La censure du tango par l’Église de France à la veille de la Grande Guerre Avec un post-scriptum d’Erik Satie

Previously unpublished documents from the archdiocese of Paris and an important collection of diocesan journals show that the Church of France was the principal actor in the international campaign against the tango, condemned in 1914 by the archbishop of Paris. Its senior clergy helped make the tango a widespread erotic fantasy as well as a source of inspiration–for the composer Erik Satie, for instance, who describes the devil dancing the tango “seated in an armchair, his tail coiled around his skull.”