Piaf, Morrison, Wilde and the others..

Père Lachaise, Paris - March 25, 2005. Photo: Norwegianblogger 2005 

Yes, I've been visiting them all today - at their last resting place at Père Lachaise here in Paris. What a strange place. I arrived in the morning, and the sun shone through the trees and there was a little mist in the air. Even in sunlight it felt a little spooky. It's strange to meet death in such a profound way. At times I felt that I could smell it when I walked between the gravesites. All these people that were so filled with life, art and meant so much to so many now rest there, as bones and earth. Their work lives on though. The music of Chopin, the voice of Jim Morrison and Edith Piaf, the works of Moliere and Wilde and all the others that now are at the other side of life - dead in other words. Today I was thinking that most of the famous people resting in this graveyard experienced a lot of tragedy in their lives. Is that the price of fame? Is tragedy and sadness necessary for real art? It's hard to say, but today gave me an opportunity to think about the lives of these people and to observe (there we go again :) ) how different people react when they get to the gravesite of their heroes. At Jim Morrisson's grave there were a lot of young people with their headsets on - obviously listening to his music. At the same time there were guards at this place keeping an eye on everybody that came close and shouting out if something inappropriate was going on. The city of Paris had even closed off the area around the gravesite because of the doings of his fans. That's rock'n'roll I guess. At Chopin's grave it was really quiet, and a lot of flowers had been arranged around the white marble sculpture. At Oscar Wilde's gravesite I was amazed to see the ornamentation of the grave - when I got a little closer I could see that there were lots of marks from kisses that made up what I thought was the ornamentation. I think he would have liked that! At the same time I heard a guide say that someone had damaged parts of the sculpture because they hated that he was gay. I guess he wouldn't have been surprised about that either. At Edith Piaf's grave people stopped up and stood quietly around her grave looking sad. I guess she gave voice to a lot of people here in France during her lifetime. All in all - a visit to a cemetery could be an interesting experience. It surely was for me.

Today is a wonderful day in Paris by the way - it's summer and enjoy every minute of it. Tomorrow I'm going back to Norway so now I want to go out and enjoy the rest of the day. Au revoir!!