General Charles de Gaulle, tall and center, walks down the Champs \u00c9lys\u00e9es after the liberation of Paris from Nazi occupation in August 1944. \u00a0(Wikimedia Commons public domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
He was, to put it mildly, a personality<\/em>. \u00a0Here are a few quotations from him:<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cSince a politician never believes what he says, he is quite surprised to be taken at his word.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHow can anyone govern a nation that has two hundred and forty-six different kinds of cheese?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe better I get to know men, the more I find myself loving dogs.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe graveyards are full of indispensable men.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I am right, I get angry. Churchill gets angry when he is wrong. We are angry at each other much of the time.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I want to know what France thinks, I ask myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s a humanizing detail that I find touching: \u00a0Charles de Gaulle and his wife had three children. \u00a0The youngest of them, Anne (1928-1948),\u00a0had Down\u2019s syndrome\u00a0and died of pneumonia at the age of 20. General de\u00a0Gaulle always had a particular love for Anne; one Colombey resident later recalled how the general\u00a0used to walk with Anne hand-in-hand around his\u00a0property there, caressing her and talking quietly with her about things that she could understand. \u00a0When he died, he was buried next to her. \u00a0Greatness isn\u2019t exempt from ordinary mortal trials and everyday sorrows.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Posted from Le Chesnay, France<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 Charles de Gaulle bestrides the twentieth-century history of France like a colossus. \u00a0He was the\u00a0leader of the Free French Forces\u00a0during the Second World War, the head of the provisional government of liberated France from 1944 to 1946, the founder of France\u2019s \u201cFifth Republic,\u201d\u00a0and the nation\u2019s president\u00a0from 1959 to 1969. \u00a0The country\u2019s main airport […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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