Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #509419 in Books
• Published on: 2002-05-28
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 160 pages

From Publishers Weekly
There is a self-indulgent charm about this mini-history of the Marais (former marshes), corresponding to Paris's third arrondissement, that is hard to resist. Karmel, who fell in love with the city in his teens and later married a Frenchwoman, owns a fifth-floor walk-up in the Marais at the corner of rue des Rosiers and rue Vieille-du-Temple. He invites us to share his delight in the neighborhood and his delving into its history. But despite his affection for the Marais and his elegant, leisured prose, this is not a book for the armchair traveler. You have to be there with this slim, illustrated volume in hand. Turning the pages, you could stroll past the house where Beaumarchais wrote The Marriage of Figaro or visit the Museum of the History of Paris in the H?tel Carnavalet, knowing that the greatest literary gossip of all France, Madame de S?vign?, made it her home. The area has gone through a number of misguided attempts at modernization, the author reports, but a combination of chance and economics has preserved its character and some of its great mansions. In the end, the reader is left with envy for anyone with a pied ? terre in such a wonderful placeAand a feeling that the narrow streets remain just out of reach.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
The shelf of fond American memoirs of Paris might seem overcrowded, but for those with a weakness for the place, there's always room for more. Karmel has written a part-memoir that is really the history of the charming walk-up he and his French wife bought in Paris's Marais district in 1982. "I have centered this memoir on a specific building," he writes, "and built the history of the neighborhood (and to some extent, the city) from the standpoint of that one spot." That spot in the Marais ("swamp") is the constant?through plagues, Terrors, and architectural adjustments, from Roman settlement to jazz cellars. For all its history, though, Karmel's (My Revolution, LJ 9/15/70) elegant, brief volume resembles a deeply researched, digressive travel guide. It might have been better had Karmel interspersed his own personal account of life in postwar Paris with the less evocative chapters on French history. Recommended for larger public libraries.?Nathan Ward, "Library Journal"
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
The Marais is an especially evocative section of Paris, a vibrant neighborhood popular with Parisians and tourists alike. Calling himself a memoirist, not a scholar or travel-guide writer, Karmel, an American, shares in lively prose what he learned of the Marais' history by living there. His focus is on one particular centuries-old building in the neighborhood, the one in which he and his wife bought an apartment several years ago. By way of the history of this building, Karmel relates the larger history of the Marais. Like any neighborhood, it has had its ups and downs (it is currently fashionable), and like any neighborhood in Paris, its evolution has reflected the tides and trends of French history. Domestic life through the ages and how Paris grew from a crude spot on the River Seine to one of the loveliest spots on earth are topics he fondly discusses for travelers as well as history buffs. Brad Hooper