition, as did 7,198 others. I would not call officialdom publicly accusing anyone - let alone an artist of the stature of Dutilleux whose active support of the Résistance is well documented, of collaboration with the occupiers - a mere "administrative error" and the fact that it took almost a month and all that protest to achieve the necessary retraction, speaks far from well for the city in which Dutilleux had long ago made his home.

[french frank]

The 'public accusation' did, however, describe exactly what had been done - and was factually correct. It was understood, not that there should be no plaque for Dutilleux - there would indeed be one - but that the circumstance of unrest in Paris at that time was such that some unwelcome demonstration might take place if any ceremony had taken place at that moment. As I understood it, there was not a refusal but a postponement which hardly suggests the authorities thought that any 'public accusation' against him was so serious as to rule out the fixing of the plaque. Unless you think they were making excuses. But that would still suggest that they realised a mistake had been made.

You may have sung the petition: I signed it.

[P. G. Tipps]

You may have sung the petition: I signed it.

Come on, french frank, 'singing' a petition surely puts your boring old written signature well into the shade?

Furthermore, isn't this supposed to be a largely music forum ... ?

[ahinton]

The 'public accusation' did, however, describe exactly what had been done - and was factually correct. It was understood, not that there should be no plaque for Dutilleux - there would indeed be one - but that the circumstance of unrest in Paris at that time was such that some unwelcome demonstration might take place if any ceremony had taken place at that moment.

And waht was the source/cause of that "unrest"?

As I understood it, there was not a refusal but a postponement which hardly suggests the authorities thought that any 'public accusation' against him was so serious as to rule out the fixing of the plaque. Unless you think they were making excuses. But that would still suggest that they realised a mistake had been made.

The fact that the "mistake" - if indeed that's what it was perceived to be (though by whom and at what point remained to be answered) - was not rectified for as long as it wasn't tells all, I think. What as the reson for any such "postponement", even if that's all that it was?

You may have sung the petition: I signed it.

I signed it too - and, as I wrote earlier, I thank you for signing it as well, in the cause of a composer whose vocal writing, though a small part of his output, was hardly in-sing-nificant...

[ahinton]

Come on, french frank, 'singing' a petition surely puts your boring old written signature well into the shade?

"Singature", surely?(!)...

Furthermore, isn't this supposed to be a largely music forum ... ?

Of course it is - and isn't singing something to do with music?...