over the idea of planting a glass pyramidnsmack in the middle of the CournNapoleon. The project for the “GrandnLouvre” having thus been “approved”nby the responsible commission, it wasntransmitted on January 25, 1984, tonthe president of the Republic, who innearly February gave it his “definitivenaccord.”nThis autocratic decision stirred up anhullabaloo, which raged on for morenthan a year. Supporters of the projectnwent into dithyrambs over this “piecenof Lalique crystal,” this “visible tip ofnan iceberg,” this “feather on top of anhat” which (unlike some unobtrusivenParis metro entrance) was to act as an”signal” to errant tourists, as theyngroped their way around the “GrandnLouvre,” looking for an entrance.nFinally yielding to the clamor for anfull-scale model, the sponsors agreed innApril 1985 to have a crane hoist fournwires into position, to enable the criticsnto “judge for themselves.” Impressednbecause he could see right through thisndeceptive exercise in not-so-solid geometry,nJacques Chirac cautiously declarednthat he was “not at all hostile tonthe realization of this pyramid.” Nonwonder! A new round of parliamentarynelections was due in a few months’ntime, and the conservative mayor ofnParis knew that if he made a faux pas atnthis point and declared himself ferociouslynopposed to this avant-gardenwonder, he would promptly be consignednby his socialist adversaries to thentrash-heap of diehard reactionaries.nLess predictable than this implicitncapitulation to the “wave of the future”nwas the vox populi. By this time thenreading and listening masses of Francenhad been thoroughly worked over by anclever propaganda campaign designednto prove that, as I.M. Pei had explainednto the left-wing newspaper Liberation,n”The pyramid is in the tradition of LenNotre” — that is, of Louis XIV’s greatnlandscape gardener, who, havingnthoughtfully died a century or twonbefore, could not possibly contradictnthis sweeping affirmation. Accordingnto a public-opinion survey undertakennat this time, 48 percent of those pollednsaid they favored the pyramid, 34 percentnwere still opposed. Even moreninstructive were other revolutions: 85npercent of those interviewed did notnknow just what the Cour Napoleonnconsisted of, 50 percent had nevern42/CHRONICLESnheard of I.M. Pel’s plans to build annalluring subterranean “forum” undernthe pyramid and in the middle of thensquare, and 50 percent had never visitednthe Louvre!nThese findings, in my opinion, confirmnthe underlying validity of whatnJean-Frangois Revel, apropos of Frenchnintellectual fads, wrote in 1975: “The.nprofound desire of the bourgeois publicnin societies of consumption is to benboth flattered and fooled. Flattered, bynhaving a minority-type, aristocratic culturenreconstituted for its personal enjoymentnin the midst of a class culturenwhich deprives it of its elite status.nFooled because it agrees to accept thisnselect, minority-type culture as a simulacrum,nas a phantom substitute for thenreal thing . . . fooled too and by itselfnbecause this culture, presented as revolutionarynand even ‘proletarian,’ is, as itnknows perfectly well, simply a phase ofnworldly narcissism.”nThe fascinating thing about thatn1985 poll is that it involved a majoritynof persons who had only a hazy idea ofnjust what was involved, but who werennevertheless willing, on the basis ofnhearsay, to declare that in principle andna priori they were for the erection of annultra-modern glass pyramid in the middlenof the forecourt of the world’sngrandest neo-Renaissance palace.nWhere I disagree with Revel, who, ofncourse, was analyzing a slightly difl^erentnphenomenon — intellectual snobberynpracticed by pseudo-intellectualsn— is in thinking that those who are soneasily satisfied with this kind of bogusnavant-garde elitism and synthetic snobberynare fully aware that they arenindulging in “worldly narcissism.” Arenthey not, even more subconsciously,nthe unwitting victims of surrealist confusion?nWith the tubular, Leger-typenmonster of the “Centre Beauborg”nhaving paved the way, what couldnseem more “normal” than to plant anpyramid in the middle of the Louvre,nin the manner, say, of Giorgio dinChirico? In a world already saturatednby an incessant stream of mixed-upnmetaphors, it was doubtless inevitablenthat good taste and common sensenshould succumb to the oh-so-fashionable,nkaleidoscopic confusion of ourntimes.nCurtis Gate is a historian andnbiographer living in Paris.nnnLetter From thenLower Rightnby John Shelton ReednEditing the South, Part 2nLast fall Howell Raines griped amusinglynin The New York Times Book Reviewnabout “the Southern Living disease,”nan affliction that leads Southerners tondepict their region “as one endlessnfestival of barbecue, boiled shrimp,nfootball Saturdays, and good old Nashvillenmusic.” The three million of usnwho subscribe to that “relentlesslyncheerful” house-and-garden magazinen(Raines’s words, and he’s right aboutnthat) will recognize, however, that thenman doesn’t know what he’s talkingnabout. Southern Living does indeednoffer recipes for tailgate parties, but itsnshrimp are usually tarted up with somenfancy sauce, Nashville music seems tonbe infra dig, and as for barbecue —nwell, let me tell a story.nIf you ask me, one of the best piecesnSouthern Living ever ran was an articlenby Gary Ford on barbecue. When Insaid as much to a Southern Living staffer,nthough, he grinned. “You know,nEmory [Cunningham, the foundingnpublisher] really didn’t like thatnpiece,” he said. “He almost killed it.”nI asked why on earth he’d want to donthat.n”Too down-home. Too low-rent.”nThe point is that although Rainesnclaims that “always with the South,nthings circle back around to race andnclass,” he is strangely tone-deaf when itncomes to the social pitch of SouthernnLiving. This is one genteel magazine.nBut take Raines’s description of thenSouthern Living disease, give the bluesnequal billing with country music, add andash of cultural anthropology and antouch of political reportage, removenthe contemptuous tone, and I’d buy itnas a description of a magazine called,nsimply. Southern. Southern first appeared,nout of Little Rock, some threenyears ago. It, too, was written andnedited for a Southern middle-class audience,nbut for one that was interestednin more than portraits of itself.nWhile it lasted, in fact. Southernnepitomized a novel idea of what thenSouth is all about, one that since then1970’s has been struggling for then