EUROPEAN UNION
Press Release
Committee of the Regions
COR/05/101
Brussels, 5 October 2005
OPEN DAYS European Week of Regions and Cities finds inspiration
in Pope John Paul II, Shakespeare, Montesquieu … and Wenger
What have Pope Jean-Paul II, William Shakespeare, Charles-Louis de Montesquieu, José Maria
Carreras, David Lynch and Arsène Wenger all got in common? They are among a host of writers,
poets, theologians, philosophers, film directors, singers and sportsmen whose close affinity with particular
European regions and cities is celebrated in Facts and Figures, a handbook published to coincide with the
OPEN DAYS European Week of Regions and Cities (10-13 October).
The 116-page handbook is also packed with information and statistics about the 106 regions and cities
which are official partners for the event, organised by the Committee of the Regions and the European
Commission’s Directorate for Regional Policy with the support of the European Parliament’s Regional
Development Committee.
The European Week of Regions and Cities, spearheaded by Regional Policy Commissioner Danuta
Hübner and Committee of the Regions President Peter Straub, will feature three flagship debates and
66 workshops focused on regional development and cooperation. Nearly 2,500 participants have already
registered for the event, which will be a marketplace for new ideas, highlighting the importance of best
practice and partnership as the key to delivering regional growth and jobs.
Each of the official partners were invited to submit a special quotation or message to accompany their
factfile in the handbook – and here is a selection of the best:
“Navarre shall be the wonder of the world.”
English playwright William Shakespeare from Love’s Labour’s Lost
“Here, the skies of blue, the green of forests and fields, the silver of
lakes and rivers seem to impress with an exceptional power.”
Pope John-Paul II describing the Polish region of Lubelskie on a visit to Zamośćc in 1999
“Walking around the city, Budapest almost makes you sing … the squares and streets are so atmospheric
that you feel their music. I love this city.”
José Maria Carreras, Barcelona-born tenor
“We look to Scotland for all our ideas of civilisation.”
French writer and historian Voltaire
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“Where else do you find so many good things in such a small area?”
German poet and dramatist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe extols the virtues of Thuringia in a letter to
fellow writer Johann Peter Eckermann
“I have learned values in Alsace that have allowed me to be appreciated: discipline, respect for work, the
trust of others. A kind of naïveté … which is itself returned.”
Arsène Wenger, manager of Arsenal Football Club
“In the Year 0, when the Lord created the world, he started in Mecklenburg from the Baltic Sea.”
Fritz Reuter, 19th century writer and poet, from De Urgeschicht von Meckelnborg
“I would like to have a studio there because of the people, their professionalism, their dedication to film
and because of the atmosphere of the place itself.”
David Lynch, US film director and producer, on the Lodz region of Poland
“Berlin is broke but sexy.”
Governing Mayor Klaus Wowereit
“This is wild land, country of my choice.”
Robert Graves, 20th century English poet and novelist, who made the Balearic Islands his adopted home
“It is sweet to shipwreck in such a sea.”
From The Infinite by Giacomo Leopardi, a poem inspired by the landscape of Marche in central Italy.
“O Funen is a lovely land,
And no brave man denies it!
This isle has forest, field and strand,
And true’s the heart that tills it.”
Danish 19th century children’s author Hans Christian Andersen, writing about his home (copyright ©
Paula Hostrup-Jessen)
“It is not possible to go to Hell after living in Paradise.”
Ibn Jafaya, 12th century Hispanic-Arabic writer, describing Andalucia
“Andy Warhol never put much stock in his family background. When asked where he was from, the
elusive artist once quipped, ‘I come from nowhere’. Thanks to his parents who came over to America
from Medzilaborce, a village in the Prešov Region, ‘nowhere’ is fast becoming a place of pilgrimage for
Warhol fans.”
Natalia Tarasovová, head of Prešov (Slovakia) office, Brussels
… Returned on that bright beam, whose point now raised
Bore him slope downward to the sun now fallen
Beneath the Azores”
John Milton, 17th century English poet, from Paradise Lost
“I return to Asturias with the emotions of the homecomer, of somebody returning to a land where
affection and human warmth are never lacking.”
Spanish Crown Prince Felipe, Prince of Asturias
“Brandenburg … just waiting to be discovered.”
19th century German poet and novelist Theodor Fontane
“A perfumed land caressed by the sun.”
Charles Baudelaire, 19th century French poet, describing the island region of Réunion
“I have never seen a picture as variegated, harmonious and attractive.”
Baron Alexander von Humboldt, German naturalist and explorer, describing the Orotava Valley in
Tenerife
“If Cantabria, the civilized green land, has anything to spare, it is possibilities.”
José Camilo Cela, Spanish novelist and Nobel Prize winner
“There be such a company of willful gentlemen in Yorkshire as there be not in all England besides.”
The Abbot of York to Parliamentarian Oliver Cromwell in 1556
“There is only place on earth where everyday life is so sublimely reflected in a miraculous inter-weaving
of nature and culture.”
French 19th century writer Marie-Henri Beyle (Stendhal) on Tuscany
“The difference in languages prevents by no means a conversation between people with the same heart.”
Desiderius Erasmus, 15-16th century Rotterdam-born humanist and theologian, chosen by the East
Netherlands regional office
… And suddenly we saw the great arches of Etretat, like two legs of the cliff walking into the sea, high
enough to serve as walkways to the ships ..”
French 19th century novelist Guy de Maupassant recalling one of the gems of Haute-Normandie
“Liguria, your image, my land, I’ll always carry in my heart, as one setting out does the rough scapular his
mother gave him, weeping. …”
Camillo Sbarbaro, poet
“Malopolska and Krakow are the essence of Poland.”
Pope John Paul II
“Multiculturalism is the significant value and strength of Pomorskie Region.”
Lech Walesa, former President of Poland, Founder of Solidarność
“Inspiring.”
Gideon Kremer, Riga-born violinist, sums up his home city
“Theoria cum praxi”
Unofficial motto of the German Land of Saxony, taken from the words of Leipzig-born philosopher
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716)
“If I knew one thing that would be of use to my nation but ruinous to another, I would not mention it to
my Prince because I am a man before being French.”
Charles-Louis de Secondat Montesquieu, Baron de la Brède et de, Aquitaine-born philosopher and
jurist
“Catalonia shows a dynamism of economic development and productive work among regions that allows
us to foresee the future with hope.”
Richard von Weizsäcker, former president of the Federal Republic of Germany
Silesia’s main city is more than a fascinating tale in its own right. It embodies all the experiences which
have made Central Europe what it is … Wroclaw is a flower of Europe.”
Historian Norman Davies on Lower Silesia
For more information, please contact:
Estelle POIDEVIN
Tel. +32 (0)2 282 22 70
Fax +32 (0)2 282 20 85
email: [email protected]
Dennis ABBOTT
Tel. +32 (0)2 282 20 99
Fax +32 (0)2 282 20 85
email: [email protected]