IT IS PLEASANT to hear that the Stalin Platz in
Vienna is to have its old name back. When I was in Vienna in 1951 everyone steadfastly refused to call it anything but the Schwartzenburg Platz, so that the change back is merely a recognition of the incorrigibly historical viewpoint taken by the population of Vienna. I wonder what will now happen to the monument in the middle of the Burg dedicated to the Russian generals who died at the taking of the city? In these days of political street-names postmen must have a bad time, but I imagine that the worst place for this is still Paris. My favourite street, as regards metamorphoses, is the Rue Denfert-Rochereau, which combines commemoration of the hero of the defence of Belfort in 1870 with a realistic preserva- tion of some of the phonetic elements of the former Rue d'Enfer—so called because haunted by devils from the sixteenth century onwards; the earliest reference is, I believe, in Rabelais.
Previous page
