Describe Books Supposing Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris

Original Title:	Parisians : an adventure history of Paris
ISBN:	0393067246 (ISBN13: 9780393067248) URL http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=15578
Characters:	Marcel Proust, Charles de Gaulle, François Mitterrand, Georges-Eugène Haussmann, Napoleon Bonaparte
Setting:	Paris(France)
Literary Awards:	Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year Nominee (2011)

Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris Hardcover | Pages: 496 pages

Specify Appertaining To Books Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris

Title	:	Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris
Author	:	Graham Robb
Book Format	:	Hardcover
Book Edition	:	First Edition
Pages	:	Pages: 496 pages
Published	:	April 26th 2010 by W. W. Norton Company (first published January 2010)
Categories	:	History. Nonfiction. Cultural. France. Travel

Narration In Pursuance Of Books Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris

The secrets of the City of Light, revealed in the lives of the great, the near-great, and the forgotten—by the author of the acclaimed The Discovery of France.

This is the Paris you never knew. From the Revolution to the present, Graham Robb has distilled a series of astonishing true narratives, all stranger than fiction.

A young artillery lieutenant, strolling through the Palais-Royal, observes disapprovingly the courtesans plying their trade. A particular woman catches his eye; nature takes its course. Later that night Napoleon Bonaparte writes a meticulous account of his first sexual encounter. An aristocratic woman, fleeing the Louvre, takes a wrong turn and loses her way in the nameless streets of the Left Bank. For want of a map—there were no reliable ones at the time—Marie-Antoinette will go to the guillotine. Baudelaire, Baron Haussmann, the real-life Mimi of La Bohème, Proust, Charles de Gaulle (who is suspected of having faked an assassination attempt on himself in Notre Dame) —these and many more are Robb’s cast of characters. The result is a resonant, intimate history with the power of a great novel. 16 pages of illustrations.

Rating Appertaining To Books Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris

Ratings: 3.67 From 2151 Users | 283 Reviews

Rate Appertaining To Books Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris

i wanted to read this because i thought the concept was interesting- a history of paris told through the years through the writings and bits of history of ordinary and not so ordinary people. with the exceptions of a few stories, i felt like it dragged and didn't include any explanation to actually interest me if i didn't already know something about the background. for example, the revolts at nanterre in the late 60s. i had never heard of them before and by the time i'd pieced together what was

I wanted to give this book at least 3 stars, but really, it was just okay.The premise is great: follow key characters of Paris through defining moments of their lives (Napoleon, Marie Antoinette, etc.), in a series of vignettes that will ultimately form a narrative of the city itself. Unfortunately, the writer's style pretty much ruined the narrative for me. He had the annoying habit of trying to with hold information, such as the character's name, until the last moment. I think this was an

Most of the characters in these stories do not have streets named after them, but many are essential to the history of Paris. In the 1770s, for example, architect Charles-Axel Guillaumot saved Paris from falling into the quarries that the city had been built upon centuries before. Each chapter evokes a the city and period not only in the story but also in the language. The narrative of the student revolt in 1968, told in postmodern jargon is hysterically funny. I wish that I had read this book

Review title: We'll always have ParisParis is at once as earthy and ethereal as any spot of ground on the planet. Its ground provided the setting for the romantically remembered interlude in Casablanca and received the blood of guillotine victims during the violence of the Revolution. Robb has written an "adventure history" of the city in vignettes that highlight some of the people and events who shaped that ground and the city and people who have occupied it since that Revolution.Written in an

Robb is not just a short stories narrator, he is a thoroughly trained historian and apparently has a large literary talent. Paris comes alive in 15 pieces, fragments from the 19th and the 20th century (actually also the beginning of the 21st). Especially the bits about the subsurface of Paris, about the rebellion in New Caledonia which was precipitated by banned participants in the Commune of 1871, and the riots in the Paris suburbs in 2005 were worth reading. But occasionally, there are also

"Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose." Robb plays this theme with variations throughout his collection of anecdotes and vignettes focusing on The City of Paris and the Parisians. He explores the city that changes and yet, in many ways remains the same. Each section profiles individuals associated with the city, persons famous, infamous, and obscure. He weaves a ton of information into his stories, avoiding obtrusive info-dump like a seasoned historical novelist. The subtitle is: An

Robb's latest book is an insider's history of significant events and people in the history of Paris. As an inveterate Francophile who gave the author's previous book, The Discovery of France, five stars, I was prepared to be delighted. I wasn't. The tales are interesting but the voice that tells them suffers from a strait-jacketed style that avoids names in favor of anonymous descriptions of events. If this sounds confusing, it is. So for example, it takes a while to figure out that the person