VIEWSrnDefending Civilizationrnby Jean RaspailrnAllow me to begin with a personal recollection. I first camernto know the city of Chicago and the region of the GreatrnLakes almost 50 years ago, in 1949, when I was 23 years old.rnNothing then desdned me for a literar career. I am a writerrnwho developed late. Having regrettably neglected my universityrnstudies, I traveled. During the long war, we felt smothered inrnFrance. It was necessar’ to seek out fresh air elsewhere. I undertookrnwith three friends of the same age to retrace by canoernand paddle the same route as that followed by Father Marquette,rnwho setting out from Trois-Rivieres, in French Canada,rndiscovered the Mississippi in 1673. I called my team, the Marquetternteam. We traveled up the Saint Laurent, crossing thernrapids of the Ottawa River and the French River, passingrnthrough Lake Huron, Lake Michigan, Creen Bay, Lake Winnebago,rntraveling down the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers tornNew Orleans.rnI will not go into detail about the welcome we received: itrnwas fantastic. We were greeted by dozens of mayors, brassrnbands and majorettes, cheered by thousands of schoolchildrenrnwho had never heard French spoken in their lives, and interviewedrnby dozens of newspapers and radio stations. I have thernjean Raspail—novelist, journalist, filmmaker, adventurerwasrnthe 1997 recipient of The Ingersoll Foundation’s T.S. EliotrnAward for Creative Writing, for which this was his acceptancernspeech. The award ceremony was held at the Newberry Libraryrnin Chicago in November 1997.rngreat privilege of being an honorary citizen of 20 of the townsrnthrough which we passed. The keys to these towns still hang onrna wall in my study. This rugged and historic journey, whichrnlasted almost a year, was not without a spiritual side. It was thernfoundation of the unfailing friendship I feel for the UnitedrnStates. With, it must be said, ups and downs, I was, am, and willrnremain a friend of the United States. I want this to be firmly understoodrnin case, during the course of my little speech, yournmight come to have doubts about my feelings toward yourrncountry.rnThroughout this voyage, I had spread out on a rucksack inrnfront of me, in my canoe, two maps of the route to be followed.rnThe first was a modern-day map of America. The second was arnfacsimile of the map made in the 18th century by officers of thernKing of France. I set up our evening camps in French historicalrnsites, such as Fort Bourbon and Fort de Chartres, thoughrnBelle-Fontaine had become Bloomsdale; Riviere-la-Saline,rnFlat River; Cabaret, Crystal City; etc. Happily, Prairie-du-rnChien was still called Prairie-du-Chien; La Crosse, La Crosse;rnand St. Louis, the small French capital at the end of the 18thrncentury, was sfill called St. Louis, the birthplace of T.S. Eliotrnwhose memory, immense work, and poetry, which is almostrnliturgical in its praising of the transcendence of man, I wouldrnlike here to honor.rnI like to imagine that St. Louis, which was French untilrn1803, still had in 1888, when Eliot was born, a few palpablernmemories of its first inhabitants. I know that history movesrn14/CHRONICLESrnrnrn