The Bastille Opéra was one of François Mitterrand's grands projets, also known as grands travaux – a dozen or so highly ambitious architectural realizations which left the President's mark on Paris in a manner sometimes described, not flatteringly, as reminiscent of the monumental schemes of the Egyptian Pharaohs. Three of these – the Institut du Monde Arabe, the Musée d'Orsay (both on the Left Bank) and the Cité des Sciences at La Villette, in the north-east of the city – had in fact been embarked upon under Giscard, though they were completed during Mitterrand's first term. Among the others, the best-known are the Grand Louvre, centred on a glass pyramid, which gave the museum sorely needed new space; the Grande Arche out at La Défense, in the western suburbs, inaugurated during the 1989 bicentennial celebrations; and the Bibliothèque de France, where much of the research for this book was carried out. This was not opened until December 1996, when Jacques Chirac named it the Bibliothèque François Mitterrand in homage to the instigator of the project.

The Opéra's history is a chequered and frequently internecine one, in which political manoeuvring seems to loom larger than musical or aesthetic considerations. Before its opening Paris's main opera house had been for 114 years the opulent Palais Garnier, in the 9th arrondissement, which was utterly unsuited to contemporary music and concentrated on extremely costly sets and productions, only one of which could be housed at any one time.