week after Jean-Marie and Marine Le Pen (independently of each other) it is the turn of Emmanuel Macron celebrate the Maid of Orleans today for the annual festival that it is devoted to Orleans.
If the National Front has made its icon over the past thirty years, the French heroine, doomed to stake in 1431, has always been a figure disputed between the political camps, and this is probably not over. Then right, left, or beyond the divisions, as would the ambitious Minister of Economy, who just wants to break free? Answers Olivier Bouzy, director of the Center Joan of Arc in Orléans (Loiret).
Can we classify politically Joan of Arc?
Olivier . Bouzy There is a consistent swinging from the start between the major political forces in the name of the values it is supposed to embody: national unity and resistance to the invader. In the middle of the XVIII th century, the idea began to catch on a Jeanne would represent the nation, and not necessarily royalty. Gradually, it will drag on the Republican side, especially during the Revolution. Then Napoleon who erected a statue in Orléans for propaganda against the English enemy. From 1840, there is a net republicanization symbol under the influence of the historian Michelet.
When she slips right?
Gradually, from the defeat to Prussia in 1870. Jeanne became the symbol of the lost provinces, Alsace and Lorraine, where she was born. This nationalism takes on a more militaristic, and the heroine finds monopolized by the Catholic right. Especially at the end of XIX th century, the debate agree on his beatification, which will culminate in May 1920 and his canonization. It will become a central figure of the Vichy regime.
This changes after the war?
Yes, and this time it is the Communists, led by Thorez, celebrating the little girl of the people rising against the enemy to defend the nation, which has been unable hereditary aristocracy. Joan of Arc was even studied in Soviet military academies!
How the FN came to appropriating his face?
In the 1960s and 1970s, it falls into some disuse, and Jean-Marie Le Pen seizes. The influence of the far right is a little loose with the handover to Marine Le Pen. The success of Luc Besson’s film, in 1999, has done much with the French, which most see as the face of the FN. Today, it exceeds the cleavages, it is more consensual. For the Republican Left or sovereignists, there is a window of
Emmanuel Macron takes pleasure in being where we least expect it. Demonstration today, with its small tower Orleans, where he was invited by the mayor (LR) of the city to chair the annual festivals of homage to Joan of Arc. And it’s not pray, even if that land is far away from the traditional economy minister skill set. Already accused by the left of flirting come to the lands of the opposition, Macron did this time very strong in the symbolic, celebrating a figure rather listed to the right in recent decades.
His speech, scheduled for last fifteen minutes, should seek to demonstrate that the Maid of Orleans belongs to no camp … as it claims the move for its Power up!, launched in early April. “The will of the Minister, is to revive the Republican side to the far right discourse that has appropriated the image of Joan of Arc,” explained the Minister’s entourage.
His speaking will be scrutinized in detail. Especially by the Prime Minister, who will appreciate probably little Emmanuel Macron come talk republican values … at the heart of his political position. A stone in the garden of Manuel Valls, so … and perhaps in that of François Hollande. The Minister of Economy, who are ready presidential ambitions, as he will benefit – as it has done repeatedly in recent weeks – to overcome a bit of a president at the summit its unpopularity?
VIDEO. May 8: Macron party Jeanne d’Arc in Orleans and it does not please everyone
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