Different views on ecology, religion and the human body help explain a stunning boom in modern men and women choosing to be cremated instead of a traditional burial.
country: France
Stay informed on France with Worldcrunch. In-depth coverage of French politics, economic trends, societal changes, and cultural events with expert translations. Highlights include Paris, Lyon, Marseille, French cinema, gastronomy, modern literature, and cultural events.
Pleyel pianos, founded in 1809, built pianos for Chopin and other masters. In the end, it couldn’t find a new business strategy to survive against Asian competition.
Wednesday, November 12, 2014 CHINA-U.S. AGREE ON GAS EMISSIONS Presidents Xi Jinping and Barack Obama signed a landmark deal to limit their greenhouse gas emissions, The Washington Post reports. China, for the first time, agreed to cap its output by 2030 or even earlier if possible, and pledged to increase the share of non-fossil fuels […]
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius was smart to reject a pact that offered no long-term guarantees for Iran to dismantle its nuclear program. A Le Monde editorial.
When it comes to offering comfort and counseling to parents dealing with their Internet-era teenagers, the French government is shelling out major cash.
Babs tried and failed, so did the peeps working for Beyonce and even French President Francois Hollande. Once online, information beats to the sound of its own drum.
IVRY-SUR-SEINE — The Plateau special planning district in this small town south of Paris could almost be mistaken for a regular construction site. Since 2007 the multidisciplinary artist Stefan Shankland has guided the construction of some 1,000 apartments according to an “action research” program launched by the city government and developed over the course of […]
Worms, crickets and the like are showing up at fine European eateries. But this is not just a gastronomical fad, as population growth means finding new sources of protein in unlikely critters.
As demand for organ transplants skyrockets, a new artificial heart and other sophisticated prostheses are among the medical-tech advancements raising troubling questions.
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Diary Of A Double Mastectomy
A Parisian breast cancer patient kept this journal in the week leading up to her surgery, and sent it to Le Monde.
PARIS — The loud complaints of European leaders castigating Americans as vile spies who are betraying their allies are quite surprising. Oh, of course, perhaps they felt obligated to say something while they debated together in Geneva about what the common EU reaction to U.S. spying should be. What is surprising is the seeming astonishment […]
PARIS — Desperately wanting to find their soul mates, people who use dating sites often fall victim to pointless conversations, hurt feelings, and even addictive or irrational behaviors. We spoke with four disappointed users, who share their stories. Julia, 30, stewardess “After being single for a year and a half, I got tired of not […]
Let’s call her Juliet. This young woman is one of the few who accepted to tell her story, under certain conditions of course: no mention of her name, not even her first name, of her studies or her former university. “During my Masters, the relationship between my thesis supervisor and I gradually worsened. At first, […]
The explosion of digital technologies and other techonological advances will continue to draw casualties from a surprisingly wide array of employment sectors.
After being arrested by French police during a school field trip, then deported with her family to Kosovo, 15-year-old Leonarda has become a symbol of Roma everywhere.
TOULOUSE — After a year of work and five million euros in investments, Sigfox, a start-up from Labège, near Toulouse, southern France, has just finished deploying a new communications network — an Internet of Things — in 95% of the cities in France. Sensors spread out across cities and their suburbs will be able to […]
Bad-mouthing your colleagues can actually have unexpected benefits, both for the gossiper and the company itself, says the French author of a controversial new book.
A young climber discovered a treasure believed to be from a 1966 Indian plane crash and turned it in to authorities. Now nearby alpine towns fear wreckage seekers may come in droves.
SAINT-GIRONS — Jean Benazet is still in shock. In the early morning of Sept. 9, he discovered 30 of his sheep lying motionless at the bottom of a cliff. It was clear right away that they had all fallen to their death. He and his herd had been spending the season in the summer pastures […]
PARIS — Are Nobel Prizes a wicked luxury? This year, like every year for more than a century, Scandinavian juries will honor researchers in physics, chemistry and medicine, an author, and a man or a woman who contributed to peace. The season will end with the presentation of the latest prize, created a little more […]
PARIS — “Camille, watch out! Your hair!” Myriam calls to her 7-year-old daughter as she leans against the wall, temporarily crushing her blond ringlets, curled with an iron and hair-sprayed early in the morning. Though it’s Saturday, mother and daughter have woken early to leave their home in northern France by 8:30 a.m. They are […]
YUTZ — Use a digital tablet in gym class? You might smile, but in room A101 of the Jean-Mermoz Junior High in northeastern France, the visitor today is Luc Di Pol, whose job title for the regional education authority is digital supervisor for physical education. Here in the mostly rural French department of Moselle, Di […]
PARIS — As French lawmakers consider new legislation that would make it a crime to pay for sex, it’s becoming clear that we tend to know very little about the clientele of prostitutes. Based on the few reports that have been published on the subject, between 12% and 18% of men (and less than 1% […]
ANGOULEME — What if, thanks to technology, you could literally dive into pictures? This technological prowess would make dreams of unexplored applications come true, especially with regard to defense simulation or the presentation of urban projects. Andreas Koch, a 54-year-old animation entrepreneur in France, has reinvented the 360-degree image. The idea is not altogether new. […]
SCHILTIGHEIM — We didn’t see the big grey sedan coming, before it had stopped in the middle of the parking lot in the downtown shopping center. There are a dozen little boys killing time between the parked cars, drinking soda and talking football. Welcome to the Marais housing project in Schiltigheim, on the outskirts of […]
PARIS — Five years after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, it seems that we are passing through an unprecedented layer of thick fog. We see one country suddenly accelerating while its neighbor suffers a “sudden stop.” But this isn’t the first time. The world was consumed by the same sort of uncertainty five years after […]
Imagine a future where all high school students could go on to study whatever subject they want, where a university isn’t forced to limit the number of applicants it can accept or base its enrollment policy on grades or finances, but only on the wishes of students. It’s the dream of an education revolution that […]
A school in the low-income banlieues of Paris has been living in the digital age for three years. Results are starting to show.
Exhibitions in Matisse’s favorite French town provide new and informative contexts for the artist’s work. Given his fame, that’s no small feat.
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When Rabbis Lie
A psychological portrait of Gilles Bernheim, France’s former Chief Rabbi, disgraced last spring in a scandal of plagiarism, a bogus philosophy degree and deep human denial.
President Hollande has the power to strike militarily without parliamentary consent. But democratic and political necessities require it.
Properties of Saudi princes, the sultan of Brunei, billionaires from Qatar and Asia, and a few of the wealthiest people in France, Parisian palaces-turned-hotels are a high-rolling industry.
“I would not call it a war, but the sanction of a monstrous violation of human rights,” the French president tells Le Monde.
GUIPAVAS — In the Jacques Brel retirement home in Brittany’s town of Guipavas, Marcelle Plougoum looks at Jean-Noël Michel tenderly. They first met in a medical center for senior citizens, and have loved each other for three years in this modern residential community surrounded by gardens. “We stay together all the time,” Marcelle explains. “Being […]
To counter Islam, conservative groups are twisting the ideas of the Enlightenment writer famous for his advocacy of freedom of religion.
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Nestle And The Chocolate Factory
In the French city of Noisiel, the old Menier chocolate factory is a grand architectural landmark of the industrial age. It’s now the luxurious headquarters of Nestle France.
Youthful believers in Brittany target vacationers with God’s word, hoping to return “asleep” Catholics to the path to faith.
Djamel Mastouri was told as a child that he’d never walk again. He went on to become an Olympic champion and an accomplished French soldier.
SETE – French poet Paul Valéry called it “the singular island” – an expression that the inhabitants of Sète have adopted as their own. How else to describe this quasi-archipelago at the foot of Mount Saint-Clair, bordered in the north by the string of lakes that make up the Etang de Thau, and in the […]