Renaissance France

Europe is an astonishingly successful place. In this dazzling new history, best-selling author Simon Jenkins grippingly tells the story of its evolution from warring peoples to peace, wealth and freedom - a story that twists and turns from Greece and Rome, through the Dark Ages, the Reformation and the French Revolution, to the Second World War and up to the present day. Jenkins takes in leaders from Julius Caesar and Joan of Arc to Wellington and Angela Merkel as well as cultural figures from Aristotle to Shakespeare and Picasso.

In "Écoute Audio 5/2019" geht es in die Vergangenheit. Frankreich feiert 500 Jahre Renaissance: 1519 wurde mit dem Bau des prächtigen Schlosses Chambord begonnen und 1519 starb Leonardo da Vinci. Gastronomisch beschäftigen wir uns mit der Frage, welches "ausländische" Gericht den Franzosen das liebste ist. Und wir nehmen das château fort unter die Lupe, ein "Schloss" das so ganz anders ist als Chambord.

In every nation, in every era of history, there are inevitably one or two places that become the symbol of the times. Mention Valley Forge to an American and it will immediately conjure up visions of a hard won fight for freedom. Likewise, the word Dunkirk said to a Briton will elicit a sense of both pride and horror at the lives lost and saved at that desperate point in World War II. For the French, and those who study their history, Versailles is a symbol of, as Charles Dickens once put it, "the best of times...the worst of times."