Paris, Paris
- Author David Downie
- Narrator Max Winter
- Publisher Blackstone Publishing
- Run Time 9 hours and 55 minutes
- Format Audio
- Genre Travel and holiday, Travel writing.
Titles Purchased
- 1-5
- 6-10
- 11-15
- 16-20
- Over 20
Price p/Title
- €9.95
- €8.95
- €7.95
- €6.95
- €5.95
Listen to a sample
What to expect
Swapping his native San Francisco for the City of Light, travel writer David Downie arrived in Paris in 1986 on a one-way ticket, his head full of romantic notions. Curiosity and the legs of a cross-country runner propelled him daily from an unheated, seventh-floor walk-up garret near the Champs-├ëlys├®es to the old Montmartre haunts of the doomed painter Modigliani, the tombs of P├¿re-Lachaise cemetery, the luxuriant alleys of the Luxembourg Gardens, and the aristocratic ├Äle Saint-Louis midstream in the Seine.
Downie wound up living in the chic Marais district, married to the Paris-born American photographer Alison Harris, an equally incurable walker and chronicler. Ten books and a quarter-century later, he still spends several hours every day rambling through Paris and writing about the city he loves. An irreverent, witty romp featuring thirty-one short prose sketches of people, places, and daily life, Paris, Paris: Journey into the City of Light ranges from the glamorous to the least-known corners and characters of the world's favorite city.
Critics Review
-
“I loved his collection of essays, and anyone
David Lebovitz, New York Times bestselling author of The Sweet Life in Paris
who’s visited Paris in the past, or plans to visit in the future, will be
equally charmed.” -
“Like the guide who leads us through the
Michael Ondaatje, Booker Prize–winning author of The English Patient
Hermitage and its history in Sokurov’s Russian Ark, David Downie is
the master of educated curiosity. With him we discover Paris, a seemingly
public city that is, in fact, full of secrets—great lives, lives wasted on
the bizarre; forgotten artisans; lost graves (lost till now); the ‘papillons
nocturnes’; and the ‘poinçonneur des Lilas.’ I have walked some of the city’s
streets with him, and reading this book is just as tactile an experience.” -
“Beautifully written and refreshingly
San Francisco Chronicle Book Review
original…Curious and attentive to detail, Downie is appreciative yet
unflinching in describing his adopted home…Makes us see [Paris] in a different
light.” -
“The delightful and insightful essays in Paris,
Chicago Tribune
Paris meld history, atmosphere, and observations on Paris places,
Paris people, and Paris phenomena.” -
“Downie is a saunterer, wandering down the
Philadelphia Inquirer
narrow ancient streets of the Île de la Cité, picnicking in storied graveyards
like Père Lachaise, observing a seduction at Jardin du Luxembourg with a birder’s
patience…Captures the sort of people and places missed by those jetting from
starred bistros to hotels with showers.” -
“Compelling…A rapturous, history-rich love poem.”
Toronto Star
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