French, One Curiosity at a Time

Why are so many comics in France made for adults? A lot of it goes back to one guy, René Goscinny, the guy who wrote Astérix. In 1956 he stood up for comic artists’ rights and got fired for it. Twelve years later he was the boss, and his own artists turned on him.

The French high school protests have been all over the news this autumn. Not enough teachers, 36 kids to a class, no AC in a heatwave. Those are the headlines. Underneath them is a 17-year-old who fainted during her exam, a teacher who walked away after twelve years, and one odd fact: French high schoolers don’t have the right to strike. So what exactly are they doing out there?

Why do French people love comics so much? I've wondered that for a long time, and it turns out there isn't one answer, there are a few, and they're all good stories. So I'm doing this one as a few short episodes instead of one long one. This first one is the origin story, and it surprisingly starts with Mickey Mouse.

I've seen these book covers all over France. Cream colored or white, basically blank, just a title and the author's name. For the longest time I assumed they were for really old classics. But that’s actually not true. This episode goes into why so many French books have blank looking covers.

What's up with the French rooster? I've seen it everywhere, on jerseys, on restaurant logos, in store names, but I was never taught what it means. This is a short episode about where the bird actually comes from, about the emperor who turned it down, and about the word cocorico, which French roosters say and French front pages shout. A short and light one.

Can you be happy when other people are not? This past June, more than five hundred thousand French eighteen-year-olds opened an envelope with that question inside, and got four hours to answer it in writing. Philosophy is mandatory in French high school, and I've wondered for a long time what they actually learn in there. So I dug in, and then went one step further: I took this year's exam...

Someone on YouTube has a theory: Mandarin Chinese speakers are better at French pronunciation... unless they also speak English. Quite the emotional roller coaster for me, in about five seconds. I went up so high, because I speak Mandarin. And then I was dropped to the bottom, because I speak English too. So this episode is me checking the theory against the actual research. Turns out some of it i...

The French might be some of the funniest people in the world, and half the time the rest of us can't even tell. The wink never comes. This episode is me learning how much of what I'd read as rude, or maybe flirtatious, was actually a joke sailing right past me.

In Paris you ask for a pain au chocolat. Drive down to Toulouse and the exact same pastry is a chocolatine, and people there have real feelings about the difference. In this episode I talk about the names’ differences and origin, and how I ended up eating a snail pastry. 

Every time I'm in France I notice it. Smoke on every terrace, smoke coming through the restaurant window, a lot more than I'm used to in the US. This episode I finally looked into it. Why?

My French coworker basically never did her nails. Then she came back from a trip to France with red ones, and I quietly decided this meant something about France. It probably didn't mean anything. I got curious about the red anyway... and one of the first things I found was a 1929 French newspaper explaining that red fingernails look like amputated fingers.

In a French novel, a nervous guy rehearses excuses for cancelling a date. He rejects one for being "trop Camus"... too Camus. Too Camus? I had to find out what a dead philosopher sounds like.

Midnight, Montreal airport. I ask the guy at the INFO booth a simple question in English... and the conversation just quietly dies in the air between us. Everyone in this city speaks English, so what exactly happened? That little silence turned out to have a couple of centuries of history packed inside it.

When I asked French people why nobody has AC, I got shrugs, a lecture about shutters, and one theory involving the entire month of August. I never got a straight answer, so this summer I dug up the real one. Turns out some of the rumors were true... just much, much weirder than the versions I'd heard. Got a topic idea or just want to say hi? Leave a comment. Powered by Firstory Hosting

Four courses. For a seven-year-old. At a public school. I'd heard French kids eat lunches that sound more like a sit-down meal than a cafeteria tray, so I went to find out what's actually on it, who decides, and whether the fennel really gets eaten. Got a topic idea or just want to say hi? Leave a comment down below. Powered by Firstory Hosting

Sad endings almost feel like a French movie signature. But why? Why do so many French films resist happy endings, clear closure, or emotional payoff in the Hollywood sense? From a Paris audience yelling at an American movie in 1929 to the French New Wave, Cannes drama, and films built to start arguments, this episode follows why French cinema can feel so oddly comfortable leaving you a little unco...

A first curiosity: why does coffee in France feel so iconic... and sometimes taste so bad? Leave a comment and share your thoughts: https://open.firstory.me/user/cmosdbxkb06p701va24c24in5/comments Powered by Firstory Hosting