Today is the last full day in Paris for Ashley and I. We did a lot of site seeing including, the Pantheon and Notre Dame. But what I liked the most today was seeing the sites connected to Ernest Hemingway. After getting injured as an ambulance driver in World War I, Hemingway moved to Paris with his first wife. They lived in a small apartment in the Latin Quarter and this is were he began his career as a writer. During his time in Paris we got to meet many other writers and artists like F Scott Fitzgerald, James Joyce, and Pablo Picasso.
First we visited Cafe Deux Magots. This was a cafe Hemingway frequented and is mentioned in his book A Movable Feast. This cafe has been open for a 140 years. Though very touristy today it still has a bit of the old Parisian cafe charm. I got a cappuccino, a croissant, and a small baguette with butter. Above Ashley’s should you can see a picture of Ernest Hemingway.
Up next was places where Hemingway worked and lived. The image on the left claims he lived there for two years, though I believe he actually rented an office there so that he could work on his writing in a quiet place. The image on the right is his first apparent he rents for about a year with his first wife. It was about 20 dollars a month and had no hot water. They wanted to save their money and explore Europe. He loved this neighborhood, it was working class and filled with young artists who survived the the first world war.
Nearby his first apartment is the Place de la Contrescarpe a small tree filled square lined with cafes that Hemingway would frequent especially after his walks through the Jardin du Luxemburg.
Our last stop had to Shakespeare & Company. This was a small English bookseller and publisher in Paris. It was founded by Sylvia Beach in 1919. It was frequented by Hemingway and many other great writers. Beach was also the one to publish James Joyce’s Ulysses. It was by chance at Shakespeare and Company that Hemingway met Ezra Pound, they would have a life long friendship and Pound would give Hemingway a lot of mentorship as he begin his writing career. But the bookshop that Hemingway went to closed after Sylvia Beach was arrested by the Nazis for homosexuality.
The current Shakespeare and Company was actually opened in 1951 near the same location as the original. The man who opened this was a patron of the original and greatly admired Sylvia Beach, naming his only child after her. He took great strides to replicate the look and feel of the original. I had to stop in the store. Though mostly a tourist site today you can still feel a bit of connection to the literary history of Paris. Ernest Hemingway’s book A Movable Feast he has a whole chapter in that book about he experiences at Shakespeare and Company. I noticed before my trip that I lost my copy so it seemed appropriate to purchase a replace Shakespeare and Company with their stamp instead and everything.
The only thing left to do in Paris is to grab lost last croissant before we catch a train to Bruges.