deipnosophist

"Unawares, I found myself in a circle where actual poverty existed, with torn clothing and worn-out shoes, a sphere which I had never touched in Vienna. I sat at the same table with heavy drinkers, homosexuals, morphine addicts." "…passionate individuals whose only mania was mere existence…without a goal…" Stefan Zweig World of Yesterday


This weekend, finished reading The Flâneur: A Stroll Through the Paradoxes of Paris
by Edmund White- my very short review:

Overall, a quick read; meaning, it was short and it moved at a lively pace. It wouldn't be a book I would recommend if one wanted an understanding of the flâneur. I think it would have been more honest to simply title the book- A Stroll through the Paradoxes of Paris, which he does capture that quality. Each chapter seems to focus on a marginalized people and their anecdotal history as he strolls from neighborhood to neighborhood. He writes about the crazy writers, gays, Jews, black-Americans, and royalists (or was that monarchists?). It is a great introduction to a complicated history, but it did make me wonder how a flâneur- novel should be written. Perhaps that's a challenge to be taken up.
My favourite sub-chapter was on the Gustave Moreau museum, mostly because it was one place in Paris that I also visited (of the many listed in his book). Like White, I also believe that Moreau was a minor Symbolist painter, but nevertheless, the museum's charms and mysteries seduced me. Someday in the future I will post some pictures. Other reviews and discussions of the book-

http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=1582341354
http://www.fadzilah.com/ostrichlookingforsand/2006/05/25/the-flaneur/#more-178


just for fun-I'm going to post semi-random links-link this random page off of Wikipedia
and this headline from my email
and this blog

Becuase there's pleasure in the aleatory...