Saturday June 8, eve of European elections. The public is sparse, but the atmosphere is good-natured at the Château de Villers-Cotterêts (Aisne), the former hunting lodge of François Ier, converted in 2023, after major restoration work, into the International City of the French Language. High school students and amateur theater companies compete in eloquence during the Château Festival, organized by a handful of volunteers in the park which runs along the Retz forest. A few hundred meters away, we adjust the sound system for the Joséphine B ball[re]aker, who is held that same evening in the courtyard. “We are fully on track”smiles Paul Rondin, director since January 2023 of this establishment which combines an interactive course around the French language, residences for French-speaking authors and an auditorium for shows.
In six months, the Cité internationale de la langue française has 180,000 visitors, without specifying their profile or the proportion of paid entries. “We will see more clearly this summer”promises Paul Rondin, convinced of attracting the general public with the new exhibition “It’s a song that resembles us”, dedicated to French-speaking stars, scheduled until January 5, 2025.
Outwit Fate
Not without malice, its commissioner, the music journalist Bertrand Dicale, started the journey with the Franco-Malian singer Aya Nakamura, who, expected to sing Piaf during the Olympic Games, was targeted in March by a torrent of hatred emanating from the far right. Quite a symbol, in a town administered for ten years by a National Rally (RN) mayor, Franck Briffaut, a supporter of Jean-Marie Le Pen.
Also read the portrait (2023) | Article reserved for our subscribers Aya Nakamura, the “Queen” of French pop
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Emmanuel Macron believed that by transforming this dilapidated castle into a high place of the French-speaking world at great expense, he would provide a shield against intolerance. By inaugurating it on October 30, 2023, he praised a world language “hospitable and traveling”at the moment when “we would like to send the communities back to back”. This profession of faith, coupled with a colossal investment of 211 million euros that the Court of Auditors has in its sights, has not caused the far right to back down. In this corner of Picardy forgotten by the public authorities, the Cotteréziens voted on June 9 by 46.9% for the European list of the president of the RN, Jordan Bardella.
Read the report (2023): Article reserved for our subscribers In Villers-Cotterêts, a resigned France “stuck between the Macron castle and the RN town hall”
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Reversing mentalities takes time, Paul Rondin wants to believe. “I am in the place I have always dreamed of, where I can welcome all artists, all audiences without prerequisites. » Where, he hopes, he can thwart fate. In 2014, when the National Front won the town hall of Villers-Cotterêts, Paul Rondin supported Olivier Py, then director of the Avignon Festival. The latter then threatened to relocate the prestigious event if the far-right party won the votes in the City of the Popes.
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