The little French town of Saint-Genis-Pouilly has not previously figured conspicuously in the annals of world events. Until now. While much of Europe cowers spinelessly over the Danish cartoons, Saint-Genis-Pouilly has bravely stood up for Voltaire against the very religious fanaticism that he fought. As the Wall Street Journal reports, a cultural centre in the town organised a reading of a 265-year-old play by Voltaire, Fanaticism, or Mahomet the Prophet, which is not an attack on Islam per se but lampoons all forms of religious intolerance. Islamist activists immediately demanded that this reading be cancelled.

Instead, Mayor Hubert Bertrand called in police reinforcements to protect the theater. On the night of the December reading, a small riot broke out involving several dozen people and youths who set fire to a car and garbage cans. It was ‘the most excitement we've ever had down here,’ says the socialist mayor.

Herve Loichemol, a French theater director who produced the recent readings of Voltaire's play in Saint-Genis-Pouilly and Geneva, says he wasn't trying to provoke Muslims but knew from experience his production might anger some. He pushed ahead anyway. Banning blasphemy ‘admits private beliefs into public space,’ he says. ‘This is how catastrophe starts.'

Amazing! A member of the intellectual elite with moral intelligence! The WSJ story goes on to record a previously less glorious response to this play by authorities in Switzerland. Those who follow with keen interest the career of Tariq Ramadan, the iconic ‘moderate’ and super-cool pin-up of the appeasement crowd, might be particularly interested in one aspect of this part of the story:

In the early 1990s, Mr. Loichemol had proposed staging the play to mark the 300th anniversary of Voltaire's birth in 1694. Islamic activists objected, among them Tariq Ramadan, a Swiss Muslim whose grandfather founded the Muslim Brotherhood fundamentalist movement in Egypt. Mr. Ramadan wrote an open letter in October 1993 warning that performing Voltaire's play would ‘be another brick in an edifice of hatred and rejection in which Muslims feel they are being enclosed.’

After weeks of debate, Geneva authorities dropped the play, citing financial reasons. Mr. Loichemol, who lives near Voltaire's old chateau outside Geneva, denounced the decision as a revival of intolerance. Mr. Ramadan, who has become one of Europe's most influential Muslim intellectuals, has since tried to distance himself from the campaign to censor Voltaire, saying he admires the writer and has taught ‘Fanaticism’ to students. In an interview last year with the French magazine Medias, he said he was in Egypt when the play got canned and ‘;was not even aware of this affair.’

Now read the sequel:

Last spring, Mr. Loichemol decided to take another stab at reviving the play and persuaded Saint-Genis-Pouilly to include it in a program of cultural events, along with Flamenco dancers and a lowbrow farce. Mr. Akhrouf, the cafe owner and activist, says that in early December, he got an agitated phone call from a friend who had just received a leaflet advertising the event. Mr. Akhrouf found a copy of the play on the Internet and started shaking with rage as he read the portrayal of Muhammad as a fanatic.

Shortly afterward, he attended Friday prayers at a big mosque in Geneva and talked about his concerns with Hafid Ouardiri, a mosque official and veteran of the earlier anti-Voltaire campaign. They drafted a letter to the mayor demanding the play be cancelled ‘in order to preserve peace.’ Mr. Ouardiri, an Algerian-born former leftist radical, came to France in the 1960s and says he used to chant the 1968 student slogan, ‘It is forbidden to forbid.’ Now a devout Muslim, he says he champions ‘the need to forbid.’ Algeria and other Muslim countries, he says, were colonized by Europeans ‘nourished by Voltaire.’

Mayor Bertrand considered dropping the play. But after talking to aides and voters, he decided to stand by Voltaire. A meeting two days later to defuse the crisis got nowhere. Mr. Bertrand, flanked by officials from France's security service and other state bodies, quoted a section of France's constitution that guarantees free speech. Mr. Akhrouf and Mr. Ouardiri pleaded with authorities to try to understand Muslim feelings. Mr. Akhrouf broke down in tears. ‘I was very emotional,’ he says.

The night of the reading, riot police took up positions outside Saint-Genis-Pouilly's cultural center. An hour into the performance, the mayor got called out of the hall because of street disturbances. The mayor says the mood was ‘quasi-insurrectional,’ but damage was minor. Police chased Muslim youths through the streets. Now that tempers have calmed, Mayor Bertrand says he is proud his town took a stand by refusing to cave in under pressure to call off the reading. Free speech is modern Europe's ‘foundation stone,’ he says. ‘For a long time we have not confirmed our convictions, so lots of people think they can contest them.’

He does have one regret: He found the play, five acts in archaic verse, ‘deeply boring.’

Bravo, M.le maire!