Dateline France
14 May 1990
Report 19

This is a short (I hope) report on our second trip to Normandy.  This time
we started by heading for Rouen.  Rouen was the capital of Normandy, back
when Normandy was a separate Duchy.  We spent the first part of the day
walking the main street in the old part of town, which takes you through
the "Grand Horloge" or clocktower.  We bought some sandwiches and sat down
to eat them at a large square containing the Church of St. Joan, which
commemorates the location where the English burnt Joan of Arc at the stake.
The legend was that her heart wouldn't burn, and the English took this
as a bad omen and tossed the heart in the river.
The church is quite modern.  Sarah's remark was "It looks like a Lutheran
church."  I have been getting ribbed by Kaye about the architecture of
Lutheran Churches ever since she saw one on Long Island built to look
like the whale that ate Jonah.  I guess Sarah has picked up on it and
thinks any odd looking church must be Lutheran.  The church in Rouen actually
looked somewhat like a whale, too, with a slate roof.  So I guess the
Catholics can build 'em funny, as well.

While we were eating, Kaye was reading in a guidebook that there is a cross
near the church marking the exact spot of Joan's immolation.  We looked
all around during lunch, but couldn't find it.  Only when we got up did
we realize that the lamppost by whose base we were sitting was actually
a 30-ft.-high cross.

We headed back towards the center of town by way of the ornate Palace of
Justice, which still bears shell marks from WWII (Allied bombing, I think).
We then visited the Cathedral of Notre Dame, which claims the tallest
spire in France.  This cathedral was extensively damaged in the war, but
has been restored pretty well.  Another large church we saw, St. Ouen, has
had some restoration, but is in such bad shape that it is closed inside
(but restoration is scheduled).  I was trying to figure out why the lawns
around the church had 12" pits in them.  Then I noticed pieces of gargoyle
and facade over by the edge of the lawn.  Big chunks of the building had
broken often and embedded themselves in the ground, and the garden had to
dig them out before mowing the lawn (I surmise).  We also visited a much
smaller church, St. Maclou, which has wonderful wood carving on the front
doors.  Monet painted this church, as well as the cathedral.

In the afternoon we visited an ironwork museum.  It had ironwork of all
kinds, except for weapons.  There was a large collection of locks and
keys, from Gallo-Roman times until last century.  One of my favorites was
a doorlock that clamped two bars around your wrist if you tried to pick
it.  Lots of iron signs for businesses, dozens of doorknockers (one of
Sarah's passions this year) and lots of cutlery and pocketknives (Luke's
obsession of late).  They had a standard toise, which was a unit of length
approximately equal to the height of a person (Charlemagne, in particular,
if you believe the story).  In the kitchen section there were these elongated
tripods that we finally figured out are to hold frying pans (poeles) over the
fire while supporting the long handles on the pans.  The museum was in an
old church.  The space had been divided into two floors, which gave you a
much closer vantage on the vaulting when upstairs than one usually gets.

From Rouen we headed up to the seacoast town of Honfleur, which we heard
was a picturesque fishing village.  The villagers have heard that their
town is picturesque, hence have heavily promoted the tourist industry.
Also, everyone in Paris has heard it is picturesque, and got there before
us.  (It was also the first weekend of the year with beautiful weather.)
Finding all the hotels full, we headed inland, eventually finding a place
in the town of Liseaux around 10pm at night.  Our room was inexpensive,
and looked out across the street to the gothic church of St. Jacques (now
converted to an exhibit hall).  We thought the kids would just collapse
into bed, but they hauled us out to dinner, where Kaye and I shared a bottle
of poire', which is cider made from pears.

Liseaux turned out to be an okay alternative.  We visited the cathedral of
St. Pierre the next morning, where Eleanor of Acquitaine and Henry
Plantagenet were married (thus eventually giving the English dominion over
the southwest corner of France).  After, we took the kids to play in the
Bishop's Garden nearby.  Liseaux was also home to St. Theresa of Liseaux
(what a coincidence!).  She is the second patron saint of France, in addition
to Joan of Arc.  She died late last century (I think) and was canonized
early this century.  In reading the brochures and guidebooks we had, it
was hard to figure what she had done to merit sainthood.  She wanted to
join a convent at the age of 9, and she spent a lot of time praying for
priests.  She also advocated a child-like (non-intellectual) approach to
faith.  Kaye asked a French friend why Theresa had been made a saint, and
she said "Oh, because the other nuns were mean to her and she died very
young."  [I realize the technical reason she became a saint was that two
miracles were attributed to her intercession after she had been beatified,
but there must have been some reason people started praying to her to
interceded.]

I digress.  The reason I mention her is that outside of Liseaux on a hill
is the basilica of St. Theresa.  This edifice was constructed between
1929 and 1954 (hiatus in construction during the war).  It is one of the
largest 20th century churches in the world, and the last large church built
in France totally by public subscription.  The architecture is, umm, unusual,
to say the least.  I have a hard time describing.  Imagine what the
"Pavilion of Religion" would have looked like at the 1939 New York Worlds
Fair.  Or think of the architectural style in the 20th Century Fox logo.
Lots of ornamental columns that taper inward from bottom to top.  Kaye
pegged the style as "Futuro-Romanesque".  Much of the inside was covered
in mosaics with a Byzantine-Art Deco flavor.  The nave holds 3000 people,
to accommodate people who make pilgrimages there.  There is a regular parish,
but it normally worships in the crypt, also completely done in mosaic.
St. Theresa's right arm is in one of the side chapels, but the rest of
her remains are buried behind the church, along with her mother and father.
Kaye read later that during the summer at 9:30 in the evening there is
a service in the main part featuring laser images of St. Theresa's face
projected on all the pillars.  If anyone was ever going to design the
"Kathedral of Kitsch," this would be a good place to start.  Kaye and
I did like some of the stained glass, though.

From Liseaux we took a winding route back home, discovering along the
way the the "funny bridges" that Kaye saw marked on the map were actually
ferry crossings over the Seine.  But we didn't have to wait long, and
they were cheap.  We stopped off to see the ruins of the Abbey of Jumieges.
The abbey was on the site of a church destroyed by the Normans, then
rebuilt by the Normans in the 10th century.  Some of the pre-Romanesque
parts can still be seen.  There was a later Romanesque church built next
to the Norman church.  There were Gothic extensions put over the Romanesque
church, and because of the partial destruction, you can see how Gothic
windows were fitted over Romanesque ones.  The abbey was Benedictine, and
had ties with the abbey at Mont St. Michel.  The abbey was seized by the
state during the revolution (although the local parish at one time had
a chance to take it over).  It was sold to someone who started to use it
as a quarry for stone.  In 1802 he had the lantern (spire over the
transept) blown up to get at the stone in it.  The walls of the nave
are mostly there, but there is not much left forward of the nave.

The final miles back home presented us with the longest traffic "bouchon"
(cork) that we've encountered so far.  The lesson: don't be driving
towards Paris at 7pm on the last day of a nice weekend or long vacation.

---------------------

A few days later we met Harry Porter in Paris to go see the Marmottan
museum, which is best known for its collection of Monet's in the basement,
but also has paintings and art objects from many other periods.  This
museum is mentioned in "Linnea in Monet's Garden" which Sarah brought
along and amused herself with by matching pictures in it to paintings
on the wall.  [Yes, it's true.  Most of my knowledge of art comes from
a children's book.  But it has a lot of interesting information that is
not mentioned elsewhere, such as the painting "Impression--Sunrise", the
eponym for the Impressionist Movement, having been stolen from this
Museum.  Most of my knowledge of French history comes from another
children's book, "The History of France" by Lucien Bleys.  Kids' books are
great--you can read the quickly, lots of pictures, and you don't get
bogged in tracing the evolution of the role of the judiciary in the ruling
class.]  After visiting the museum, Luke and Sarah went for donkey rides.
The kids and some others rode donkeys that were hooked up to a little covered
wagon.  The most exciting part was when a little kid fell out of the back
of the wagon.  To top off this day, we visited the nearby Museum of
Eyeglasses.  I kid you not.  Antique eyeglasses and opera glasses, glasses
from famous people, glasses for reading while lying on your back, glasses
to avoid carsickness.  (They had small slits in front to look through,
ostensibly to make you focus far away.  The packaging said the design was
based on the observation that the driver of the car never gets carsick.)
The whole thing was in the back room and basement of the shop of an occulist
who has written a book on the history of glasses and binoculars. 

Trivial tidbit of the week: Many gas station owners live in the gas station.
Last week I glanced through a side door while paying to see the family
sitting down for Sunday dinner.  About a month ago, I happened on someone's
front hall while looking for the men's restroom.  Now that I've been looking,
I see that many gas stations, particularly on country roads, have curtains
in some of the windows.