The Ile-de-France (Routledge Revivals)

Marc Bloch
First published in English in 1971, The Ile-de-France presents the reader with a study of the countryside around Paris through the eyes of Marc Bloch, a man with his own view of history. It looks at the area’s origins, extent, geographical features, archaeology, and past local histories. The book extends beyond the region of Paris itself and offers the reader a masterful demonstration of the methodology of such enquiries and their purpose within the wider context of historical research. The work is particularly valuable in that it covers a wide variety of subjects and makes extensive use of archives and original documents.

Disneyfying Ile De France?

Anne-Marie d’Hauteserre
The book captures the history, as well as the meaning and the value of the on-going partnership between the French state and the Walt Disney Company, remembering that it involved from the start more than a tourism project. It examines how the combined aspirations of the French state and the American Company transformed Val d’Europe as the sole potential location in Europe for the Company’s theme parks while allowing the state to retain its egalitarian ideals. Most critics believed the French state had caved into every demand of the Company. No one ever mentioned profits of the state that it would then invest to support other projects. The first part of the book investigates the encounter between the partners and the reasons why a welfarist state encouraged penetration by a capitalist enterprise, alongside the Company’s reasoning. The second section reveals the continued cooperation between the two entities in the management of the urbanization of Val d’Europe from the opening of the first Park and the start of a new major tourism development, in spite of criticisms and fluctuating attendance in the parks. The third part highlights more recent actions of the partners to create a formidable urban tourism pole that will attract ever more visitors, while still critically examining their effectiveness and sustainability.

The Ile de France and the Golden Age of Transatlantic Travel

Thomas Kepler
When the luxury liner Ile de France sailed into New York harbor for the first time in 1927, she brought to America the first great, coordinated example of what the French then called L'Art Moderne. The revolutionary Art Deco interiors found on the Ile de France were unlike anything previously seen on the North Atlantic and set a standard in ocean liner décor for decades to come. Her glittering passenger lists of the 1920s and 1930s were the envy of other shipping lines: Marlene Dietrich, Gloria Swanson, John D. Rockefeller, Buster Keaton, Barbara Hutton, Maurice Chevalier, Will Rogers, Cary Grant, Marie Curie and Arturo Toscanini were but a few of the luminaries that graced its salons. The Ile de France served heroically in World War II as a troopship, and in peacetime came to the rescue of other ships nine times during her career, most notably when she rescued more than 700 survivors from the stricken Andrea Doria following its collision with the Stockholm in 1956. In a last gasp of immortality, the Ile de France appeared in the epic disaster film The Last Voyage standing in for a fictional, stricken liner. Forgetting her ignoble end, the Ile deFrance is still held in awe and reverence both in her native France and by the maritime community worldwide. Although neither the fastest nor the largest liner of her time, one writer said of the Ile de France, “She was handsome without being grand, comfortable without being overstuffed, class-conscious without living by exclusions.” The penchant the Ile de France had for attracting the famous, the talented, the youthful, along with her special chic and verve ensured her place in the pantheon of immortal Atlantic liners.

The Ile-de-France

Marc Bloch
First published in English in 1971, The Ile-de-France presents the reader with a study of the countryside around Paris through the eyes of Marc Bloch, a man with his own view of history. It looks at the area's origins, extent, geographical features, archaeology, and past local histories. The book extends beyond the region of Paris itself and offers the reader a masterful demonstration of the methodology of such enquiries and their purpose within the wider context of historical research. The work is particularly valuable in that it covers a wide variety of subjects and makes extensive use of ar.

Report

United States. Congress. House