Wednesday, 17 November 2010

Evariste Galois and the Four Musketeers













.... in early 1831 Evariste Galois was well known enough in Republican circles to be at a top dinner with another famous French democrat... Alexandre Dumas... writer of the Three Musketeers...

Dumas may well have written about tough men... but he couldn't walk the talk himself... so, when Evariste proposed a toast to the King whilst brandishing a menacing dagger, Dumas wimped out of a nearby window...

Of course, government spies were present, Evariste was arrested, and quickly put on trial for threatening to kill the king...

... in court Evariste's passionate nature and truthfulness was undermining his case so much the judge ordered him silent for his own good... but he needn't have worried... the jury was made up of Parisians... republicans... and despite his obvious guilt they set him free...

... justice of a sort... something Evariste's life was so very short of...

Above are our own Four Musketeers... Ash, me, Sam (playing Evariste), and David... intrepid adventurers in Paris to track down the forgotten man...

... twas a great little trip that would have been better if I hadn't forgotten which way Charles de Gaul airport was and charged us off in the wrong direction on the way back... just far enough in the wrong direction so we missed our plane home by 10 minutes and had to doss down overnight in a frankly rubbish airport...

c'est la vie


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