English has taken many words from French. Café, camouflage, fiancé… these are neutral words. When used in English, however, the word rendez-vous implies a certain naughtiness. In French, though, the word simply means a scheduled appointment. If you have a rendez-vous with the dentist, you are likely going to get your teeth cleaned!
Anyway, I had two rendez-vous recently, on the same day, with two different French men. The first one lasted three hours and involved lunch. The second took only about 45 minutes, during which time I received a glass of water. And so it goes…
1) I was to meet Monsieur D at his office, which happens to be at the Louvre. Turns out, there are lots of entrances to the Louvre, some of which are better marked than others. This one requires a RDV (that’s French shorthand for rendez-vous, the showing of an ID, the giving of a day pass, and the waiting for an escort. D came to greet me and we were off on a labyrinthine backstage tour of the world’s largest museum [okay, maybe 2nd largest after the Hermitage, but I think it’s a toss-up]. First to his office, which is on an upper floor in a wing not visited by most, at least from what I could tell. Then he showed me a courtyard that was under construction. Since it’s not really possible to build additions onto the Louvre (although he told me with a laugh that there are those who would like to see the original Tuileries Palace rebuilt on the West end of the current structure!), the plan for now at least is to make use of as much of the existing building as possible, and also ideally to profit from the spaces underneath the courtyard areas. He whisked me through several passkey entrances and then into the galleries, where he pointed out a few of his favorite pieces and showed me the error in Greek that has now been painted on the ceiling in one hall. Oops!
Then we were on our way down a few more hallways, and into a tiny staff elevator to an exit that led us to Le Fumoir, where we lunched on beautiful salades niçoises and shared a demi-bouteille of white wine, followed by a lovely chocolate dessert that came with delicious vanilla ice cream and a slice of burnt sugar such as you might find atop a crème caramel. We talked about work, and he asked me how I became attached to French and/or France (not an obvious attachment, by any means!), and about travelling in the States, and cultural oddities that are amusing and/or irritating.
We walked back though the behind-the-scenes Louvre and I was able to meet his colleague, C, who was the co-director of the Roman Art from the Louvre exhibit in the States, which is the reason I met D in the first place. She also does work at Princeton, it turns out. Before I left, D offered me two passes to the “new” Greek gallery opening for the following week. He had plans to be on vacation, but he encouraged me to attend.
I gave back my entry badge with some regret – I felt like a character in a French version of From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.
After a few hours’ time at the library, I picked up the kids from their centres – a bit late, it turned out, so M the Guide was waiting for us at home. And then I was off again, for RDV #2.
2) Monsieur N is a note-worthy French film critic with many scholarly publications to his name. A couple of years ago, he co-organized a special exhibit honoring one of my main research subjects; his collaborator was the archivist with whom I’ve been working for several years. That is not how I got in touch with Monsieur N. however. Two years ago, I answered a classified ad for a summer sublet in Paris. The woman who I dealt with in the negotiations and planning is a History professor at a prestigious French university. Upon meeting her, she mentioned that her husband is a famous French film critic, did I know him? Turns out, I had dinner with him in New York back in the day when he came to give a talk at NYU. Over the course of the summer, I spoke to him a couple of times and he gave me Monsieur N’s personal email address and suggested I contact him.
When I got the NEH grant, I contacted Monsieur N. for help getting into the Cinémathèque, which is a private institution dedicated to the cinema. He was instrumental in getting me in contact with the right people, and also mentioned that he’d be pleased to get together with me to talk about French films of the 30s, etc. And then, when I inquired about a RDV, he invited me to his apartment, in the evening. This felt a bit odd to me, but what was I going to do? Well, I asked for his indulgence and to forgive me for my sensitivity on this matter, but could we meet at a café near his place? His response: “Will I see you at 6:45?” So I went, with my map and his address and the code and the interphone number. But I left word with M the Guide to call me after 30 minutes to check in on me.
It was all fine. I drank the water he offered me and I mentioned briefly why I was in Paris this summer and also how I got his email address. Then I listened to him catalogue various filmmakers and their works and their casts and the main critics who have written about them. This is extremely French in terms of scholarship, I find. I was pleased to learn that we shared a common disdain for one overly fawning writer. He mostly talked, and I mostly listened, for about 45 minutes, then he went to his computer and sent me some emails; these contained articles that he has written and also names and emails of other French film critic types that might be useful to me. He encouraged me to contact them. And he mentioned twice that I should keep him informed of my progress.
That was obviously my cue to leave. So I shook his hand and thanked him for his time and headed out. My explanation of how I came to know this person probably took longer than our RDV, but at least I have this person in my circle and I can surely be back in touch with him if I think he could be helpful to me.
Then I returned home and collapsed. It had been quite a day!
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