Full Description
Paris Street Tales is the third volume of a trilogy of translated stories set in Paris. The previous two are Paris Tales, in which each story is associated with one of the twenty arrondissements, and Paris Metro Tales, in which the twenty-two stories are related to a trip round the Paris Metro. This new volume contains eighteen newly translated stories related to particular streets in Paris, and one newly written tale of the city.
The stories range from the nineteenth century to the present day, and include tales by well-known writers such as Colette, Maupassant, Didier Daeninckx, and Simenon, and less familiar names such as Francis Carco, Aurélie Filipetti, and Arnaud Baignot. They present a vivid picture of Paris streets in a variety of literary styles and tones. Simenon's Maigret is called upon to solve a mystery on the Boulevard Beaumarchais; a flâneur learns some French history through second-hand objects retrieved from the Seine; a nineteenth-century affair in the Rue de Miromesnil goes badly wrong; a body is discovered on the steps of the smallest street in Paris. Through these stories we see how the city has changed over the last two centuries and what has survived. All the tales in the book are translated apart from the last, a new story by David Constantine, based on the last days of the poet Gérard de Nerval.
Contents
1: Didier Daeninckx: Rue des Degrés
2: Jean Follain: Streets
3: Guy de Maupassant: The Rendezvous
4: Octave Mirbeau: Tableau Parisien
5: Arnaud Baignot: Rue de la Tacherie
6: Émile Zola: Old Iron
7: Marcel Aymé: Rue Saint Sulpice
8: Jacques Réda: The Freedom of the Streets
9: Frédéric H. Fajardie: A Rapist's Shout One Night in Montparanasse
10: Julien Green: Lost Street Cries
11: Joris-Karl Huysmans: Rue de la Chine
12: Georges Simenon: The Affair in the Boulevard Beaumarchais
13: Roland Dorgelès: Rooftop over the Champs Elysées
14: Vincent Ravalec: The pigeon who shat on people
15: Aurélie Filipetti: The Street is not enough
16: Francis Carco: Rue Pigalle
17: Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette: The hold-up in the Rue Ordener
18: Gisèle Prassinos: The Tree with three branches
19: David Constantine: Rue de la Vieille Lanterne
