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Paris
Born an American in Paris in 1900, Green accompanies the reader on an imaginative stroll through the French capital sharing his discoveries at every turn. From haunted visions of Notre Dame to memories of the old Trocadero, Green lovingly describes these strange and often little known locations. This special bilingual edition is illustrated with the Green's own photographs.
"Exquisitely literary in a traditional French manner."-"New York Review of Books"
Julian Green was a member both of the the AcadA(c)mie FranAaise and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
"Exquisitely literary in a traditional French manner."-"New York Review of Books"
Julian Green was a member both of the the AcadA(c)mie FranAaise and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
162 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
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About the author
Julien Green
198 books99 followersJulien Green was an American writer, who authored several novels, including Léviathan and Each in His Own Darkness. He wrote primarily in French.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 65 reviews
January 16, 2013
There is a certain category of thin books on the City of Lights by talented writers who love her. There was, for instance, John Glassco's Memoirs of Montparnasse -- which I am currently reading a couple of chapters at a time -- and Edmund White's The Flaneur. Paris by Julien Green is another such litle classic, and probably the best of the bunch. It consists of a series of short feuilletons without connection to one another attesting to his love of the city, even when, perhaps especially when, the sun is not shining and the rain is falling.
Green was born of Americans living in Paris. He wrote most of his books in French. In fact, my edition of Paris is bilingual with the French text on the even-numbered pages. He was probably the only person to be simultaneously a member of the Academie Francaise and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Instead of visiting the big tourist sights -- no Bateaux-Mouches or Eiffel Tower for him! -- Green visits some of my favorite places, such as the Musee Carnavalet in the Marais, the Victor Hugo Museum at the Place de Vosges, and the Cluny Medieval Museum on the Left Bank. He protests against the modernization of the city:
Green was born of Americans living in Paris. He wrote most of his books in French. In fact, my edition of Paris is bilingual with the French text on the even-numbered pages. He was probably the only person to be simultaneously a member of the Academie Francaise and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Instead of visiting the big tourist sights -- no Bateaux-Mouches or Eiffel Tower for him! -- Green visits some of my favorite places, such as the Musee Carnavalet in the Marais, the Victor Hugo Museum at the Place de Vosges, and the Cluny Medieval Museum on the Left Bank. He protests against the modernization of the city:
What will Paris be like tomorrow? The thought was in my mind as, strolling beside the Seine in the mist, I contemplated the glory of the buds that covered the trees with a delicate veil. Paris possesses a beauty that alarms me at times because I feel it is fragile, under threat. Mainly from our town planners. Which young architect is at last going to give us the city of the future, a fine city capable of appealing to the generations to come as we have been enchanted by the Paris that has been fashioned slowly by the centuries? Is it too much to dream of a visionary who will be the poet of space and no longer one of those organisers of a life uglified, to paraphrase Baudelaire, one of those bearers of wasted space who erect modern apartment buildings as graceless cubes, full of the sound and fury of the neighbours' television sets and plumbing facilities....I could only wish I could do as much justice to Los Angeles, a city which I have come to love, which is day by day being destroyed by incompetent architects in the employ of "rape and pillage" developers, whose word is law in Southern California.
February 2, 2024
L’amore, il desiderio, la nostalgia, la visionaria poesia e l’anelito inesauribile per una delle più amate, desiderate, rimpiante, anelate e poeticamente scritte fra tutte le città.
“Ai miei occhi Parigi resterà lo scenario di un romanzo che nessuno scriverà mai.”
“Il cielo grigio scuro fa di Parigi una città tutta bianca. Notre Dame, splendente di giovinezza.”
“Parigi avvolta in una leggera foschia sul far della notte, il riflesso delle luci nell’acqua, Notre Dame tutta bianca aldilà dei ponti, non è possibile sognare un paesaggio più ammaliatore.”
“Ma nell’ombra Parigi è tutt’altra cosa e, se parla, è a se stessa che rivolge il suo tenebroso discorso.”
“Ai miei occhi Parigi resterà lo scenario di un romanzo che nessuno scriverà mai.”
“Il cielo grigio scuro fa di Parigi una città tutta bianca. Notre Dame, splendente di giovinezza.”
“Parigi avvolta in una leggera foschia sul far della notte, il riflesso delle luci nell’acqua, Notre Dame tutta bianca aldilà dei ponti, non è possibile sognare un paesaggio più ammaliatore.”
“Ma nell’ombra Parigi è tutt’altra cosa e, se parla, è a se stessa che rivolge il suo tenebroso discorso.”
July 14, 2015
This was really a nice surprise! I started reading not expecting much of it, but what a great surprise this book is. The book itself is a collected of ensays about Paris written along the years, but what's interesting here is the way the author expresses is views of the city. He's a lover of Paris and though the book is all about this relationship of the author with his native city it doesn't get boring at all since it can be viewed as a kind of biographic itinerary of his own. More strakly though is that the author is not of french nationality, although he seems a french at heart! He was american but he was the first foreigner to enter the french academy for his destinguish writting. The book as a kind of nostalgic feeling and beeing it his last book we can see it as a kind of goodbye letter to his readers. I really liked it and wish to read more from him in the time soon.
July 18, 2025
Che cos’è una città se non una proiezione mentale, un disegno personale e sempre diverso in cui i ricordi diventano una mappa da seguire per ritrovare sé stessi, il proprio passato, quello che pensavamo di aver perso?
Non è necessario essere a Parigi per percorrerne le strade strette e buie, per vedere le acque della Senna agitarsi ed esondare, per salire gli innumerevoli gradini di scale spaventose capaci di trasportarti in altri mondi, in altre dimensioni, in una Parigi diversa da quella che ricordavi.
Green ripensa a Parigi dal suo esilio forzato, ne traccia i confini con gli occhi della mente, guardandone la mappa appesa al muro immagina la città come un enorme cervello, capace di sentire, pensare, esistere di una vita propria, multiforme, indipendente.
Parigi è un organismo profondamente vivo e vitale: se sa un lato subisce i cambiamenti che le vengono imposti, dall’altro lato qualcosa di lei sfugge sempre al controllo dei suoi abitanti e la città rimane la stessa imprevedibile Parigi, che racchiude in sé molti volti e molti segreti: se non tutti possono essere svelati, ognuno di loro alimenta le ombre della sera, la nebbia invernale, la luce sbiadita dell’estate e il vento gentile della primavera.
continua a leggere qui: https://parlaredilibri.wordpress.com/...
Non è necessario essere a Parigi per percorrerne le strade strette e buie, per vedere le acque della Senna agitarsi ed esondare, per salire gli innumerevoli gradini di scale spaventose capaci di trasportarti in altri mondi, in altre dimensioni, in una Parigi diversa da quella che ricordavi.
Green ripensa a Parigi dal suo esilio forzato, ne traccia i confini con gli occhi della mente, guardandone la mappa appesa al muro immagina la città come un enorme cervello, capace di sentire, pensare, esistere di una vita propria, multiforme, indipendente.
Parigi è un organismo profondamente vivo e vitale: se sa un lato subisce i cambiamenti che le vengono imposti, dall’altro lato qualcosa di lei sfugge sempre al controllo dei suoi abitanti e la città rimane la stessa imprevedibile Parigi, che racchiude in sé molti volti e molti segreti: se non tutti possono essere svelati, ognuno di loro alimenta le ombre della sera, la nebbia invernale, la luce sbiadita dell’estate e il vento gentile della primavera.
continua a leggere qui: https://parlaredilibri.wordpress.com/...
August 3, 2021
I received a Waterstone's voucher for my birthday - surely the best kind of present there is? - and set about spending it immediately. When browsing in my local branch, a thin, pale green spine caught my eye, and before I knew it, I had added Julian Green's Paris to the rather large stack of books which I was already balancing in my arms. Part of the reason that I picked it up was my love for Penguin Classics, but mostly it was due to the fact that a holiday in France - one of my favourite countries, and one in which I have been lucky enough to spend a large span of time in my life so far - sadly looks very much off the cards in 2021.
It is described in its blurb as an 'extraordinary, lyrical love letter... taking the reader on an imaginative journey around its secret stairways, courtyards, alleys and hidden places.' Further, the blurb declares, it is 'a meditation on getting lost and wasting time, and on what it truly means to love a city.' I was further intrigued when I read that the Observer calls Paris 'the most bizarre and delicious of travel books'. Sold, to the girl with the voucher.
Julian Green was born in Paris in 1900, to American parents, and spent the majority of his life in the city. He was a prolific author whom I had never read before, publishing over sixty-five books in France, and a further five in the USA. He wrote mainly in French; indeed, Paris was originally penned in this Romantic language. The Penguin edition is interestingly a bilingual one, the first of the kind which I have read to date. I am just about proficient enough in French to read Green's original text, but I appreciated being able to compare and contrast his own turns of phrase with those in the translation by J.A. Underwood.
Green opens his travelogue in rather a charming manner: 'I have often dreamed of writing a book about Paris that would be like one of those long, aimless strolls on which you find none of the things you are looking for but many that you were not looking for.' He goes on to explain why he wished to look at the more hidden corners of the city, commenting, perhaps a little controversially: 'Possibly from having looked at them too much, I can no longer see the architectural glories of Paris with quite the open mind required... I make no secret of the fact that it is the old buildings that I prefer, and yet I should be bored to tears if I had to write a page about the Hôtel des Invalides... I should be similarly struck dumb by Notre-Dame... I prefer to remain silent; for me, Notre-Dame is simply Notre-Dame, full stop.'
When Green was forced to be away from his beloved city during the war years, the thought of his home sustained him, holding a great deal of comfort. He reflects: 'Thinking about the capital all the time, I rebuilt it inside myself. I replaced its physical presence with something else, something supernatural...'. When he returns to Paris, one of the first things which he does is to climb the dome of the Sacre-Coeur: 'It was as if the whole city hit me in the chest... Winter was drawing to a close; the dazzling March light already consumed everything, and as far as the eye could see there was Paris, wearing, like a cloak that kept slipping from its shoulders, the shadow of the great clouds that the wind was chasing across the breadth of the sky.' He goes on to say: 'Certainly the city's smile is reserved for those who draw near and loaf in its streets; to them it speaks a familiar, reassuring language. The soul of Paris, however, can be apprehended fully from afar and from above, and it is in the silence of the sky that you hear the great and moving cry of pride and faith it upraises to the clouds.'
Green's short chapters, which are more like a series of essays than anything, take us on a sweeping tour around the city. He speaks of Paris' history at times, and writes at length about his favourite places to peruse. He is essentially a flâneur; on the Rue de Passy, for instance, he captures the following: '... the shoeshop where Lina, my nanny, used to buy those slippers with the sky-blue pompoms, and the stationer's where flies basked in the sun on the covers of the exercise books, and the grim Nicolas shop, the wine merchant's, and Mr Beaudichon's pharmacy (he had such a beautiful beard), and the great gold letters high up on a balcony, proclaiming to all and sundry that a dental surgeon lived here... and the heavenly fragrance of the first sprays of lilac that the florist with the red hands kept in the shade beneath the archway of number 93...'.
Paris is a really beautiful, musing piece on what it means to be a Parisian. According to Green, 'Every walk I have ever taken along its streets has seemed to create a fresh link, invisible yet tenacious, binding me to its very stones. I used to wonder as a child how the mere name of Paris could denote so many different things, so many streets and squares, so many gardens, houses, roofs, chimneys, and above it all the shifting, insubstantial sky that crowns our city...'. He goes on to tell us: 'There is scarcely a corner of Paris that is not haunted with memories for me.'
Paris is not merely a romantic musing on the city. Green is remarkably realist in places about aspects of the city's history, or areas which were perhaps less salubrious than others as he wandered. He comments that in his Paris, 'Ceaselessly, day and night, poverty and sickness prowl the dreary Montmartre streets that in the tourist's eyes glitter like a paradise of carefree pleasure...'. He captures such a great deal throughout, often in just one or two sentences which are loaded with detail. He writes, for instance: 'If the night is a clear one, and if the shadows are sharp and the moonlight good and white, there comes a moment when the best-informed stroller, as for all of the mystery of his city is concerned, stops and stars in silence. Paris, as I have said, is loath to surrender itself to people who are in a hurry; it belongs to the dreamers, to those capable of amusing themselves in its streets without regard to time... consequently their reward is to see what others will never see.'
At just 119 pages, Green captures such a great deal in Paris. It was a delight to peruse the photographs included on some of the pages, all of which were taken by Green himself. He was an excellent chronicler of a city which holds such a dear place in my heart, and which I hope to return to as soon as I can. I found Paris to be a very thoughtful and evocative account of what it means to make one's home in a single place, and to know it almost as well as one knows oneself. What a wonder, and what a privilege, to travel its streets with one who knew it so well.
It is described in its blurb as an 'extraordinary, lyrical love letter... taking the reader on an imaginative journey around its secret stairways, courtyards, alleys and hidden places.' Further, the blurb declares, it is 'a meditation on getting lost and wasting time, and on what it truly means to love a city.' I was further intrigued when I read that the Observer calls Paris 'the most bizarre and delicious of travel books'. Sold, to the girl with the voucher.
Julian Green was born in Paris in 1900, to American parents, and spent the majority of his life in the city. He was a prolific author whom I had never read before, publishing over sixty-five books in France, and a further five in the USA. He wrote mainly in French; indeed, Paris was originally penned in this Romantic language. The Penguin edition is interestingly a bilingual one, the first of the kind which I have read to date. I am just about proficient enough in French to read Green's original text, but I appreciated being able to compare and contrast his own turns of phrase with those in the translation by J.A. Underwood.
Green opens his travelogue in rather a charming manner: 'I have often dreamed of writing a book about Paris that would be like one of those long, aimless strolls on which you find none of the things you are looking for but many that you were not looking for.' He goes on to explain why he wished to look at the more hidden corners of the city, commenting, perhaps a little controversially: 'Possibly from having looked at them too much, I can no longer see the architectural glories of Paris with quite the open mind required... I make no secret of the fact that it is the old buildings that I prefer, and yet I should be bored to tears if I had to write a page about the Hôtel des Invalides... I should be similarly struck dumb by Notre-Dame... I prefer to remain silent; for me, Notre-Dame is simply Notre-Dame, full stop.'
When Green was forced to be away from his beloved city during the war years, the thought of his home sustained him, holding a great deal of comfort. He reflects: 'Thinking about the capital all the time, I rebuilt it inside myself. I replaced its physical presence with something else, something supernatural...'. When he returns to Paris, one of the first things which he does is to climb the dome of the Sacre-Coeur: 'It was as if the whole city hit me in the chest... Winter was drawing to a close; the dazzling March light already consumed everything, and as far as the eye could see there was Paris, wearing, like a cloak that kept slipping from its shoulders, the shadow of the great clouds that the wind was chasing across the breadth of the sky.' He goes on to say: 'Certainly the city's smile is reserved for those who draw near and loaf in its streets; to them it speaks a familiar, reassuring language. The soul of Paris, however, can be apprehended fully from afar and from above, and it is in the silence of the sky that you hear the great and moving cry of pride and faith it upraises to the clouds.'
Green's short chapters, which are more like a series of essays than anything, take us on a sweeping tour around the city. He speaks of Paris' history at times, and writes at length about his favourite places to peruse. He is essentially a flâneur; on the Rue de Passy, for instance, he captures the following: '... the shoeshop where Lina, my nanny, used to buy those slippers with the sky-blue pompoms, and the stationer's where flies basked in the sun on the covers of the exercise books, and the grim Nicolas shop, the wine merchant's, and Mr Beaudichon's pharmacy (he had such a beautiful beard), and the great gold letters high up on a balcony, proclaiming to all and sundry that a dental surgeon lived here... and the heavenly fragrance of the first sprays of lilac that the florist with the red hands kept in the shade beneath the archway of number 93...'.
Paris is a really beautiful, musing piece on what it means to be a Parisian. According to Green, 'Every walk I have ever taken along its streets has seemed to create a fresh link, invisible yet tenacious, binding me to its very stones. I used to wonder as a child how the mere name of Paris could denote so many different things, so many streets and squares, so many gardens, houses, roofs, chimneys, and above it all the shifting, insubstantial sky that crowns our city...'. He goes on to tell us: 'There is scarcely a corner of Paris that is not haunted with memories for me.'
Paris is not merely a romantic musing on the city. Green is remarkably realist in places about aspects of the city's history, or areas which were perhaps less salubrious than others as he wandered. He comments that in his Paris, 'Ceaselessly, day and night, poverty and sickness prowl the dreary Montmartre streets that in the tourist's eyes glitter like a paradise of carefree pleasure...'. He captures such a great deal throughout, often in just one or two sentences which are loaded with detail. He writes, for instance: 'If the night is a clear one, and if the shadows are sharp and the moonlight good and white, there comes a moment when the best-informed stroller, as for all of the mystery of his city is concerned, stops and stars in silence. Paris, as I have said, is loath to surrender itself to people who are in a hurry; it belongs to the dreamers, to those capable of amusing themselves in its streets without regard to time... consequently their reward is to see what others will never see.'
At just 119 pages, Green captures such a great deal in Paris. It was a delight to peruse the photographs included on some of the pages, all of which were taken by Green himself. He was an excellent chronicler of a city which holds such a dear place in my heart, and which I hope to return to as soon as I can. I found Paris to be a very thoughtful and evocative account of what it means to make one's home in a single place, and to know it almost as well as one knows oneself. What a wonder, and what a privilege, to travel its streets with one who knew it so well.
July 18, 2019
One of the best books I have read all year! The way Green presents Paris in all of it splendor and grace, in an upmost poetic and highly visual redundancy, left me wanting more. As someone who is captivated by the City of Lights as well as having yet to travel there, Julian Green has cemented my desire to see Paris all the more. Grand book overall and superbly written.
October 6, 2011
Poor. For some reason there are a lot of mediocre travelogues, meditations and vignettes about Paris. I thought Paris Sketches by JK Huysmans would great, I thought Paris Peasant by Louis Aragon would be excellent and I thought this looked like a pretty interesting book from a great publisher but they all disappointed. When you compare these to the writings of Thomas de Quincy, Charles Lamb, William Hazlitt, Charles Dickens, Ford Maddox Ford or Iain Sinclar on London there is just no contest. This book is a tired, derivative work in the fin de siecle tradition. Green moans about change, fixates upon the middle ages and displays a constant snobbery towards other people. It is filled with cheap lyricism and emptily purple prose. I won't bother with him again.
December 9, 2022
I used an AI to write this review. The prompt that the AI answered read as follows: "Please provide the transcript of a conversation between a cow chewing its own cud and a syphilitic Baudelaire who cannot finish his sentences. They are to discuss the fenestration of Val-de-Grace. The cow cannot talk."
Baudelaire: (incoherent mumbling)
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: (mumbling) Fenestration... Val-de-Grace...
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: ...windows... open...
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: ...beautiful... light...
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: (incoherent mumbling)
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: (mumbling) Fenestration... Val-de-Grace...
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: ...windows... open...
Cow: *Chewing*
Baudelaire: ...beautiful... light...
Cow: *Chewing*
June 12, 2019
A beautifully slow and meaningful exploration of Paris. Julian Green pulled me along on a tour of Paris that most people wouldn't know. I especially enjoyed The City Above The City and the final paragraph of the book which reflected on what Paris is, was, and will be.
Read slowly, dipping in and out, often when waiting for something to happen. In the car, on trains, in parks and finished in bed.
Read slowly, dipping in and out, often when waiting for something to happen. In the car, on trains, in parks and finished in bed.
March 31, 2021
One of thE most beautiful books ever omg it feels like reading poetry and now i just wanna go to Paris even more haha
July 1, 2024
París es una de las ciudades más fascinantes en las que he estado. Ya, sin haberla pisado nunca, era una ciudad que me maravillaba y cuando la visité lo confirmé. Me prometí a mí mismo que volvería una vez cada año, pero parece que no cumplo lo que (me) prometo... Así que tengo que recurrir a la literatura para no quedarme con las ganas.
Bohemio, soñador, romántico, artístico, centro europeo del amor, del arte y de la luz, revolucionario, arquitectónicamente perfecto… Paris sera toujours Paris.
Me ha encantado descubrir la ciudad de la infancia de un escritor como Julien Green: protestante por decisión materna, después católico por una vivencia mística, exiliado por la ocupación de los nazis, viajero incansable, miembro de la Academia Francesa, homosexual (auto)censurado y diseñador de su propia tumba.
Con fina capa de nostalgia, Green nos dibuja un París que parece no existir ya: muros destruidos, catedrales abandonadas, caminos de tierra que ahora son carreteras, viejos medios de transporte que han quedado relegados a museos y recuerdos que florecen como fotos vintage. Es un París que queda como recuerdo tras el exilio forzado por la segunda guerra mundial, puede que desdibujado y con tonos grises en un cielo que me pareció siempre brillante.
Conocer más de cerca esta ciudad y ese pasado me ha gustado bastante. Y es que “París” es un retrato muy personal de una ciudad que se sabe eterna y de la que cada visitante (amante u odiador) tiene una imagen nítida. Pasear por aquellos puentes, escuchar el murmullo del Sena o acordarse de aquellos muros, calles y callejuelas que formaron parte del paisaje… No es un libro para todo el mundo, pero desde luego que es un escritor para todo el mundo. ¡Estoy deseando leer más cosas de Julien Green!
Bohemio, soñador, romántico, artístico, centro europeo del amor, del arte y de la luz, revolucionario, arquitectónicamente perfecto… Paris sera toujours Paris.
Me ha encantado descubrir la ciudad de la infancia de un escritor como Julien Green: protestante por decisión materna, después católico por una vivencia mística, exiliado por la ocupación de los nazis, viajero incansable, miembro de la Academia Francesa, homosexual (auto)censurado y diseñador de su propia tumba.
Con fina capa de nostalgia, Green nos dibuja un París que parece no existir ya: muros destruidos, catedrales abandonadas, caminos de tierra que ahora son carreteras, viejos medios de transporte que han quedado relegados a museos y recuerdos que florecen como fotos vintage. Es un París que queda como recuerdo tras el exilio forzado por la segunda guerra mundial, puede que desdibujado y con tonos grises en un cielo que me pareció siempre brillante.
Conocer más de cerca esta ciudad y ese pasado me ha gustado bastante. Y es que “París” es un retrato muy personal de una ciudad que se sabe eterna y de la que cada visitante (amante u odiador) tiene una imagen nítida. Pasear por aquellos puentes, escuchar el murmullo del Sena o acordarse de aquellos muros, calles y callejuelas que formaron parte del paisaje… No es un libro para todo el mundo, pero desde luego que es un escritor para todo el mundo. ¡Estoy deseando leer más cosas de Julien Green!
June 7, 2018
I was expecting something... different. It is not bad, don't understand me wrong.
These are anotations by Julien Green so it's normal it doesn't have a guiding thread through all chapters.
“Sometimes we do things, without thinking, that make no sense to us until much later, and yet appear to have been prompted by the most alert part of our being.”
These are anotations by Julien Green so it's normal it doesn't have a guiding thread through all chapters.
“Sometimes we do things, without thinking, that make no sense to us until much later, and yet appear to have been prompted by the most alert part of our being.”
February 7, 2025
Per chi ama Parigi, è bellissimo ripercorrerla tra queste pagine. Una passeggiata sentimentale.
Bello leggerselo prima di partire.
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Bello leggerselo prima di partire.
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February 14, 2023
Paris não se entrega de modo nenhum a gente apressada, já o disse, ela pertence aos sonhadores, àqueles que sabem divertir-se nas ruas sem se preocuparem com quaisquer tarefas urgentes que os chamem algures; a recompensa obtida é a de se ver aquilo que jamais poderá ser visto pelos outros.
September 15, 2024
lubię takie twory. bardzo prywatne zeznania przeszłości i nadzieję przyszłości, urzeczywistniające miasto i nadające mu duszę jak reszta jego mieszkańców. może nawet ociepli mnie trochę do samego paryża.
July 2, 2025
I love seeing a city through other people's eyes ❤️
July 10, 2023
„i call it a secret city because foreigners never enter it, and i am tempted to call it sacred, because its sufferings make it dearer to us”
May 11, 2025
“La città, infatti, sorride solo a chi l'avvicina e si perde nelle sue strade: a costui parla una lingua rassicurante e familiare, ma l'anima di Parigi si rivela solo da lontano e dall'alto, ed è nel silenzio del cielo che si ode l'immane, patetico grido di orgoglio e di fede che essa innalza verso le nuvole.”
July 21, 2021
4.5 étoiles
J'ai bien aimé explorer cette écriture de voyage de Paris du 20e siècle. L'auteur était un Américain qui est né à Paris et y habitait la majeure partie de sa vie.
J'ai apprécié les rêveries et pensées sur beaucoup de choses différentes de Paris - les musées et principaux monuments (p. ex. le tour Eiffel et la Notre Dame) mais aussi les rues de son enfance, des escaliers, des églises diverses, etc. Il écrivait aussi de ses émotions, ses souvenirs et ses sentiments de Paris entièrement et à travers le temps (de sa vie). Il écrivait l'atmosphère, l'ambiance et les gens avec compétence et un tel amour de sa ville que cela saute aux yeux.
L'édition est bilingue - en français et en anglais. C'était une bonne expérience de comparer le français original et la traduction anglaise (tel que les mots et les expressions la traductrice a choisi).
L'expérience de la lecture m'a rappelé que j'aime Paris et que je veux vraiment le visiter à nouveau.
Si tu veux le lire en français, en anglais, ou les deux, je le recommande pour les gens qui aiment l'écriture de voyage et l'écriture sur Paris !
---
4.5 stars
I really enjoyed this exploration of travel writing of 20th century Paris. The author was an American born in Paris and he lived there for most of his life.
I appreciated the musings and thoughts he had on many things about Paris - the museums and landmarks/monuments (such as the Eiffel tower and Notre Dame) but also the streets of his childhood, the staircases, the various churches etc. He also wrote of his emotions, memories and feelings of Paris as a whole and across time (his lifetime). He wrote atmosphere, mood, and people so well and with such love of his city that it jumps off the page.
This edition is bilingual - both French and English. It's a great experience to compare the original French with the translation (especially the words and phrases chosen by the translator).
The writing experience reminded me how much I love Paris and how much I want to visit it again.
If you want to read it in French, English, or both, I really recommend it for people who love travel writing and writing on Paris!
J'ai bien aimé explorer cette écriture de voyage de Paris du 20e siècle. L'auteur était un Américain qui est né à Paris et y habitait la majeure partie de sa vie.
J'ai apprécié les rêveries et pensées sur beaucoup de choses différentes de Paris - les musées et principaux monuments (p. ex. le tour Eiffel et la Notre Dame) mais aussi les rues de son enfance, des escaliers, des églises diverses, etc. Il écrivait aussi de ses émotions, ses souvenirs et ses sentiments de Paris entièrement et à travers le temps (de sa vie). Il écrivait l'atmosphère, l'ambiance et les gens avec compétence et un tel amour de sa ville que cela saute aux yeux.
L'édition est bilingue - en français et en anglais. C'était une bonne expérience de comparer le français original et la traduction anglaise (tel que les mots et les expressions la traductrice a choisi).
L'expérience de la lecture m'a rappelé que j'aime Paris et que je veux vraiment le visiter à nouveau.
Si tu veux le lire en français, en anglais, ou les deux, je le recommande pour les gens qui aiment l'écriture de voyage et l'écriture sur Paris !
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4.5 stars
I really enjoyed this exploration of travel writing of 20th century Paris. The author was an American born in Paris and he lived there for most of his life.
I appreciated the musings and thoughts he had on many things about Paris - the museums and landmarks/monuments (such as the Eiffel tower and Notre Dame) but also the streets of his childhood, the staircases, the various churches etc. He also wrote of his emotions, memories and feelings of Paris as a whole and across time (his lifetime). He wrote atmosphere, mood, and people so well and with such love of his city that it jumps off the page.
This edition is bilingual - both French and English. It's a great experience to compare the original French with the translation (especially the words and phrases chosen by the translator).
The writing experience reminded me how much I love Paris and how much I want to visit it again.
If you want to read it in French, English, or both, I really recommend it for people who love travel writing and writing on Paris!
November 6, 2013
Stop! Those people looking for a geographical and/or historical guide to Paris be warned. This is not it! Instead Paris by Julian Green is a gentle meditation on one of the world's most fascinating cities. As Lila Azam Zanganeh writes in her introduction - in a way talking to him after his death: "Oftentimes you caught yourself dreaming sadly of a Paris which, you suspected, no longer existed. But you also secretly thought that, the more vulnerable Paris appeared, the lovelier it was."
Green writes about the district of Passy as it was when he was a child, the church of St Julian the Poor, the Palais Royal, the stairways and steps of Paris, the cloister of Les Billettes and more.
"Paris is a city that might well be spoken of in the plural, as the Greeks used to speak of Athens, for there are many Parises, and the tourists' Paris is only superficially related to the Paris of the Parisians. The foreigner driving through Paris from one museum to another is quite oblivious to the presence of the world he brushes past without seeing. Until you have wasted time in a city, you can not pretend to know it well.
Recommended for the discerning reader.
Green writes about the district of Passy as it was when he was a child, the church of St Julian the Poor, the Palais Royal, the stairways and steps of Paris, the cloister of Les Billettes and more.
"Paris is a city that might well be spoken of in the plural, as the Greeks used to speak of Athens, for there are many Parises, and the tourists' Paris is only superficially related to the Paris of the Parisians. The foreigner driving through Paris from one museum to another is quite oblivious to the presence of the world he brushes past without seeing. Until you have wasted time in a city, you can not pretend to know it well.
Recommended for the discerning reader.
August 5, 2023
Se amate Parigi, questo libriccino fa al caso vostro. L'ho scoperto per caso, girovagando per gli scaffali della mia libreria preferita. La semplicità della cover e quella parola, Parigi - in grado di evocare scenari mozzafiato e di allestire un sogno lucido nella mia mente - non mi hanno fatto dubitare nemmeno per un istante. Quel libro doveva essere mio.
Inutile dire che questo libro mi abbia stupita. Leggendo alcune parole mi sono trovata a rabbrividire e ho avvertito delle lacrime che sgorgavano dai miei occhi. Come si può rimanere indifferenti, come si trattiene l'emozione di fronte a tanta bellezza?
E come non potrei elogiare Green per la sua scrittura, così limpida e minuziosa, tanto che durante la lettura mi pareva quasi di sentire gli odori che descriveva, apprezzare le ombre proiettate dagli ippocastani su un muretto, di essere sommersa dal caos e dalla strabiliante frenesia di questa città, cuore e cervello, passato e futuro, quiete e tempesta?
Inutile dire che questo libro mi abbia stupita. Leggendo alcune parole mi sono trovata a rabbrividire e ho avvertito delle lacrime che sgorgavano dai miei occhi. Come si può rimanere indifferenti, come si trattiene l'emozione di fronte a tanta bellezza?
E come non potrei elogiare Green per la sua scrittura, così limpida e minuziosa, tanto che durante la lettura mi pareva quasi di sentire gli odori che descriveva, apprezzare le ombre proiettate dagli ippocastani su un muretto, di essere sommersa dal caos e dalla strabiliante frenesia di questa città, cuore e cervello, passato e futuro, quiete e tempesta?
May 31, 2016
"Paris is a city that might well be spoken of in the plural, as the Greeks used to speak of Athens, for there are many Parises, and the tourists’ Paris is only superficially related to the Paris of the Parisians. The foreigner driving through Paris from one museum to another is quite oblivious to the presence of a world he brushes past without seeing. Until you have wasted time in a city, you cannot pretend to know it well. The soul of a big city is not to be grasped so easily; in order to make contact with it, you have to have been bored, you have to have suffered a bit in those places that contain it. Anyone can get hold of a guide and tick off all the monuments, but within the very confines of of Paris there is another city as difficult to access as Timbuktu once was."
November 21, 2014
While this account mainly focuses on the beauty and complex character of Paris as a whole, it also looks at its fragility and the way in which it is under threat. The author states 'a certain amount of destruction is inevitable'. 'Paris' is a romantics account of the city that references poets and painters perceptions of the city throughout.
April 21, 2018
Just makes you want to engage in that walking wonderlust on the streets of Paris. I have a fear that some places described no longer exist, a really evocative and beautiful book.
August 14, 2021
language and imagery are so beautiful, i am excited to go to paris, wish i could read the french, “space and nature – it always comes back to that”
September 21, 2023
Una bellissima descrizione dal punto di vista dell’autore, che ama la sua città e che ci fa scoprire una Parigi diversa da quella turistica e superficiale.
March 14, 2025
Ci sono libri che avremmo potuto scrivere noi, ne siamo convinti tutti, solo che li hanno scritti altri e, forse, questa convinzione è dovuta al fatto che in realtà convivono nella nostra mente gli echi dei tanti libri letti. Mi è capitato di provare questa sensazione dopo le prime due o tre pagine di “Parigi” di Julien Green. Parigi è da sempre una città narrata, filmata, raccontata, cantata attraverso i secoli , come poche altro città lo sono state: forse solo New York e Londra hanno avuto la stessa “fortuna narrativa”. Il libro è semplicemente un atto di amore incorruttibile ed eterno per Parigi. “…Avevo affisso al muro una mappa di Parigi, che catturava lungamente il mio sguardo e quasi a mia insaputa mi erudiva. Scoprii che Parigi aveva la forma di un cervello umano…” Julien Green tratta Parigi con lo stesso approccio che fu dei surrealisti. Più di un passo, di questo prezioso volumetto edito da Adelphi, sembra attingere al patrimonio della letteratura surrealista, a cominciare dallo strabiliante “Nadja” di André Breton fino al mirabolante “Le Paysan de Paris” di Louis Aragon. È proprio l’anima del vero flâneur che anima tutto il volume e basta la lettura di qualche pagina per rendersene conto “…Chi non ha perso tempo in una città non può certo pretendere di conoscerla bene. L’anima di una metropoli non si lascia cogliere tanto facilmente per entrare in comunicazione con lei bisogna essersi annoiati, avere un po’ sofferto nei luoghi che la delimitano…” Parole di questo tenore sono proprie solo di pochissimi autori, legati alla città da un cordone ombelicale mai reciso. Il lettore di questo libro non può avere con l’autore che la stessa affinità elettiva, perché Parigi richiede una dedizione totale, non uno sguardo da turista e questa non è una guida turistica. Basta leggere “Le alture del Sedicesimo” (ove sedicesimo sta per XVI Arrondissement), dedicato al quartiere di Passy (per intenderci quello che inizia sotto il Ponte di Bir Hakeim, dove l’urlo di Marlon Brando squarciava la quiete parigina).La descrizione della Rue de Passy ha molto a che fare con le meraviglie del “paesano” paragonata ai “passages” dove provare la “vertigine del moderno”: il vinaio Nicolas, la pasticceria Coquelin, gli sguardi che i garzoni lanciano ai polpacci delle massaie, la Rue Raynouard, tutto ciò non può nascere da una semplice ammirazione per la città, nemmeno da un amore per la città, ma può nascere solo da una devozione per Parigi che è di molti, ma non di tutti. La stessa cosa può dirsi per le scorribande sentimentali di Julien Green nei giardini del Palais Royal, “uno di quei luoghi dove aleggia un non so che di misterioso, più facile da percepire che da dire”, scrive l’autore preso ormai dal feticismo più sfrenato: “La mia mano sfiorò una delle colonne bianche (…) Come in preda ad una allucinazione, infilai il viso tra le sbarre della cancellata le cui punte di lance dorate brillavano contro un cielo minaccioso…” Evitate di leggere un libro così se non l’amate come l’amo io, potrebbe deludervi perché leggereste un libro su una città e non su “la” città. Curiose coincidenze: lo scorso anno, proprio in queste settimane lessi “Paris s’il vous plaît” (Einaudi). Ecco, la giovane autrice romana, tra i contemporanei, è quella che maggiormente sembra essere sulla stessa lunghezza d’onda con libri simili a questo, dove la bellezza di Parigi si rivela in tutta la sua convulsività e vale la pena ricordare che come scrisse Breton “La beauté sera convulsive ou ne sera pas.
May 24, 2025
Sono da poco tornato dal mio primo viaggio a Parigi. Avevo sentito parlare di questo libro alla sua uscita per Adelphi e mi ero ripromesso che lo avrei letto poco prima di partire. Uno di quei piccoli libri Adelphi che quando li compri sai che non stai sbagliando.
L’unica pecca è che li finisci presto, ma forse meglio così. “Parigi” è un’ode in tutto e per tutto a Parigi.
Julien Green,di origine americana, ci è nato e cresciuto (e con lui anche la città). Green ha amato la sua città con tutto il cuore, esplorandola fisicamente ed emotivamente, aggiungendo nuove prospettive, nuovo percorsi, in un continuo perdersi e ritrovarsi. Green vuole ritrovare l’essenza del flâneur. Questo libro è il viaggio di un flâneur. Più che viaggio, un girovagare, un vagabondaggio, un abbraccio alla Ville Lumiere non solo attraverso le sue maestosità mastodontiche, ma addentrandosi nelle nicchie,nei suoi misteri, nel suo cuore medioevale ormai quasi del tutto scomparso. Il flâneur non è un’attività esclusivamente fisica, si arricchisce di una patina surreale, è una passeggiata senza meta, che ha dei connotati spirituali. Questa passeggiata al limite tra il reale e il surreale è spesso interconnessa all’azione della memoria: i ricordi, le emozioni del passato, rivivono attraverso gli spazi percorsi. Green ci descrive i luoghi mitici di Parigi, i luoghi nascosti, gli incontri con gli amici, Cocteau e Colette, le chiese, i chiostri, il Trocadero e i musei, passando per i Passages, il Quartiere Latino, Montparnasse, Le Marais e il suo quartiere preferito: quello di Palais-Royal e i suoi bellissimi portici e i giardini. Giardini che ho avuto modo di visitare e che ho amato particolarmente anche io e in cui ho ripensato ad un passaggio in particolare:
“Comunque sia, la mappa di Parigi mi aiutò più di una volta a superare ore difficili e, avendone scoperto, come ho detto, una somiglianza con il cervello umano, mi sforzavo di piazzare entro i confini della capitale tutte le circonvoluzioni osservate in passato. Mi piaceva quindi credere di essere nato nell'area dell'immaginazione e cresciuto nel cuore della memoria; esitavo sulla sede della volontà, della riflessione e del gusto, che cambiavo incessantemente di quartiere; talvolta mi sembrava naturale che la città si rammentasse la propria storia con l'ausilio del Marais, che svolgesse le sue operazioni intellettuali grazie al V arrondissement e ai suoi calcoli aritmetici nel quartiere della Bourse; ma tutto questo era attraversato dalla Senna, che rappresentava ai miei occhi ciò che di istintivo e inespresso ci portiamo dentro, come una grande corrente di vaghe ispirazioni che brancola nel buio alla ricerca di un mare in cui perdersi.” (p.17)
Forse ancora più significativa è l’osservazione seguente:
“Durante la guerra, a New York, sognavo la Parigi che mi era stata in un certo senso confiscata e, come ho detto allora, la immaginavo come un cervello. Da frenologo presuntuoso, collocavo in ogni zona la sede di questo o di quel sentimento, di pensieri, di energie che, a mio avviso, più le assomigliavano. Adesso non paragonerei più Parigi a un cervello, ma a un cuore, un cuore messo in orizzontale e attraversato dalla sua grande arteria, la Senna, perché ormai per me i ricordi hanno invaso lo spazio e davanti a loro la realtà fittizia scompare. Così Parigi si popola di tutte le persone che ho incontrato, conosciuto, amato; le frasi dei nostri dialoghi si intrecciano nell’aria come la rete invisibile che trattiene il tempo nelle maglie della memoria” (pp. 107-108)
Non credo ci sia altro da aggiungere.
L’unica pecca è che li finisci presto, ma forse meglio così. “Parigi” è un’ode in tutto e per tutto a Parigi.
Julien Green,di origine americana, ci è nato e cresciuto (e con lui anche la città). Green ha amato la sua città con tutto il cuore, esplorandola fisicamente ed emotivamente, aggiungendo nuove prospettive, nuovo percorsi, in un continuo perdersi e ritrovarsi. Green vuole ritrovare l’essenza del flâneur. Questo libro è il viaggio di un flâneur. Più che viaggio, un girovagare, un vagabondaggio, un abbraccio alla Ville Lumiere non solo attraverso le sue maestosità mastodontiche, ma addentrandosi nelle nicchie,nei suoi misteri, nel suo cuore medioevale ormai quasi del tutto scomparso. Il flâneur non è un’attività esclusivamente fisica, si arricchisce di una patina surreale, è una passeggiata senza meta, che ha dei connotati spirituali. Questa passeggiata al limite tra il reale e il surreale è spesso interconnessa all’azione della memoria: i ricordi, le emozioni del passato, rivivono attraverso gli spazi percorsi. Green ci descrive i luoghi mitici di Parigi, i luoghi nascosti, gli incontri con gli amici, Cocteau e Colette, le chiese, i chiostri, il Trocadero e i musei, passando per i Passages, il Quartiere Latino, Montparnasse, Le Marais e il suo quartiere preferito: quello di Palais-Royal e i suoi bellissimi portici e i giardini. Giardini che ho avuto modo di visitare e che ho amato particolarmente anche io e in cui ho ripensato ad un passaggio in particolare:
“Comunque sia, la mappa di Parigi mi aiutò più di una volta a superare ore difficili e, avendone scoperto, come ho detto, una somiglianza con il cervello umano, mi sforzavo di piazzare entro i confini della capitale tutte le circonvoluzioni osservate in passato. Mi piaceva quindi credere di essere nato nell'area dell'immaginazione e cresciuto nel cuore della memoria; esitavo sulla sede della volontà, della riflessione e del gusto, che cambiavo incessantemente di quartiere; talvolta mi sembrava naturale che la città si rammentasse la propria storia con l'ausilio del Marais, che svolgesse le sue operazioni intellettuali grazie al V arrondissement e ai suoi calcoli aritmetici nel quartiere della Bourse; ma tutto questo era attraversato dalla Senna, che rappresentava ai miei occhi ciò che di istintivo e inespresso ci portiamo dentro, come una grande corrente di vaghe ispirazioni che brancola nel buio alla ricerca di un mare in cui perdersi.” (p.17)
Forse ancora più significativa è l’osservazione seguente:
“Durante la guerra, a New York, sognavo la Parigi che mi era stata in un certo senso confiscata e, come ho detto allora, la immaginavo come un cervello. Da frenologo presuntuoso, collocavo in ogni zona la sede di questo o di quel sentimento, di pensieri, di energie che, a mio avviso, più le assomigliavano. Adesso non paragonerei più Parigi a un cervello, ma a un cuore, un cuore messo in orizzontale e attraversato dalla sua grande arteria, la Senna, perché ormai per me i ricordi hanno invaso lo spazio e davanti a loro la realtà fittizia scompare. Così Parigi si popola di tutte le persone che ho incontrato, conosciuto, amato; le frasi dei nostri dialoghi si intrecciano nell’aria come la rete invisibile che trattiene il tempo nelle maglie della memoria” (pp. 107-108)
Non credo ci sia altro da aggiungere.
January 18, 2024
4.5 stars.
Ah, Paris. I spent a schoolyear near it, at Orsay, and went every weekend to Paris, to buy something, or just wander a bit in bookstores or record stores, or something other. I have been there on other travels also, before and after that year. Miss it, and would like to go again.
The author was a Paris-born American, who lived most of his life in it. Majority of the small essays here were published here (first in 1983), or in the 1940s. The views vary from times of his childhood, near WWII and when he has to be away from it most of that wartime, and in times after (some clearly 1970s). I kept a DK Paris guide near me while reading it, just to check what some places looked like.
The book is bilingual, so you can choose to read the left, French, side or the English right side. Already slim as it is, the book reads quicker if you read just one side. But you might want to linger in his pictures of the place, some absolutely gone and some still there. One set of black and white photos is inside. Some notes at the end explain certain people and places.
Green clearly prefers older buildings, though he’s not sorry at all to see the ugly Trocadero palace building go. In these essays he tries to talk about less touristy stuff, though he can’t help writing one on Notre-Dame (but that place deserves it, and his writing on it talks about a certain time that makes it interesting). He talks about his childhood in Passy (western Paris), what was there and what still is, what he could see as a schoolboy, running home past shops.
He visits some smaller churches too, like St Julian The Poor, and Val-de-Grace church, at least on the outside. Other things include talking about what those who live in Paris see that visitors won’t, the stairways of it, of long-gone crier-seller of things like food for little birds, visiting museums, how sun shines through window or on other buildings, the Seine and its ‘talk’, what would happen if the Paris scenes in his books were real, Paris of the painters (especially impressionists), and the statues’ views high above. This slim book packs a lot of Paris in it haha.
And at the end: thoughts on what the future Paris will look like, what will the future people think about the Paris of the past (or their present), what buildings go down or are built, will there still be enough trees (he really doesn’t like how much trees are felled). But whatever happens, he has given us a view on Paris of the past, closer past, of what its people see – and not much of what the tourists see. Some rare views and small surprises, various moods, seasons, scenes. Things can be really beautiful even when it’s just this text you read.
During wartime, when he couldn’t be in Paris due to being American, he looked at a map in Paris, and dreamt of the Paris he knew. We might have much or only some or none of experience of Paris, but we can read this and make our own dreams of what it would be like to be there. And use that to ‘be there’!
Ah, Paris. I spent a schoolyear near it, at Orsay, and went every weekend to Paris, to buy something, or just wander a bit in bookstores or record stores, or something other. I have been there on other travels also, before and after that year. Miss it, and would like to go again.
The author was a Paris-born American, who lived most of his life in it. Majority of the small essays here were published here (first in 1983), or in the 1940s. The views vary from times of his childhood, near WWII and when he has to be away from it most of that wartime, and in times after (some clearly 1970s). I kept a DK Paris guide near me while reading it, just to check what some places looked like.
The book is bilingual, so you can choose to read the left, French, side or the English right side. Already slim as it is, the book reads quicker if you read just one side. But you might want to linger in his pictures of the place, some absolutely gone and some still there. One set of black and white photos is inside. Some notes at the end explain certain people and places.
Green clearly prefers older buildings, though he’s not sorry at all to see the ugly Trocadero palace building go. In these essays he tries to talk about less touristy stuff, though he can’t help writing one on Notre-Dame (but that place deserves it, and his writing on it talks about a certain time that makes it interesting). He talks about his childhood in Passy (western Paris), what was there and what still is, what he could see as a schoolboy, running home past shops.
He visits some smaller churches too, like St Julian The Poor, and Val-de-Grace church, at least on the outside. Other things include talking about what those who live in Paris see that visitors won’t, the stairways of it, of long-gone crier-seller of things like food for little birds, visiting museums, how sun shines through window or on other buildings, the Seine and its ‘talk’, what would happen if the Paris scenes in his books were real, Paris of the painters (especially impressionists), and the statues’ views high above. This slim book packs a lot of Paris in it haha.
And at the end: thoughts on what the future Paris will look like, what will the future people think about the Paris of the past (or their present), what buildings go down or are built, will there still be enough trees (he really doesn’t like how much trees are felled). But whatever happens, he has given us a view on Paris of the past, closer past, of what its people see – and not much of what the tourists see. Some rare views and small surprises, various moods, seasons, scenes. Things can be really beautiful even when it’s just this text you read.
During wartime, when he couldn’t be in Paris due to being American, he looked at a map in Paris, and dreamt of the Paris he knew. We might have much or only some or none of experience of Paris, but we can read this and make our own dreams of what it would be like to be there. And use that to ‘be there’!
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