Travelers' Tales Paris

by James O'Reilly

  “Money can’t buy happiness,” admitted my friend Claude Roy, a writer who lives on the rue Dauphine, but a person can use it well and happily here to buy his fruit, cheese and wine at the rue de Buci street market, books at Le Divan or La Hune, paintings in the dozens of galleries, all within a few minutes’ stroll of his apartment. In a shop on the rue de Tournon that sells toy soldiers of ancient breed—Napoleon, Lafayette, Joan of Arc—I saw a newer toy soldier, of painted lead, in a black hat and cape. It was one of the heroic battlers in the wars of the Left Bank circa 1930, a tall, thin, Irish toy soldier—James Joyce. The pen can be both as mighty and as leaden as the sword.

  Come with me down this street and meet the ghosts of our earliest years. Run, school-boy, run, with your sachel bouncing between your shoulderblades—shout, shout for no reason, for the pleasure of being alive, glance quickly into the antique shop, where the grey cat sleeps amid the yataghans, parasols, and fans, run on past the shop where the embroideress is ruining her eyesight stitching initials onto snow-white sheets, run past the bearded chiropodist as he surveys the long pavement from his window, run as far as the bronze lion guarding the entrance to the Villa Fodor. But you’re so quick, I’ve lost sight of you. Have you slipped into the church where the candle flames flicker in front of the grotto of Lourdes? Are you hurtling down the rue Raynouard, where the cab horses needed to be reined in? I’ll not go chasing after you, little ghost from 1908. Too much has changed for the worse in our city to let me smile at you as cheerfully as I should like.

  —Julian Green, Paris,

  translated by J. A. Underwood

  Without going out of its way to welcome the stranger, the Rive Gauche has evolved an immense traditional hospitality. Hardly anyone rejects her embrace—although, as anyone who has been the victim of Parisian impatience can attest, sometimes the embrace is pretty cool. It requires an ability to fight back, which was lacking in the tourist I saw desperately shouting. “Diet pop! All I want is a diet pop! Why can’t I get a diet pop!” on the terrace of La Palette, on the rue de Seine, near various art schools. This is one of my favorite cafés, but the burly waiter, who must have attended Berlitz Anti-Charm School, kept asking, “Champagne? Cognac? Faites un bel effort, monsieur!” (“Make a beautiful effort, sir!”), as if he didn’t understand. Of course the waiter understood the tourist’s wish. Of course he likes to play his games. Of course the art students and Rive Gauche locals—including an African prince in his robes, Swedish explorers, tousled philosophers, and me—were sadistically entertained by this unwinnable battle.

  Shakespeare and Company is an irreplaceable institution: it is an English-language outpost if you need that, but more fundamentally it is a place to renew yourself, a place that embodies a belief in books and in people, a place with a liberal, literate heart and soul—and in that sense a place that symbolizes part of the special spirit of the city. That spirit extends to the chalkboard notices scrawled outside the door, too, source of some of Paris’ prime wisdom and deals, where I found the following: “Paris bookseller looking for outdoor girl to build cabin in north woods. If she will cook him trout for breakfast every morning, he will tell her dog stories every night. “

  —Donald W. George,

  “The Liberation of Paris,”

  San Francisco Examiner

  One of the special pleasures of the Left Bank is browsing the different bookstores specializing in English and American books. First among equals is the famous Shakespeare and Company of George Whitman, who used to hint that he was descended from Walt Whitman. His shop on the rue de la Bûcherie, a few steps from the Seine, has been a hangout for poets and college kids since it was called Le Mistral many years ago, before George adopted the name of Sylvia Beach’s bookstore-publishing company, which first printed James Joyce. He keeps open late at night and has frequent mass Sunday teas for visiting geniuses. He is, as e. e. cummings once said about someone else, a delectable mountain, albeit a skinny and irascible one.

  The Rive Gauche is a swamp filled with birds and giants, a continent of fantasy, a very lazy but agitated ancient kingdom in the midst of the 20th century, a flâneur among the world’s earnest, a place to miss nothing but also to do nothing, a silence surrounded by noise, a sausage, a beer, a giggle, a dream of the past for those who have a shrug for the future, a baguette, a bottle of red, a bevy of students, a guitar jangle, a festive street orchestra that—I actually saw this—could not pass the hat because they had left it at home. In other words, the Left Bank is a delirious confusion and fantasy.

  Like the rest of Paris, the Left Bank really used to be what we still think it is. It is heading toward being a Rive Gauche Museum. That’s the truth and should be accepted. But the flower and bird markets still exist; so do the café sitters and their crises of exhilaration (call it inspiration, call it joie de vivre), and, in that magic light of the Ile de France, so does their gracious melancholy (call it pensive, call it acceptance of the mysteries of being).

  One night on the rue de la Huchette, I came upon a group of buskers singing a stirring version of “Let It Be,” that anthem of the late Sixties. They sounded exactly like the Beatles, except that they were singing in Korean. My French friends, a novelist and a psychiatrist who live upstairs from this year-round music festival, said they sometimes couldn’t decide whether to drop coins or bags of water on the entertainers. A few years ago this pedestrian quarter, surfeited with Danish Joan Baezes and Israeli Bob Dylans, was blanketed with revolutionary posters proclaiming a bas les gratteurs de guitares! (Down With the Guitar-Scrapers!)

  My personal law for survival and thriving on the Rive Gauche is to enjoy the monuments, parks, museums, churches and great public buildings, but pay attention first of all to the people. They are the distilled essence of France, essence of Paris—beautiful, ugly, surly, funny, greedy, generous, friendly, rude, seething with energetic complication. The best, useless and most fruitful occupation is to find a café terrace, buy a newspaper or a guidebook or any-book to prop against your cup or glass, and join the interlocking dramas of the street and the little stage on which you sit—the scholars, the mumblers, the lovers, the brooders, the debaters, those looking deeply into their liquids or into each other’s eyes. Now you’re there. This was the place.

  Against all odds, even against the march of history, it still is.

  Herbert Gold is the author of many books, including Lovers and Cohorts, Fathers, Family, Best Nightmare on Earth: A Life in Haiti, and Bohemia: Where Art, Angst, Love and Strong Coffee Meet. He lives in San Francisco.

  Night after night I pored over my Philosophical Dictionary and my other books. What seemed obscure or unintelligible I attributed to my ignorance and stupidity, and I persisted. I recall how I suffered over certain passages of Sartre’s Being and Nothingness, unable to make head or tail of them. My confidence was further shaken by the fact that other sections were clear and easy to comprehend, as were the same ideas expressed in his plays, essays, pamphlets. Recently I returned to that book, and reading it again in the light of experience realized that I was not entirely to blame, that certain sentences and paragraphs are indeed cloudy to the point of meaninglessness (perhaps written under the influence of drugs). I then understood why Heidegger, whose philosophy had been a powerful influence on Sartre’s development, had described the book as “muck”—not that he was a model of clarity!

  —Shusha Guppy, A Girl in Paris

  LYNN SCHNURNBERGER

  The Mystical Scarf-Tying Gene

  Don’t let the canons of fashion get you down.

  “NO, I CANNOT SELL MADAME A STRAPLESS BRA,” THE PERFECTLY coiffed French saleswoman said haughtily, looking at me somewhat lower than in the eye. “Your breasts are too large.” (Actually, what she really said was, “Votre poitrine est trop grosse.”)

  At the time, I was living in a small town in the French countryside and was married to a Frenchman, and until that day I had never shopped in Paris. Now I stood in an elegant lingerie shop on the rue d
e Rivoli, opposite the Louvre museum and the Tuileries Gardens. The windows of the shop were filled with delicate Dior camisoles and saucy Saint Laurent panties. I was embarrassed. Did she mean that they didn’t have bras in my size (which I had not yet disclosed)? Or that she had them, but wouldn’t sell one to me?

  The vendeuse rolled her eyes in exasperation. “Non, non, Madame does not understand. It’s simply that you have, well, American breasts.... It just would not be right,” she sniffed. Ah, the perils of shopping in Paris.

  Now, I’m no shopping slouch. In fact, as a TV reporter in New York, I’m known as a shopping expert. I studied shopping at the hem of a master—my mother, a redheaded fashion plate who used her first Depression-era paycheck as a down payment on monogrammed silk underwear.

  During my formative years, it was my mother who tooled around town in a two-toned turquoise-and-white Ford Fairlaine convertible and matching leather jacket. It was she who taught me to elbow my way through Filene’s Basement and emerge un-bruised with an under $20 Norma Kamali pantsuit. And it was she who showed me how to walk into Henri Bendel (when Buster, the doorman, still tipped his hat and scrutinized all those who dared enter) with a certain élan and drop $400 on a sweater that “we understood.”

  But shopping in Paris, where dressing is an art form, requires a whole different set of instincts. Whether one is stalking the atelier of some trendy new designer, perusing the Courreges boutique, or combing the racks at Tati (a K Mart with style), one finds oneself shoulder-to-shoulder with some of the most chic women in the world. They may live in a city with cobblestone streets, but they’re wearing spike heels or four-inch-high platforms. From the art student with multi-looped earrings bracketing her Mohawk haircut to the “Madame Figaro” turned out in exquisitely accessorized pastel suits, these women are together. Put together.

  I wanted to put myself together, too, but the obstacles seemed daunting. There was the intimidating process of buying things in a foreign language, the unfamiliar terrain and clothing sizes, the thought of stepping into a community changing room with an impeccably turned out Frenchwoman who probably looked more chic in her underwear than I did in the I-can’t-afford-it-anyway $750 designer dress I was trying on. (I’m convinced that all Frenchwomen are born completely crease-free, with a unique and mystical scarf-tying gene.)

  Slowly, though, I began to overcome the intimidation and the fear. I learned about the Paris that is all haute couture and little gold chairs, and the trendy Les Halles boutiques where gamine salesgirls sport purple lipstick and black, boxy dresses. I learned the latest slang: for instance, it used to be chic to say that some new idea or style was “brancher-wired,” plugged in. Now, the hip French simply exclaim “Decker!” (pronounced deck-AIR)—trendy shorthand for Black & Decker, contemporary provider of all things plugged in.

  I also learned about browsing. The French expression for this, faire les vitrines, sounded to me suspiciously like “make the latrines.” Anyway, as it turns out, this is mostly an American pastime. Just try entering the house of Chanel to “look around.” Even in the local Benetton shop, a salesgirl will immediately appear behind you. “Voulez-vous quelque chose, Madame?” the voice inquires, its tone an implied question about your lineage, your taste, your credit line.

  “Non, je regarde.”

  You walk over to a stack of blouses. She walks over to the stack of blouses. You finger the gray chiffon. She eyes you suspiciously.

  “Would you like to try on the gray chiffon?”

  “No, thank you. I’m still just looking.”

  You move to the right. She moves to the right. You to the left, she to the left. Suddenly you feel like the prey of Inspector Clouseau.

  From Aristotle to Cuvier, from Pliny to Blainville, natural science has made great strides. Each scientist has brought his aggregate of observations and studies to this field. Intrepid explorers have traveled the world over and have made important discoveries, but for the most part they have brought back only small black, yellow, or multicolored furs. It was helpful to learn that bears eat honey and have a weakness for cream tarts.

  I admit that those are very great discoveries. But no one has yet thought about discussing the Clerk, the most interesting animal of our era. No one has specialized narrowly enough, or meditated, observed, and traveled sufficiently to be in a position to speak with reasonable authority on the Clerk.

  —Gustave Flaubert, Early Writings, translated by Robert Griffin

  Perhaps French salespeople are more attentive (just try to round up a salesperson in Bloomingdale’s when you need help). Or maybe they’re more persistent (personally, I’d rather be left alone). Perhaps the French consumer is less frivolous (and actually goes to a store to buy something). Or less curious. I’m not sure. All I know is that it’s a difference that took some getting used to. Standing in front of a mirror at home and practicing a scowl, a firm je regarde, and an arch of the eyebrow helped immeasurably.

  And when you actually find something you wish to buy (that you’ll be allowed to buy—witness my encounter with the lady in the lingerie shop), there’s the embarrassment of not understanding what it costs. Do you want to stand there counting on your fingers (in front of the impeccably dressed, crease-free, perfectly scarf-tied salesperson) or juggling your pocket calculator? It lacks a certain je ne sais quoi, if you know what I mean. A friend remembers saying “I’ll take it!” and then quickly handing over every franc in her pocketbook in exchange for a thin, flat box containing one thin, flat (albeit elegant) Hermès scarf. How many Eiffel Tower bracelets, pink mesh stockings, berets, or bottles of Chanel No. 5 could she have gotten if only she’d correctly calculated the exchange rate?

  People have asked me if I’ve noticed that at least the French are nicer to the Americans these days. “Is it because of the favorable exchange rate?” they want to know. “Not exactly,” I answer sagely. “The Japanese have had the most money to spend lately, so the French now treat the Japanese even worse than they did the Americans.”

  Living in France, I soon found that just like Frenchwomen I gradually bought fewer pieces of clothing, but more carefully selected ones. I found that I relished the opportunity to try on new personalities: after all, I could play out my fantasy of strutting into a bistro wearing patterned black stockings and a graffiti-covered micromini, absolutely confident that no one I know would recognize me. I even prevailed upon my French tutor to devote one of our lessons to teaching me how to tie a scarf à la française. And eventually I came to think of shopping in Paris as a great adventure—almost as if the FBI had relocated me to a new life, with a new name, language, identity, and size. But it took time, and it wasn’t easy.

  As for bras, I never did understand the imperious declaration of the lingerie saleswoman: were my breasts really too large, or was her remark just an example of Gallic snobbery? After that encounter, I called New York and had my bras sent from Ezra Cohen on the Lower East Side. I wore them under my latest Claude Montana and Agnes B sundresses. And if that’s not a cross-cultural experience, then I don’t know what is.

  Lynn Schnurnberger is the author of Kings, Queens, Knights, and Jesters: Making Medieval Costumes, World of Dolls That You Can Make, Kids Love New York: The A to Z Resource Book, and Let There Be Clothes: 40,000 Years of Fashion. She lives in New York.

  After dinner we felt like seeing such Parisian specialties as we might see without distressing exertion, and so we sauntered through the brilliant streets and looked at the dainty trifles in variety stores and jewelry shops. Occasionally, merely for the pleasure of being cruel, we put unoffending Frenchmen on the rack with questions framed in the incomprehensible jargon of their native language, and while they writhed, we impaled them, we peppered them, we scarified them, with their own vile verbs and participles.

  —Mark Twain (1869)

  JACK E. BRONSTON

  Le Paris Profond

  The author’s favorite companion is Vie et Histoire.

  TRAVELERS NOD KNOWLEDGEABLY WHEN
PARIS IS DESCRIBED AS beautiful, but even knowledgeable travelers would be hard-pressed if they were asked what it is that makes Paris beautiful. The closest they come is to talk about the way in which the lines and color of its buildings and open spaces have a harmonious flow and unity or to describe the way in which the natural light of Paris under an open sky flatters its surface and emphasizes those harmonies. But to find how Paris achieves that effect is a further challenge comparable to reading a score at a concert—as we begin to understand the components of those harmonies, they become more precious and more meaningful.

  I’ve had an unusual opportunity to get beneath the surface of Paris and to understand how it has achieved its mysterious effect. Thanks to my wife’s profession and my own curiosity, I have a routine which I have followed for several years which has enabled me to uncover some of the beauty secrets of the city.

  My wife is a professional photographer which is reason enough for me as her personal “photo assistant” to look at the city of Paris more closely. Thus, the development of our routine—Sandra’s work begins in the morning and lasts through the day and early evening. My services as porter, traffic-diverter, and location spotter are appreciated, but mostly after dusk when tripod and complex equipment—and my company—become more essential. Otherwise, from morning to mid-afternoon, my assistance is dispensable. I am therefore free to wander the arrondissement du mois with the intelligent and diligent companion to whom I dedicate these pages.