January 2021 also marks fifty years since she appeared before a court in California to declare
her innocence after a legendary manhunt and arrest. With sympathisers around the world mobilising to demand her freedom, she was eventually acquitted
of the charges of “aggravated kidnapping and first-degree murder” in 1972, following
a 16-month incarceration.
Last autumn in Paris, her face blazed from massive posters on newspaper kiosks around the
city. The iconic image - huge afro, serious eyes, mouth open in speech - confronted
pedestrians, motorists and bus passengers as they travelled through the streets
of the French capital.
The posters
were announcing a special edition of a new, independent magazine that had devoted
its second issue to Davis. Titled Légende, the quarterly magazine is the
brainchild of Eric Fottorino, a former editor of the left-wing newspaper Le
Monde. At a cost of 20 euros per copy, the publication is not cheap; yet
many people bought the Davis issue. According to Fottorino, the magazine had several
thousand subscribers by the end of the year.
The figures perhaps
indicate the special place Davis holds in the French popular imagination, a place usually reserved for venerable rock stars. In
2018 for instance, when she spoke at a university in Nanterre, just outside Paris,
her mere presence elicited deafening applause.
Légende contains contributions from writers
such as Dany Laferrière, Gisèle Pineau and Alain Mabanckou, reflecting on what
Davis has meant to them, and it recapitulates the events of more than 50 years
ago - detailing Davis’ membership of the Black Panther Party in the 1960s, and her
activism in the civil rights movement before and after the assassination of the
Rev. Martin Luther King in April 1968.
It also recaps the incident in 1970 that pushed her to international attention: guns she had bought were used by high-school student Jonathan Jackson when he took over a courtroom to demand the freeing of black prisoners including his brother (George Jackson), and left the building with hostages, including the judge.
These events are captured in bold photographs and illustrations throughout the 90 pages of the magazine. There’s the reproduction of the “wanted” poster, for instance, with the public being warned that Davis should be considered “possibly armed and dangerous”; there are pictures of Davis in handcuffs, and later being freed; of her with family and friends, including writer Toni Morrison; of her lecturing at universities and public events.
Légende ends with an image of Davis standing in
the back of a convertible, wearing a mask against Covid-19, her right hand raised
in a fist - while nearby, a protester holds a sign that reads “NO JUSTICE NO
PEACE”.
To learn more about how the magazine issue evolved, SWAN interviewed editor Eric Fottorino. Below is a shortened version of the interview, which took place at Légende’s offices in Paris.
SWAN: Why did you choose Angela Davis for this issue?
Eric Fottorino: Because when we decided to do this second issue of Légende, there had been the death of George Floyd in the United States, and there’d been in France the demonstrations regarding Adama Traoré, and as we wanted to feature a woman, we choose Angela Davis - to remind people of her work and to show that the combat she fought in the Seventies, and later, for civil rights and feminism is still going on. We thought it was important to speak about Angela Davis’ past at the present time, whether that’s in the United States or France. Quite often we think that the present can only be explained by what’s happening now, but it is essential to know the history.
E.F.: For the generation of the Seventies, she incarnated a struggle, a dream for justice, and also exactly the opposite - she embodied a female victim of injustice, but one who would fight with all her forces, energy and intelligence. And for France, that was important because she had studied philosophy at the Sorbonne, and so she received a great deal of support in intellectual circles, whether from Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean Genet, or Louis Aragon, and also from the Parti communiste français (PCF). She was the subject of a powerful poem by Jacques Prévert as well. So, she had intellectual and political support. There were marches, too, and we have a photo of one of these in which her sister (Fania) marched with Aragon in the streets of Paris, protesting for her freedom.
I think that
all these elements made her a popular figure in France, and the famous cry “Free
Angela” that could be heard in different countries around the world was taken
up in France too. Besides, when she was liberated, she did a tour - to say thanks
but also to make it clear that she wasn’t giving up the fight. She appeared on
the big literary programs of the time, such as “Apostrophe”, and also in the studio
of France Inter and the big public radio broadcasters. She was a huge presence,
and then later a popular French singer, Pierre Perret, made a song about an
individual who was the victim of racism, and one could see Angela Davis’ story
in it, even if he didn’t specifically dedicate the song (Lily) to her.
SWAN: How
about the political newspapers of the time? What role did they play?
E.F.: She had the support of the socialist newspapers
like L’Humanité, but it must be remembered that the Parti communiste was
among the strongest parties in the Seventies, with about 25 percent of the
vote. It was even stronger than the Socialist Party. So, the support from people
like Aragon (who was a member of the Parti communiste français) sent a huge symbolic
signal.
James Baldwin,
who supported her as well, was a writer who was very well known in France. He
was not a popular author, but, in intellectual and literary circles, Baldwin
was someone whose voice carried weight because he had lived for some time in
Paris, and the fact that he wrote that Open Letter to his Sister Angela (An
Open Letter to My Sister, Miss Angela Davis, 1971) stayed in people’s
memory. (The translation by Samuel Légitimus is reproduced in the magazine.)
SWAN: Did
you try to speak with Angela Davis for the issue?
E.F.: We tried but she was very busy, and I
think she was also quite tired at the time we made the request. But this wasn’t
a necessity for us in writing about her life and the past. Of course, if she
had been available, we would have interviewed her, but we didn’t think it was
indispensable. In a certain way, her actions, and her life, speak for her.
SWAN: Some Black French thinkers say that
there is a sort of fascination and veneration in France for African Americans,
including Angela Davis. How would you respond to that?
E.F.: In France, social justice fighters aren’t
necessarily black, so there hasn’t been emblematic figures like in the United
States with Angela Davis, Malcolm X or Martin Luther King and others.
It’s true that
in political life in France, Black people have had a limited space, and sometimes
people outside France say that there has not been a black minister or anyone
prominent, but they don’t know about Christiane Taubira or Kofi Yamgnane. So,
it’s not true that people like that haven’t existed. What is true is that there
is no huge emblematic political leader like Angela Davis here.
(Ed: Fottorino
has helmed another publication that examines the subject of being black in
France, titled Être
Noir en France.)
For an
article about Davis’ visit to France in 2018 to commemorate the 1968 workers
movement, see: http://www.ipsnews.net/2018/05/protests-strikes-solidarity-france-revisits-may-68/
Photos - top to bottom: the cover of Légende; Angela Davis in Paris (A.M./SWAN), and Eric Fottorino in his office (A.M./SWAN).
