The first thing that struck me about Jean-Paul Capitani was his hands. Square, powerful. Hands with muscular fingers, which reminded me of those of marble workers or fishermen, except that theirs were still damaged, whereas those of Jean-Paul had gone through the years and the toils remaining intact. Because there had been chores, for sure. You don’t develop such hands by multiplying dinners in town. Simple and strong hands, very thick, which completely defined him, as they announced what a friendship with him could be. Simple and strong. Lots of elegance. And as in all true elegance, nothing unnecessary. Nothing complicated.
This took place in Arles, in the fall of 2004. Hubert Nyssen had just welcomed me as an author of Actes Sud: “The house is no longer me, you will have to deal with Françoise, Jean-Paul and Bertrand. Françoise was her daughter, of course, Françoise Nyssen, Jean-Paul, her husband, and Bertrand Py, the editorial director. “He’s a landsman,” he added of Jean-Paul. “You’ll get along fine. »
In the summer of 2005, Françoise and Jean-Paul, accompanied by Antoine, then 11 years old, and Pauline, 18 years old, came to Greece to attend a wedding. I suggested that they stop on their return to Spetses and spend a few days with us. It was a week of happiness, friendship revealed, sealed. A rare friendship. From then on, the Spetsiote week became a ritual. The following year, Françoise and Jean-Paul returned, accompanied by Antoine, thus until 2012. The first year without Antoine. The tradition of the Spetsiot week, in memory of Antoine, continued. His favorite vacation, he had told Francoise. Interrupted by the Covid in 2020, they had to resume, finally. They will resume.
To evoke moments of happiness when one is in great sorrow is both difficult and essential. Spetsian weeks with the Nyssen-Capitani family (more pleasing to the ear than Capitani-Nyssen, we said) were made up of a succession of unforgettable moments that began at the breakfast table, taken in a small courtyard adjacent to the kitchen. Jean-Paul’s was in keeping with the man of the land: hearty, solid, healthy. Fried eggs, fruit juice, black bread, butter, honey, cheese, yoghurt… The joy of living. It whetted our appetites. And him, still thin, firm, not a gram of fat, caramba!
The memory that remains of these long episodes is not only due to the composition of Jean-Paul’s gargantuan menus. We remade the world, the opportunity, each time, to take the measure of the love that Jean-Paul had for everything related to nature, and of course the sea, to which he was deeply attached, in Arles. He had spotted an area by the sea where the municipality of the island was incinerating rubbish in the open air. How to seize the European authorities? Should we go see the mayor? Where to find the financing to build an incineration plant? Nothing is impossible in the eyes of Jean-Paul, a quiet visionary. Great admirer of Pierre Rabhi’s thought and values, which my wife and I had never heard of. Was it a Peter Rabbi? Weird, though. We would soon find out more. Sacred man, Pierre Rabhi. The friendship between the two men was easily explained.
I think back to all those summers spent with Jean-Paul, to the days spent at his home in Arles, to those in Paris and elsewhere. Taken end to end, it would make whole months, and I realize how much, at every moment, he remained himself, constant in his unbreakable simplicity. Not a gram of affection, ever. The Good Lord must have said to himself one day, thinking of Jean-Paul: “That one, I will do without vanity.” Really zero. It will change us. Let’s see what gives. »
Thus passed the Spetsian days and evenings, which the Nyssen-Capitani family embellished with their soothing presence. Our children, our grandchildren, everyone adored them. I remember a word my grandson Orestes had to say about Françoise, a declaration of love that she liked to repeat. At 3 years old, he had spotted her great tenderness. Of course, Françoise was always a couple, a whole, her and Jean-Paul; as he was a couple. Never have my wife and I known a man and a woman so united, both passionately and in extreme tranquillity.
A small weakness, however, marked Jean-Paul. All the simplicity in the world did not deprive him of a great concern for elegance. She had her own characteristics: extreme, but absolute discretion. Like all true elegance, it had to be flushed out. Above all, she was not oriented towards others. Doubtless Jean-Paul considered it his duty to put himself in harmony with the beauty of the world.
Came on February 8, 2012. Antoine flying away. Is there any greater pain for parents than to suffer the inversion of the cosmic order? Antoine, portrait of Jean-Paul, whose grace and refinement he had inherited, was leaving his family. “Take good care of yourself,” he left them in a final message. That summer, in Spetses, Jean-Paul wore his son’s clothes. The shoes, too, Repetto, magnificent. A heartbreaking vision, that of this father who, in the depths of misfortune, faithfully repeated the inversion of the cosmic order he had just undergone. Thus was born L’École du domaine du possible, at La Volpelière, more than a hundred hectares devoted to the learning of young children, in symbiosis with nature, in memory of Antoine. At each instant, being begins again, Jean-Paul must have said to himself. A way for him to transcend necessity.
