Mr. Speaker, Georges Moustaki, with his Mediterranean face, the face of a wandering Jew and a Greek shepherd, and his wild hair, left us this morning, taking the byways he travelled all his life to finally join Félix Leclerc, Jacques Brel, Barbara and Georges Brassens in the pantheon of French song.
Moustaki was a poet who wrote about intimate and universal concepts, and his songs have been sung throughout the world in every language by musicians from several generations.
He was a humanist and pacifist who lived on the left bank. As a champion of freedom and simple living, he was an icon for an entire generation—a generation for whom love and the future of our planet were more important than all the gold, power or money in the world.
Here are the lyrics of one of Moustaki's songs:
See the people bustling about,
Clothed in lies and deception.
You can be a beggar and proud of it,
Clothed in rags but not poor.
Thank you, Moustaki.