The Need for Roots by Simone Weil

Author:Simone Weil
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 1952-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

1 Ecole Normale Supérieure: situated rue d’Ulm in Paris. Institution created by the Convention in 1794, reorganized under the Empire in 1808. Its object is to form an élite of teachers for secondary schools, and, in practice, teachers for all the higher branches of education are drawn from it. [Translator.]

2 Tour de France: one of the last vestiges of the guild or corporation system. Young workmen serving their apprenticeship were known as compagnons, and in order to perfect themselves in their trade, used to undertake a journey on foot across France, following a fixed itinerary which took in the principal centres of production. The arrival of the railway gradually caused this very ancient custom to die out. [Translator.]

3 J.O.C.: stands for Jeunesse Ouvrière Chrétienne. Organization founded by the French Catholic clergy, chiefly concerned with exercising an influence on working-class youth from the professional and social points of view. In the latter respect, it bears a certain affinity to the Boy Scout Movement. [Translator.]

4 C.G.T., or Confédération Générale du Travail: founded towards the end of the last century, a few years after the law of 1884 authorizing the existence of tradeunions. This organization has dominated the industrial workers’ trade-union movement in France. At the height of the general strike of 1947, a split occurred between extremist and non-extremist elements, the latter regrouping themselves under the banner of Force Ouvrière. The C.G.T. still remains, however, the largest single industrial workers’ trade-union organization; the second largest being the C.F.T.C. (Confédération Française des Travailleurs Chrétiens), with the aforesaid Force Ouvrière coming third. [Translator.]

5 chantier de jeunesse: type of instructional centre created by the Vichy Government with the object of giving young people on leaving school a supplementary education and practical experience in a trade. [Translator.]

6 Budé Library: the Guillaume Budé Library was started some years ago by the association of the same name, with the object of providing the better-class reading public with the best possible texts in the Greek, Latin and French classics, translated or revised, as the case may be, and annotated by experts. [Translator.]

7 camps de compagnons: see note on p. 65. These camps were apparently organized on a parallel basis to the chantiers, and were designed to replace the period of military service prohibited by the German occupants. [Translator.]

8 C.G.T.: see note p. 64. [Translator.]

9 Tour de France: see note p. 52. [Translator.]

10 Chantiers or Compagnons: see notes pp. 65 and 71. [Translator.]

11 ‘out of it’: as in text. [Translator.]

12 Confidences and Marie-Claire: two illustrated weeklies addressed to the feminine public, whose apparently elevated tone fails to disguise their profound moral and intellectual mediocrity. [Translator.]

13 ‘in it’: as in text. [Translator.]

14 the financier on the shoemaker: reference to La Fontaines’s fable ‘Le Savetier et le Financier’, vol. 8, fable no. 2. [Translator.]

15 Tour de France: see note p. 52. [Translator.]

16 Marie-Claire: see note p. 79. [Translator.]

17 … ‘disgrace to France’: prostitution ceased to be officially recognized in France in 1947. [Translator.]

18 Belleville: working-class quarter in the N.E. of Paris. [Translator.]

19 Jocistes: members of the J.

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