Yvelines
—  Department  —
Coat of arms
Location of Yvelines in France
Coordinates: 48°50′N 1°55′E / 48.833°N 1.917°E / 48.833; 1.917Coordinates: 48°50′N 1°55′E / 48.833°N 1.917°E / 48.833; 1.917
Country	France
Region	Île-de-France
Prefecture	Versailles
Subprefectures	Mantes-la-Jolie Rambouillet Saint-Germain- en-Laye
Government
• President of the General Council	Pierre Bédier
Area1
• Total	2,284 km2 (882 sq mi)
Population (2006)
• Total	1,395,804
• Rank	9th
• Density	610/km2 (1,600/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Department number	78
Arrondissements	4
Cantons	39
Communes	262
^1 French Land Register data, which exclude estuaries, and lakes, ponds, and glaciers larger than 1 km2

Yvelines (French pronunciation: [ivlin]) is a French department in the region of Île-de-France.

History[link]

Yvelines was created from the western part of the defunct department of Seine-et-Oise on 1 January 1968 in accordance with a law passed on 10 January 1964 and a décret d'application (a decree specifying how a law should be enforced) from 26 February 1965.

It gained the communes of Châteaufort and Toussus-le-Noble from the adjacent department of Essonne in 1969.

The departmental capital, Versailles, which grew up around Louis XIV's château, was also the French capital for more than a century under the Ancien Régime and again between 1871 and 1879 during the early years of the Third Republic. Since then the château has continued to welcome the parlement when called upon to sit in a congressional sitting, jointly with the upper house in order to enact constitutional changes or, as happened most recently in June 2009, to listen to a formal declaration by the president.^[1]

Geography[link]

Yvelines is bordered by the departments of Val-d'Oise on the north, Hauts-de-Seine on the east, Essonne on the southeast, Eure-et-Loir on the southwest, and Eure on the west.

The eastern part of the department, as well as its northern part along the Seine, is part of the Paris metropolitan area, but the rest of the department is rural, much of it covered by the Forest of Rambouillet (also known as the Forest of Yveline, from which the name of the department is derived).

Besides Versailles (the prefecture) and the subprefectures of Mantes-la-Jolie, Rambouillet, and Saint-Germain-en-Laye, important cities include Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, Poissy, Les Mureaux, Houilles, Plaisir, Sartrouville, Chatou, Le Chesnay, and the new agglomeration community of Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines.

Two regional parks can be found in Yvelines: the parc of the Haute Vallée de Chevreuse and part of the parc of Vexin Français.

Yvelines is home to one of France's best known golf courses, La Tuilerie-Bignon, in the village of Saint-Nom-la-Bretèche.

See also Map of Yvelines.

Demographics[link]

In French, a man from the Yvelines is called Yvelinois (plural Yvelinois); a woman is Yvelinoise (plural Yvelinoises).

Place of birth of residents[link]

Tourism[link]

Palaces and Châteaux[link]

• Palace of Versailles
• Château of Breteuil
• Château of Buc
• Château of Dampierre
• Château of Maisons-Lafitte
• Château of Rambouillet
• Château of Saint-Germain-en-Laye
• Château of Thoiry
• Château of Vaux-sur-Seine
• Château of Mauvières
• Château du Pont
• Château Villette

Museums[link]

• Museum of National Antiques (Saint-Germain-en-Laye)
• Museum of River and Canal Craft (Conflans-Sainte-Honorine)
• Horse-drawn Coach Museum (Versailles)
• Toy Museum (Poissy)
• Sheep Museum (Rambouillet)
• Cloth Museum of Jouy (Jouy-en-Josas)
• National Barn Museum of Port-Royal (Magny-les-Hameaux)
• International Museum of Naive Art
• Musee Lambinet (Versailles)

Artist's and Writer's Houses[link]

• André Derain's house (Chambourcy)
• Elsa Triolet-Aragon's house (Saint-Arnoult-en-Yvelines)
• Émile Zola's house (Médan)
• Maurice Ravel's house/museum (Montfort-l'Amaury)
• Ivan Turgenev House (Bougival)
• Alexandre Dumas, père's Château de Monte-Cristo (Port-Marly)
• Jean-Claude Richard's family estate (Saint-Nom-la-Bretèche)

Parks and Gardens[link]

• Chèvreloup Arboretum (Rocquencourt)
• Marly Estate (Marly-le-Roi)
• Vaux sur Seine Castle Garden (Vaux sur Seine)
• The King's Vegetable Garden (Versailles)

Politics of Yvelines[link]

Senators from Yvelines[link]

• Nicolas About (Centrist Union)
• Jacques Bellanger (Socialist Party)
• Dominique Braye (UMP)
• Alain Gournac (UMP)
• Gérard Larcher (UMP)

Sources[link]

1. ^ "Communiqué de la présidence de la République" (in French). http://elysee.fr/documents/index.php?lang=fr&mode=view&cat_id=8&press_id=2699. Retrieved 17 October 2009. 

See also[link]

• Cantons of the Yvelines department
• Communes of the Yvelines department
• Arrondissements of the Yvelines department

External links[link]

• (French) Prefecture of Yvelines
• (French) General council of Yvelines
• (French) History of Famous People and Yvelines

Sandy Casar

Personal information
Full name	Sandy Casar
Born	(1979-02-02) February 2, 1979 (age 33) Mantes-la-Jolie, France
Height	1.77 metres (5.8 ft)
Weight	70 kilograms (150 lb)
Team information
Current team	FDJ-BigMat
Discipline	Road
Role	Rider
Rider type	Breakaway Specialist
Professional team(s)
2000–	Française des Jeux
Major wins
Tour de France, 3 stages Route du Sud (2005)
Infobox last updated on 2 January 2012

Sandy Casar (born February 2, 1979 in Mantes-la-Jolie, Yvelines) is a French professional racing cyclist.

Casar turned professional in 2000 after riding for Jean Floch-Mantes as an amateur. As a professional he has always ridden for FDJ. Severo Casar's talent was revealed in Paris–Nice 2002, which he finished second at 23 years old. He finished 13th in the 2003 Giro d'Italia, in front of climber Marco Pantani. He had his biggest win in a stage of the 2003 Tour de Suisse. He then finished 16th in the 2004 Tour de France, and sixth in the 2006 Giro d'Italia, 25 minutes behind winner Ivan Basso. Casar also won the Route du Sud in 2005.

On 27 July 2007, he won his first Tour de France stage, beating Laurent Lefevre, Axel Merckx and Michael Boogerd in a sprint after a collision with a dog earlier in the day.

In 2009, Casar finished second in the 16th stage of the 2009 Tour de France. Stage 16 was originally won by Mikel Astarloza. However, Astarloza was found after the Tour to have tested positive for EPO before the race had started.^[1] The organisers stripped him of the stage win and Casar became the official stage winner.^[2]

Main results[link]

2012

2nd stage 12 Giro d'Italia

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website (French)
• Team biography
• Sandy Casar profile at Cycling Archives

Jacques Dutronc
Dutronc singing in Lorient, France in January 2010
Background information
Born	(1943-04-28) April 28, 1943 (age 69)
Origin	Paris, France
Genres	French pop, French rock, Chanson, Yé-yé, Garage rock, Psychedelic rock
Instruments	Guitar, Piano, Drums, Percussions, Bass, Accordion, Recorder, Sitar, Banjo, Ukulele

Jacques Dutronc (born 28 April 1943 in Paris; French pronunciation: [ʒak dytʁɔ̃]) is a French singer, songwriter, guitarist, composer, and actor. He has been married to singer Françoise Hardy since 30 March 1981 and the two have a son (jazz guitarist Thomas Dutronc, born 1973). He also has been a longtime songwriting collaborator with Jacques Lanzmann. Some of Dutronc best known hits include "Il Est Cinq Heures, Paris S'éveille" (a chanson tune akin to "Waterloo Sunset" by The Kinks that All Music Guide has called "his finest hour"),^[1] "Le Responsable",^[2] and "Les Cactus".

Dutronc played guitar in the rock group El Toro et les Cyclones. He wrote successful songs for Françoise Hardy in the 1960s before moving on to pursue a successful solo career. His music incorporated traditional French pop and French rock as well as styles such as psychedelic rock and garage rock. He later branched out into film acting, starting in 1973.^[3] He earned a Cesar for Best Actor for the leading role in Van Gogh, which was directed by Maurice Pialat.^[4] According to the All Music Guide, Dutronc is "one of the most popular performers in the French-speaking world",^[3] although he "remains little known in English speaking territories" aside from a cult following in the U.K.^[5]

Career history[link]

Early history[link]

Between 1963 and 1964, Dutronc played guitar for the group "El Toro et les Cyclones" with Hadi Kalafate. During this time he also appeared at Le Golf Drouot in Paris as backing guitarist for stars including Eddy Mitchell. After performing his obligatory military service, he landed a job as assistant at Vogue Records to Artistic Director Jacques Wolfsohn. In this capacity, he arranged songs for several lesser known artists such as Zou Zou and Cleo. At Vogue Records, he teamed with writer Jacques Lanzmann, then director at Lui magazine, to create songs for up-and-coming artists. One of their first commissions was for the pop singer Benjamin, however, after his first EP failed to perform, Vogue Records unceremoniously booted him from their roster. After hearing one of the demos that Dutronc had produced, Wolfsohn declared that Jacques should perform the record for release. This single, "Et moi, et moi, et moi" was released in 1966, and its popularity turned Dutronc into a star.

With Lanzmann writing lyrics and Dutronc producing the music, the two created several significant songs. Songs such as "Et moi, et moi, et moi", "Les Playboys", and "Les cactus", are still frequently played. Other songs include "Mini, mini, mini", "Le responsable", "J'ai mis un tigre dans ma guitare", and "L'opportuniste".

Dutronc's songs combine American and British musical influences with French lyrical themes. Many of his early songs feature a British garage sound comparable to that of Ray Davies of The Kinks. Dutronc's "La fille du père Noël" and David Bowie's "Jean Genie" share a riff likely derived from the Yardbirds' accelerated version of Bo Diddley's "I'm a Man" (the Belgian singer Arno Hintjens recorded a medley of the Dutronc and Bowie songs ("Jean Baltazaarr") with the American singer Beverly Jo Scott that highlight these similarities). However, Dutronc is distinctive for his mocking attitude toward late 1960s French youth culture. Dutronc's biggest hit was "Il est cinq heures, Paris s'eveille", with the classical flute player Roger Bourdin performing an essential part. In this song, Dutronc paints an evocative portrait of the French capital in the early morning hours.

In 1973, "Et moi, et moi, et moi" was adapted with English lyrics. "Alright Alright Alright" and became a UK No. 3 hit for the group Mungo Jerry.

Also in 1973, Dutronc began a second career as an actor in the film Antoine et Sébastien, directed by Jean-Marie Périer. In the following years, Dutronc devoted most of his energies toward his acting career. He has appeared in films directed by Andrzej Zulawski, Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Lelouch and Maurice Pialat.

In retrospect to Dutronc's early career, critic Mark Deming of the All Music Guide has remarked:

Dutronc's early hits were rough but clever exercises in European garage rock, with Dutronc and his band laying out a simple, tough vamp as he sneered his witty, pointed lyrics about a life lived amidst the chaos of the '60s with all the sweet venom he could muster... like Dutronc's role models Bob Dylan and Ray Davies, he could write melodies strong enough to work even without their excellent lyrics, and his band had more than enough energy to make them fly (and the imagination to move with the musical times as psychedelia and hard rock entered the picture at the end of the decade).^[5]

Later history and current activities[link]

Dutronc returned to music in recent years, and also has enjoyed a resurgence of popular interest in his music. Since the early Dutronc songs had a classic late-sixties freakbeat backing (provided by session musicians), his songs were played in the hip retro clubs of the UK and US in the late 1990s, a practice which continues to this day. He is celebrated in the 1997 Cornershop song "Brimful of Asha" with the line: "Jacques Dutronc and the Bolan Boogie/The Heavy Hitters and the Chichi music."

Dutronc earned a Cesar for Best Actor for the leading role in Van Gogh, which was directed by Maurice Pialat. Critic Christopher Null of the AMC Network praised Dutronc's performance, commenting that:

"Though lacking key features (like the shock of red hair and the chopped-up ear), Dutronc oddly resembles Van Gogh in many ways. But more importantly, he manages to embody the obvious manic depression from Van Gogh's later years, all exuding from his scraggly face, sunken eyes, and bony frame... the searing Dutronc is the real reason to sit through the film".^[4]

Dutronc currently lives in the town of Monticello on the Mediterranean island of Corsica.

Selected discography[link]

• Jacques Dutronc (Vogue, 1966)
• Guerre et Pets (Gaumont Musique WEA, 1980)
• Dutronc au casino (Columbia, 1992)
• Madame L'Existence (Columbia, 2003)

Selected filmography[link]

• Antoine et Sébastien (Jean-Marie Périer, 1973)
• L'important c'est d'aimer (Andrzej Żuławski, 1974)
• Le bon et les méchants (Claude Lelouch, 1975)
• Us Two (Claude Lelouch, 1979)
• Sauve qui peut (la vie) (Jean-Luc Godard, 1979)
• Return to the Beloved (1979)
• Malevil (1981)
• Tricheurs (Barbet Schroeder, 1983)
• Mes nuits sont plus belles que vos jours (Andrzej Żuławski, 1989)
• Van Gogh (Maurice Pialat, 1991) (also music)
• Place Vendôme (Nicole Garcia, 1998)
• Merci pour le chocolat (Claude Chabrol, 2000)

See also[link]

• French pop
• French rock
• Yé-yé
• Jacques Lanzmann

Further reading[link]

• Jacques Dutronc, by Michel Leydier ISBN 2-290-30077-2

References[link]

External links[link]

• The official website of Jacques Dutronc
• French Wikipedia article
• The original dandy: Jacques Dutronc
• rfimusique.com entry
• Jacques Dutronc at the Internet Movie Database

v t e César Award for Best Actor 1976 Philippe Noiret · 1977 Michel Galabru · 1978 Jean Rochefort · 1979 Michel Serrault · 1980 Claude Brasseur · 1981 Gérard Depardieu · 1982 Michel Serrault · 1983 Philippe Léotard · 1984 Coluche · 1985 Alain Delon · 1986 Christophe Lambert · 1987 Daniel Auteuil · 1988 Richard Bohringer · 1989 Jean-Paul Belmondo · 1990 Philippe Noiret · 1991 Gérard Depardieu · 1992 Jacques Dutronc · 1993 Claude Rich · 1994 Pierre Arditi · 1995 Gérard Lanvin · 1996 Michel Serrault · 1997 Philippe Torreton · 1998 André Dussollier · 1999 Jacques Villeret · 2000 Daniel Auteuil · 2001 Sergi López · 2002 Michel Bouquet · 2003 Adrien Brody · 2004 Omar Sharif · 2005 Mathieu Amalric · 2006 Michel Bouquet · 2007 François Cluzet · 2008 Mathieu Amalric · 2009 Vincent Cassel · 2010 Tahar Rahim · 2011 Éric Elmosnino · 2012 Omar Sy