Well actually, no.  Rather a piece about the French predilection for sexing inanimate objects.  (“Ok, ok”, I hear you say, “strictly speaking cocks and fannies aren’t inanimate objects”, although these days mine is becoming increasingly so).

I’ve been reading Tim Moore’s “French Revolutions” about his attempt as a fairweather cyclist to complete the Tour de France.  In it he relates how he went into a bar after a gruelling day in the saddle and ordered “Un bier”.

“Une bierre” replied Renee frostily.

“I’ll take two then please” he said. “One of each”.

So where does the logic come from that beer is feminine but wine is masculine?  “Latin” I hear you say.  And you’d be right – evidence other Latin-based languages, Spanish and Italian, for instance, and for all I know Romance and Portuguese.  The cognoscenti like my goodself will well remember declining “annus”, “mensa” and “bellum”.  (I declined Latin after the 3^rd form). 

But why?  What’s the reason Virgil and more latterly Eric Cantona decided to sex inanimate objects?  Did they try them all for size?

And no-one gets more defensive about it than the French.  They have government departments, committees and thought police set up to defend the integrity of la belle langue and more zealously still to stem the tide of all-pervasive English.  I put it down to an envy of the legacy of British imperialism and the paucity of their own.  Whereas Britain left behind  democracy and cricket in its former colonies, the French left bugger all except the confusion as to whether l’escargot is masculine or feminine and more implausibly still that your cock is feminine but your fanny masculine.