Who owns history? The aphorism goes, “History is written by winners,” but what if it’s not entirely clear who wins? What if countries win, lose, and draw their way through a cycle of wars and conquests and capitulations, until a tide of political reformation washes over all their sand castles and leaves… a reconstructed, 300-year-old…
There are so many good things about my new job at the Fortress of Louisbourg, it’s hard to know where to start talking about it. That’s also a recurring problem within the job: we’re on site to “interpret” the historical significance of Louisbourg to visitors who, in many cases, know nothing about its role in…
We’re sitting in a terrace outside Moulin D’Or, a restaurant in the Place du Théâtre, one of Lille’s many town squares. Actually we’re in the second-class terrace – the covered tables are for customers ordering food, mostly mussels or meat pies; mere coffee drinkers like ourselves sit on the outside of the fenced-in patio, closer…
