The Flaneur
Ratings1
Average rating3
15
Ratings1
Average rating3
**From Amazon.com:**
“One has the impression, reading *The Flâneur*, of having fallen into the hands of a highly distractible, somewhat eccentric poet and professor who is determined to show you a Paris you wouldn’t otherwise see…Edmund White tells such a good story that I’m ready to listen to anything he wants to talk about.”—*New York Times Book Review*
A flâneur is a stroller, a loiterer, someone who ambles through city streets in search of adventure and fulfillment. Edmund White, who lived in Paris for sixteen years, wanders through the streets and avenues and along the quays, into parts of Paris virtually unknown to visitors and indeed to many Parisians. In the hands of the learned White, a walk through Paris is both a tour of its lush, sometimes prurient history and an evocation of the city’s spirit. The Flâneur leads us to bookshops and boutiques, monuments and palaces, giving us a glimpse into the inner human drama. Along the way we learn everything from the latest debates among French lawmakers to the juicy details of Colette’s life.
Series
1 released bookWriter and the City is a 6-book series first released in 2001 with contributions by Peter Carey, Edmund White, and 3 others.
Reviews with the most likes.
“And no wonder Paris, land of novelty and distraction, is the great city of the flaneur – that aimless stroller who loses himself in the crowd, who has no destination and goes wherever caprice or curiosity dictates his or her steps.”
What is there to say about Paris that has not already been said? Ask any person on the street and he will tell you Paris is the best. And the worst. Alive. And dying. But when one is asked to write about Paris, one must. And thus this book. White uses the pages of this slim book to do this, to tell once again how Paris is the best and the worst and alive and dying.
This was lovely, and the cutest edition fitting perfectly in my hands (the tactile experience of reading is still a thing folks) a collection of essays on various pockets of history and culture in Paris.
