Read The Invention of Paris Online
Authors: Eric Hazan
30
âA “blank”, an enormous “blank”, and without the shadow of a transition, suddenly the measure of time is no longer in quarters of an hour but in years and even decades . . .' (Marcel Proust, âà propos du “style” de Flaubert',
Nouvelle Revue française
, 1 January 1920).
31
Swann was an exception, living on the Quai d'Orléans.
32
âIn the middle of the symphony an old-fashioned tune rang out; replacing the sweet-seller, who generally accompanied her song with a rattle, the toy-seller, to whose kazoo was attached a jumping-jack which he sent bobbing in all directions, paraded other puppets for sale, and, indifferent to the ritual declamation of Gregory the Great, the reformed declamation of Palestrina or the lyrical declamation of the moderns, warbled at the top of his voice, a belated adherent of pure melody: “Come along all you mammies and dads,/Here's toys for your lasses and lads!/I make them myself,/and I pocket the pelf./Tralala, tralala, tralalee./Come along youngsters . . .”' (Proust,
The Captive
,
Remembrance of Things Past
, vol. 3, p. 133).
33
Thanks to Berenice Abbott, who bought nearly 2,000 negatives of Atget's that were left in his studio on his death and bequeathed them to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the major works on Atget are American; among others, John Szarkowski and Maria Morris Hambourg,
The Work of Atget
, 4 vols (New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1981â85); Molly Nesbit,
Atget's Seven Albums
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992). Several major American photographers, Walker Evans and Lee Friedlander among them, were very familiar with Atget's work.
34
As John Szarkowski tries to do in
The Work of Atget
, vol. 1.
35
These
Albums
are:
L'Art dans le vieux Paris
;
Intérieurs parisiens
;
La Voiture à Paris
;
Métiers, boutiques et étalages de Paris
;
Enseignes et vielles boutiques de Paris
;
Zoniers
; and
Fortifications de Paris
.
36
On Atget's political opinions, the best indication is provided by his gift to the Bibliothèque historique de la Ville de Paris of issues of
La Guerre sociale
, Gustave Hervé's anarcho-syndicalist newspaper, and
La Bataille syndicaliste
, organ of the CGT that was then a fighting union (Molly Nesbit, âLa second nature d'Atget', in
Actes du colloque Atget
, special issue of
Photographies
, March 1986).
37
At 17 Rue Campagne-Première, which was not a building but rather an avenue between Rue Campagne-Première and Rue Boissonade, bordered by little houses.
38
Benjamin, âA Short History of Photography'.
39
Waldemar George,
Arts et Métiers graphiques
, special issue on photography, 1930. This is clearly an allusion to the description of the shop windows in the Passage de l'Opéra, and particularly the purveyor of canes.
40
André Breton, letter to Tzara, cited in
Oeuvres complètes
, vol. 1, p. 1294, note.
41
Breton,
The Lost Steps
, pp. 81â2.
42
André Breton, âLe surréalisme et la peinture',
La Révolution surréaliste
, no. 9â10, 1 October 1927.
43
Brûlage involved submerging the negative in hot water, which caused the emulsion to partially melt. Ubac's text is quoted in
Explosante Fixe, photographie et surréalisme
, exhibition catalogue (Paris: Centre George-Pomidou/Hazan, 1985), p. 42, note.
44
Breton, âLe Surréalisme et la peinture', apropos Man Ray.
45
Cited by Marguerite Bonnet in the notes to
Nadja
in
Oeuvres complètes
, vol. 1.
46
See for example Dawn Ades in
Explosante Fixe
, and R. Krauss, âPhotographie et surréalisme', in
Le Photographique, pour une théorie des écarts
(Paris: Macula, 1990). One need only compare Boiffard's photos with the views of Paris in
Nadja
that are not by him (the statue of Ãtienne Dole in the Place Maubert, for example), to see what really is a banal photograph.
47
Boiffard in fact returned to medicine around 1935, and practised as a radiologist at the Hôpital Saint-Louis until the late 1950s.
abandoned babies and children,
153
,
318
abattoirs.
See
slaughterhouses
Abbott, Berenice,
359n33
,
361
,
363
aeronautics industry,
186
African immigrants,
xii
,
135
,
203
,
217
Algeria and Algerians,
xii
,
87
,
255
,
51
,
163
,
217
Anne-Marie-Louise d'Orléans,
14
apartment buildings,
113â14
,
206
, 224
Apollinaire, Guillaume,
79
,
168â69
,
193
,
197
,
321
,
356â57
Apponyi, Rodolphe,
258â64
passim,
271n97
Arab immigrants,
xi
,
xii
,
xiii
,
202
Arago, François,
174
,
247
,
258
,
262n75
,
278
,
302
Aragon, Louis,
40
,
79
,
82
,
170
,
362
,
365
Arc de Triomphe,
116
,
118n17
,
232
Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel,
31
arches,
17
,
31
,
54
,
61n76
,
100
.
See also
gates
architects in the Marais,
64â65
emigration from the Marais,
65â66
,
104
arrondissements,
6
,
15
,
115
, 172â75,
175
2
nd
,
238
3
rd
,
238
7
th
,
102
10
th
,
214
14
th
,
161
,
163
,
182
,
185
,
187â88
,
228
17
h
,
194
19
h
,
213
21
st
(de facto),
368
artists,
164
,
362
.
See also
painters and painting
artists' models,
196
,
350â53
passim
assassinations,
36
,
50
,
61â62
,
132
,
207
,
211n76
Asselineau, Charles,
97
,
328
,
330n29
,
334
Atget, Eugène,
6
,
189
,
205
,
222
,
342
,
347n10
,
358â62
,
365
automobiles,
194
Babou, Hippolyte,
299
,
304n168
,
316
Bailly, Jean-Christophe,
35
Baltard, Victor,
42
The Atheist's Mass
,
248
Baudelaire on,
333
on Cadran Bleu and Café Turc,
87
at Café Tabourey,
97
La Comédie humaine
,
40
,
77
,
103
,
192n30
,
321â28
passim,
359
La Cousine Bette
,
29â30
,
121n26
,
147
Evelina Hanska and,
121
,
150
,
192
on executions,
161n98
on Faubourg Saint-Antoine,
122
The Girl with the Golden Eyes
,
90
on
grisettes
,
126
âHistoire et physiologie des Boulevards de Paris',
40
,
71
,
76
,
77
,
80
,
81
,
84â85
house in Passy,
192â93
on Latin Quarter,
94
Lily of the Valley
,
25
on
lorettes
,
144n70
on loss,
30
Lost
Illusions
,
22â23
,
25
,
48â49
,
53
,
71
,
93
,
96
The Magic Skin
,
24
Marais and,
66
on Montparnasse,
163
Old Goriot (Le Père Goriot
),
5
,
91
,
208
on poor people,
153â54
Saint-Germain-des-Près and,
102
Scenes from a Courtesan's Life
,
37
,
100
A Woman of Thirty
,
31n27
The Wrong Side of Paris
,
89
bankers and banking,
35
,
55
,
72
,
79
,
140â41
,
262
,
271n97
,
322
,
326
banlieue
,
xiiâxiii
,
176
,
181
,
182
Banque de France,
35â36
,
37n36
Banque Nationale de Paris,
79
Banville, Théodore de,
94
,
97
,
328
,
333
Barbès, Armand,
x
,
197
,
256
,
257
,
264
,
266
,
268
Barbey d'Aurevilly, Jules-Amédée,
233
Barère, Bertrand,
32
barracks,
28
,
131
,
143
,
251n50
,
341
Barras, Paul François Jean Nicolas, vicomte de,
22
,
32
Barrès, Maurice,
49
,
97
,
145
,
168
barricades,
92
,
160
,
229
,
232
,
238â45
passim,
249
,
255
,
257
,
295
,
299
in art,
351
coup of 1851 and,
303
,
305
,
306
,
307
June rebellion (1832),
253
May 1968,
310
revolution of 1848,
261
,
274
,
276
,
281
,
283
,
284
,
291
barriers (
barrières
),
30â31
,
47
,
114
,
128n43
,
129
,
132
,
152
,
165
.
See also
barricades
;
walls
Bastille,
xi
,
3
,
11
,
14
,
15
,
72
,
261
,
262
Baudelaire, Charles,
40
,
74
,
90
,
126
,
218
, 224,
265â66
,
345
,
346
at cafés and taverns,
96
,
97
,
164
on Balzac,
114n12