Anny, the cynic and once Francophile in me wants to say that early on the
French Government, it appears, was into marketing - putting or burying fame
all in one place and then making it into a global destination target!
Certainly that was not the original reason why much of Frances cultural
wealth got buried in the same place. But a tourist economy trumps all other
intentions, I suspect, and so France has discovered another level of
mortuary meaning.
(Somebody recently said that if Tourism were a country, it would be the
third or fourth largest in the world!)
I also suspect there are the families of both famous and/or not who prefer
cremation - inaccessibility of remains becomes a virtue. Or, if you are
really interested, read the books or look at the art of the beloved
deceased.
Yet, to contradict, I love the Vietnam Memorial as a site of grievance - and
its huge service to the needs of this country to take account the dark facts
of that way. May the Memorial for the Iraq dead (both Iraqi and 'Coalition
Forces' }be enshrined in Crawford, Texas - I say. Bush should never left to
live with himself again. I diverge!
As to where to bury and enshrine poets, it's kind of a startling thought -
but sweetly curious for the imagination to wonder - if there could be a
national burial ground in the USA, Canada, Australia or anyone else. Imagine
- in the USA - Wallace Stevens, Dickinson, Frost, Lowell, Rexroth, Duncan,
Langston Hughes, etc., etc., all buried in shared grounds. Talk about
possibilities for creative landscaping! (And the politics of getting in.
One hesitates to think of National Endowment for the Arts application to get
your remains into a 'plot'!
Just off the cuff, a single line from Beverly Dahlen's recent book, A
Reading 18 - 20:
Mourning becomes etc.
I am not sure precisely why that line rings some bells, hard one. I am sure
it was written during the overwhelming number of deaths from AIDS as that
epidemic took off in the eighties.
Stephen V
http://stephenvincent.net/blog/
> I googled Père Lachaise Cemetery because I had the idea of quoting it in a
> poem, see here for God's sake who is in there besides the ones that Mark
> mentioned: Doré, the same Abelard, Balzac, Isadora Duncan, Max Ernst, Gérard
> de Nerval, and I haven't scrolled down the page, yet.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Burials_at_P%C3%A8re_Lachaise_Cemetery
>
>
>
> On 3/30/07, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>> You pass Chopin, Berlioz, Yves Montand and Simone Signoret on the way
>> from the one to the other. Pretty neat, tho it definitely could use a
>> cafe. Every decent cemetery should have a cafe.
>>
>> Don't tell Starbucks.
>>
>> The tombs of the Rothchilds are in the Montparnasse cemetery, near
>> where I used to live. Their very plain crypts are marked with a larfe
>> R, reminiscent of the double R of Rolls Royce.
>>
>> Check outthis funereal news in the New York Times:
>> http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/30/us/30ashes.html
>>
>> Mark
>>
>> At 04:34 PM 3/30/2007, you wrote:
>>> I guess I would just split myself and gather around both. Never been
>> there
>>> even if I was twice in Paris but just for a short stay.
>>>
>>> On 3/30/07, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Which in French means "don't gambl;e with tough guys." Always good
>> advice.
>>>>
>>>> Last time I was in Pere Lachaise more folks were gathered arounf
>>>> Apollinaire than Morrison. Something to cheer about.
>>>>
>>>> Mark
>>>>
>>>> At 03:33 PM 3/30/2007, you wrote:
>>>>> Sorry, I meant to add that in Paris, where Jim
>>>>> Morrison is buried, they have a French saying that
>>>>> translates roughly as "don't put the cart before The
>>>>> Doors."
>>>>>
>>>>> Candice
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> __________________________________________________________________
>>>> __________________
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