The singer and actress died on Sunday July 16 in Paris, she was 76 years old. Although she left England at a very young age, her country of origin followed her life.
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Jane Birkin died on Sunday July 16 in Paris, at the age of 76. The most English of French women has built her reputation and her life on French soil. She left her native England at a very young age but when her death was announced, her country of origin remembered her fondly.
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A scent of scandal has long surrounded this daughter of an actress and a commander in the Royal Navy. Jane Birkin was born in London in December 1946. Less than 20 years later, England, shocked, discovered her in blow-up of Antonioni. The actress stars nude in a three-way sex scene in this film, which is set in 1960s “Swinging London”. It was around this time that she left the UK for France. Despite everything, the English prudes have not finished with the “beautiful provocateur”.
In 1969, the title I love you too , a Birkin-Gainsbourg masterpiece. It’s too much for the BBC which refuses to air the song for its overtly sexual content. However, the British adore it and it becomes a symbol of the liberation of morals. It reached number one on the charts and remained the top-selling record in the country for 34 weeks, a first at the time for a foreign-language title.
A career as a singer and actress less known in England than in France
Across the Channel, the English also remember her for her role in fashion. A handbag also bears his name. The story goes that in 1981, she discussed with the CEO of Hermès her difficulty in finding a stylish bag large enough for the mother of two she was at the time. The luxury house invents this somewhat catch-all accessory that has become timeless and is still on sale today.
She herself said of this bag that you could put too many things in it and that this was perhaps the reason for the tendonitis from which she suffered. The founding discussion for the creation of this object took place on a plane between Paris and London, a beautiful symbol for the one who is described in England as “the most French of English women”.