1000 Years of Annoying the French

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We Brits feel no resentment about 'losing' our American colonies. We're quite fond of independent Americans, and see them as distant cousins who can't spell our language properly. We've cooperated with America pretty amicably on projects like liberating Europe and inventing pop music. And we have no desire whatsoever to try and govern Texas.” King Edward was married to the daughter of one of the warring Anglo-Saxon earls, but he had taken a vow of chastity, and he had no direct heir.” One of the most frequent questions I get when doing readings and talks is: why is there such a love-hate relationship between the French and the Brits?

1000 Years of Annoying the French: Stephen Clarke

This is of course the Prince of Wales’s motto to this day, though subsequent princes have not adopted John of Bohemia’s custom of fighting while tied up and blind.” Journey across China’s epic history—through millennia of early innovation to modern dominance. And upcoming from The Shortest History Series— The Shortest History of England! This book starts with the events leading up to the Battle of Hastings, where the Duke of Normandy (which is in France) had a very decisive victory against the British. It is explained that the naming of Normandy came from the Normans (Vikings) who settled there. This is all just to point out that the British may have lost, but not (just) to the French. Though technically, the invading army did come from France. This pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the book. William Faulkner was talking about the Southern USA when he said that “the past is never dead. In fact, it’s not even past.” But exactly the same thing can be said about the French and the all English-speakers – no matter what we try to do in the present, the past will always march up and slap us in the face. I'm not saying we're eternal enemies, just that we can't ignore our pasts. And that our past is studded with wonderful stories of betrayal, distrust, violence and all-too-rare attempts to be nice to each other. Starting with William the Conqueror (who, contrary to what the French might claim, wasn't French at all, and died fighting the Paris-based King of the Franks) and going right up to the horrendous diplomatic gaffes inflicted on recent French presidents, I have sifted through our common history for tellable tales, and kept only the juiciest nuggets. Can you have a juicy nugget? Well, I suppose a certain fastfood restaurant would say yes, but I meant the golden kind. How about: I kept only the goldenest historical nuggets. Goldenest? Is that a word? Sorry, I'm rambling. You know what, I’m going to let the book's introduction speak for itself – I think I explained it a bit more clearly there. Here goes:

You don’t have to be a Brit or an Anglophile or even a Francophobe to appreciate this book but it helps. Stephen Clarke takes a potted look at 1000 years of Anglo-French relations from the Norman invasion of Britain in 1066 to President Sarkozy’s visit in 2008 and reveals that all of France’s failures in those thousand years were due to the machinations of the Brits and France’s successes (few and far between, according to Clarke) were actually achieved by someone else who was distinctly not French. Is monsieur annoyed by now? Tres bien.

1000 Years of Annoying the French :: Stephen Clarke :: Book 1000 Years of Annoying the French

From the Norman (not French) Conquest, to XXX, it is a light-hearted - but impeccably researched - account of all out great-fallings out. Harold didn’t need to hire expensive lawyers to dream up a credible defence, though – what hostage is going to refuse to take an oath to a man who is holding him hostage? And what jurisdiction did this Norman foreigner have in England?”

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Philippe also brought along musicians - mainly trumpeters and drummers - to scare the enemy. Even then, French music was known to terrify the English.”

1000 Years of Annoying the French by Stephen Clarke - Goodreads

The narrative flows well and is littered with jokes such as those mentioned above. But this is not history dumbed down, it is as informative as any core text book. Who knew that modern champagne was invented in England, that Dom Perignon tried to remove the fizziness from the French stuff because the bottles kept exploding whereas the English went crazy for it and the fizzier the better? Granted, this is more of a fun book than a history reference, and the writer isn't outright hostile to the French and simply retold the facts; but in a biased manner. Beginning with William the Conqueror (not French) and ending with Nicolas Sarkozy (French), Clarke covers a fair bit of ground including food, battles, trade, battles, Canada, battles, wine, battles, Voltaire, battles, the French Revolution and battles. Oh, and there are about seven chapters dedicated to Napoleon.

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A laugh out loud hilarious and perceptive look at the history of England and France and their relationship for the past one thousand years. This is no dry history book, but a humorous recounting with lots of pithy statements and witty asides. I loved the humorous approach because it was not politically correct and because humor often allows you to get closer to the truth and reality of a thing. A bonus is that the humor is on point most of the times which by itself this saves the book in many cases. You learn a lot about the impact of France on the world. In many cases, as the book has a clear anti-French bias (albeit tongue-in-cheek apparently) Clarke takes pains to point out where our common understanding of the influence of France on history is misplaced. Clarke describes a broad range of amusing encounters between the Brits and the French. Some of the examples were quite unconvincing though, in my opinion. For instance, his use of Voltaire was quite ambivalent. At first Clarke uses him as an important example for French disinterest in Canada, but later on he writes a whole chapter on Voltaire not being representative for his fellow countrymen. Which is fine, but then don’t use him as a French example in other chapters. I also was a bit troubled by the guillotine. Clarke points out that the Brits already had a similar invention called the Halifax. That may be so, but unless Guillotine used this Halifax for his own design, I don’t really see the point. Did Guillotine even know of the existence o The love is easy to explain – despite what we might say in public, we find each other irresistibly sexy. The hate is more of a problem – for a start, it’s mistrust rather than hatred. But why is it even there, in these days of Entente Cordiale and European peace?