|
| The
Bluffer's Guide to Paris | | By
Jim Hankinson and Paul Bahn | | |
| Extracts
from the book | |
| Mon
Dieu | | The
younger Alexandre Dumas (who should be referred to as "Alexandre Dumas fils""
remarked that, 'God invented the Parisian to prevent foreigners from ever understanding
anything about the French.' And all in all, he did a good job of it. You will
never get a straight answer from a Parisian unless it happens to be a rude one:
and even then you're unlikely to be much the wiser, although you might be a good
deal sadder. | | |
| Something
for the weekend | | The
real Montmartre, you will never tire of pointing out, the -centre of literary
and artistic activity in the city towards the end of the last century, and still
beautiful and relatively quiet, is located to the south-west of the Place du Tertre.
Steep winding streets connected by flights of stone steps, small, inexpensive
restaurants, including one of Paris's better-known vegetarian places on the rue
des Trois Fr¸res, called, wittily, Au Grain de Folie, little bars run by decrepit
old couples, decaying hotels with paper-thin walls through which one can hear
the activities of discerning couples on a dirty week-end or 'weekend amoureux'
as the French more poetically call it: this is the real Montmartre. |
| | | Taking
the piss | | Another
legendary feature of Parisian 'sanitary' arrangements, now sadly entirely vanished,
was the pissoti¸re (usually, though wrongly, known as 'a pissoir'). This, as its
name graphically suggests, was a urinal found on street corners, and constructed
from iron lattice-work in such a way that almost every part of the body, except
for the bit actually being employed at the time, was visible to passers-by. It
was generally considered that the -pissoti¸res, or Vespasiens, as they were known
(presumably because they dated from the reign of the Roman emperor Vespasian),
lent a whiff of raffish charm to the Parisian street scene, though that of course
was not the only thing they lent a whiff of. |
| | | The
French are always revolting | | The
Revolution of 1830. This was a totally Parisian affair and quite implausibly romantic.
Indeed, some see it as primarily the work of Victor Hugo, Berlioz, Madame de Sta‘l
and Delacroix. In three glorious days during July, 1830, Charles X, the last of
the Bourbons, was driven from Paris (to the strains of La Marseillaise -as effective
then as it was in Casablanca), the H™tel de Ville was stormed, and a citizen
king, Louis Philippe, was elected. | | |
| | |
| . |
| | | Reviews |
|
| | | |
|
|
| | | |
|
|
| | | |
|
|
| | | Table
of Contents | |
Introduction
1
When to be in Paris 2 Getting
Around 3
Transport 4
Props 6
Areas 7
Eiffel 12
Princess
Diana trail 13
Amˇlie and Toulouse-Lautrec trail 15 Living
19
Restaurants 19
Bars 24
Clubs 26
Sex 26
The police 29
French lavatories 30
Doctors 32
Beaux arts 33
Da Vinci Code trail
35
Theatre 36
Cinema 37
Music 39
Literature 41
Politics 41
History
of Paris 43 Glossary
of idiomatic French 53
Some useful words 54
The family 55
Vices
55
Parts of the body 56
Adjectives 56
Useful phrases 57
Verlan
59 | | Glossary
| | |
| |
Fortune
Telling
