An American in Paris

La Seine and nearby dock from the
Simone-de-Beauvoir foot-bridge

Paris is not in England and should therefore not necessarily be included in this blog, which is vaguely trying to focus on my novel (get it? it's a pun!) experience in the UK. But Paris est Paris: the city of iron lace modernity and curling stone antiquity; of romanticisms and existentialisms; of ex-patriots, drunk poets, poor philosophers, and starving artists; of lights; of love. Quite frankly, there is no place like Paris (see note 1).

The depth of literature associated with Paris is so great, I can't even begin to think about diving down that hole. The result would be me, having plummeted blindly for some time, crushed against some great pile of Baldwin, Wilde, Orwell, Voltaire, Hemingway, Hugo, Proust, Beckett...My bones broken, all the descriptions and bits of plot stained with my over-worked blood. 

And that is why I present to you short collection of my photos and some bits of quotes gathered from the great interweb. I highly suggest you get on a plane and be seduced and inspired by Paris yourself. 

The Palais Garnier, home to the Opéra National de France.
Inspiration for the Paris Opera House in Leroux's The Phantom
 of the Opera; there really is an underground lair.

"It is perfectly possible to be enamoured of Paris while remaining totally indifferent or even hostile to the French."

-James Baldwin

"There is an atmosphere of spiritual effort here. No other city is quite like it."

-James Joyce

A view of the street from the Palais Garnier, late afternoon.

"But Paris was a very old city and we were young and nothing was simple there, not even poverty, nor sudden money, nor the moonlight, nor right and wrong nor the breathing of someone who lay beside you in the moonlight."

-A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway

"The national characteristics...the restless metaphysical curiosity, the tenderness of good living and the passionate individualism. This is the invisible constant in a place with which the ordinary tourist can get in touch just by sitting quite quietly over a glass of wine in a Paris bistro."

View of Paris from the rooftop of Les Galeries Lafayette

-Lawrence Durrell

The Eiffel Tower

"She was a committed romantic and an anarcha-feminist. This was hard for her because it meant that she couldn't blow up beautiful buildings. She knew the Eiffel Tower was a hideous symbol of phallic oppression but when ordered by her commander to detonate the lift so that no-one should unthinkingly scale an erection, her mind filled with young romantics gazing over Paris and opening aerograms that said Je t'aime." 

-Jeanette Winterson (see note 2)

"Paris was a universe whole and entire unto herself, hollowed and fashioned by history; so she seemed in this age of Napoleon III with her towering buildings, her massive cathedrals, her grand boulevards and ancient winding streets--as vast and indestructible as nature itself. All was embraced by her, by her volatile and enchanted populace thronging the galleries, the theaters, the cafes, giving birth over and over to genius and sanctity, philosophy and war, frivolity and the finest art; so it seemed that if all the world outside her were to sink into darkness, what was fine, what was beautiful, what was essential might there still come to its finest flower. Even the majestic trees that graced and sheltered her streets were attuned to her--and the waters of the Seine, contained and beautiful as they wound through her heart; so that the earth on that spot, so shaped by blood and consciousness, had ceased to be the earth and had become Paris."

-Interview with a Vampire, Anne Rice

The tombstone of Oscar Wilde, covered with kisses and
lipstick tokens of love.

"When good Americans die, they go to Paris."
-Oscar Wilde


"There is never any ending to Paris, and the memory of each person who has lived in it differs from that of any other. Paris was always worth it, and you received return for whatever you brought to it..."
-A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway

Note 1: My experience in Paris was bittersweet. The friend I was meeting there for the weekend bailed on me at the last possible second (being in the City of Love ALONE sucks); I lost my camera on the first day (these are taken by ipod); I am le poor and have not the money for expensive Parisian dinners or activities. But I am always in love with Paris, and like a lover, I cannot wait to return.

Note 2: I happened upon this quote quite suddenly, and I know it's a bit strange and not in the same tone as all the rest, but I still haven't quite stopped giggling at it.

Side-note: This is a really lazy post about Paris; I apologize.  Perhaps I'll come back to this write up my own ideas about the city, but that will be for another day. 

View of Paris from Montmartre