France: Twilight of Grandeur

Just by existing he will play a political role. He can't help it. He is in the woodwork and everybody knows it.

WITH those words, Andre Malraux last November expressed a widely held belief about his old chief. Many Frenchmen felt that even after Charles de Gaulle had abandoned the Presidency of the Fifth Republic, he nonetheless would continue to exercise a profound influence on the country's politics.

But last week the first anniversary of De Gaulle's abrupt resignation passed almost without notice in France. He stepped down from the presidency on April 28, 1969 because of his defeat on a referendum in which he sought approval of a reorganization of France's governmental structure. Since then, De Gaulle has remained, except for one brief trip to Ireland, sequestered in his nine-acre, walled-in estate atop a small hill in the village of Colombey-les-Deux-Egiises, 120 miles southeast of Paris. More aloof than ever, he has received only a handful of the faithful, and has refused all requests for private political discussions or larger meetings. De Gaulle's notes from Colombey, written in his proud hand, are as highly prized as were Napoleon's scribblings from Elba. His invitations to lunch or dinner are as rare and valued as "an invitation to dine privately with Brezhnev or Mao," to quote one old Gaullist, who has not made it.

Early Riser. Though De Gaulle resolutely refuses all requests for interviews, TIME Correspondent William Rademaekers pieced together an account of his present activities. Colombey gossips and sentimental Gaullist supporters in Paris are in agreement on one respect of De Gaulle's life: he is deeply engrossed in writing his memoirs, and gives little thought to the daily problems of France or to his successor. Last month the first result of his labors was published: Messages and Speeches 1940-1946, a 665-page compilation of his addresses during the war years. The general has also completed the first of his three-volume series on la France et moi, covering the period until 1962. It will be published in the fall. The second volume, covering 1962-65, is scheduled to be completed within another 18 months, and the third presumably within a similar length of time. Four more volumes of his speeches are also scheduled for publication.

De Gaulle gets up early, eats a hefty version of a Continental breakfast. Then he moves to his study, where he dictates to his secretary for three to four hours. Weather permitting, he walks, at 11 each morning, around his property, occasionally carrying bread crumbs for his birds and chickens. He inspects his delicately manicured lawn and the garden, one segment of which forms a floral fleur-de-lis, the symbol of French royalty. After 40 minutes, the general is back at his desk in his book-lined study. As he edits manuscripts, he extends his right index finger along the contoured body of the fountain pen to its tip. To his right is an old-fashioned inkwell from which he refills the pen, and to his left photographs of his grandchildren. There is always a vase of fresh flowers on the desk.

Lunch is a major event. The general has always been a bonne fourchette, but now, in retirement, he eats with gusto, if not abandon, and his weight is a source of anxiety to old friends. His stomach protrudes like the prow of a tugboat, and his eyes are nearly hidden by his puffy cheeks and his prominent nose. On a typical day, he might lunch on breaded pigs' feet or pot au feu, or boeuf Bourguignon, served on simple Limoges china with a glass of unassuming Burgundy or Bordeaux, accompanied by a salad and vegetables and potatoes. The meal is followed by cheese, which De Gaulle did not allow to be served in the Elysee because "people linger over it." He finishes the repast with his favorite dessert, chocolate eclairs.

After the midday meal, he takes another long walk around the property "to digest," relaxes on a sofa for some 15 minutes, and then returns to work in his study. In the early evening he leaves Colombey for a walk in the forest, accompanied by dozens of visible and invisible police. Often after another excursion in hefty eating, he returns to his study and works until 10:30 or 11 p.m.

No Saint Helena. The days fold into one another, broken only by an occasional arrival of a black Citroen DS bearing a courier, or an old friend, such as Malraux, Couve de Murville, the former Premier, or Pierre Messmer, the former Armed Forces Minister. Oblivious to it all, De Gaulle's wife, Yvonne, dressed in grandmotherly gray, makes her morning round of the village shops, where she buys her husband's papers, probes the meat he will eat, and carefully selects his dessert at the bakery, Au Fidele Berger (the Faithful Shepherd).

In his private conversations, De Gaulle has ruled out any possibility of another return to the political scene. "There will be," he says, "no second Saint Helena." His friends say he is determined to live out his last days and die in quiet dignity. De Gaulle has picked out his gravesite at the edge of Colombey, close to the forest, where there is now a tombstone reading ANNE DE GAULLE 1928-1948, which marks the grave of his retarded daughter, who died of pneumonia. When the time comes, a simple line will be carved on the granite: Charles de Gaulle, 1890, and the year of his death.

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