Little wonder then, that FBI files from 1960 to early 1970s show 1884 documents on Baldwin, only 276 on Richard Wright and a mere 110 on Truman Capote. In spite of an extensive urban renewal project in the 1960s and ’70s that led the city to raze many prewar buildings in Montparnasse, Le Select remained intact, its Art Deco décor virtually unchanged since the 1920s. Both restaurants, their Art Deco mosaics still brilliantly maintained, were hot intellectual and creative night spots during the 1950s and ’60s, the Tournon largely considered the place where the St.-Germain neighborhood jazz scene got its start, providing the stage where Duke Ellington made his Parisian debut.

During this time she was also a ground stewardess for Middle East Airlines. Still, the cost of living in the center limits the neighborhood’s actual diversity. Everyone in Paris who went to a café, knew this woman, but none could have depicted her with the accuracy and humor of James Baldwin. Fleeing racism in America, he arrived in Paris in 1948. I still love the book. This small, sparely and simply written book set in 1950s Paris of a love affair between two men, vividly describes not only the emotional torment of each man, but also the underbelly of the seedier bars and clubs in the less salubrious quartiers of la capitale. This is captivating. For my first day on Baldwin’s trail, I caught the Métro from my apartment in Batignolles — a recently trendy neighborhood in the once working-class northeast corner of the 17th Arrondissement — south, across the Seine, to the Sixth Arrondissement and St.-Germain-des-Prés. James Baldwin fulfilled his dream of living in Paris beginning in 1948. Surely, this fastening is largely due to St.-Germain’s fabled expatriate history, beginning with Thomas Jefferson’s stay on what is now the Rue Bonaparte. I shall certainly investigate more black writers in France. Thank you so much for your comment. Belleville or Château Rouge for ethnic diversity. The sun had already begun to set, its final rays fading into the variegated shimmer cast by a long procession of dim Art Nouveau lamps and bright storefront neon. Baldwin associated with many of these students, mostly ex-G.I.’s, writing about his experiences with them in the essay “A Question of Identity.”. The clientele that afternoon consisted largely of French students earnestly discussing politics and philosophy, a handful of American tourists and local businessmen having a late lunch and people I took to be neighborhood regulars reading newspapers and books, or simply staring out at the boulevard. Even if France is no longer a haven for people of color, Paris remains a beacon, a vital connection to a time when, for many of our most important artists, writers and political thinkers, a much-needed shelter was sought and found. First time logging in? He returned to America in 1957 to be a part of the movement despite equal rights for homosexuals not being part of their agenda. Tales from the Crypt… The Archeological Kind, Letter from Paris: October 28, 2020 News Digest, Author Carolyn Campbell on City of Immortals, Père-Lachaise Cemetery. But I arrived in Paris generations after the time when the French were inclined to leave people of color alone. She added that the group’s favorite spots were Le Montana on the Rue St.-Benoît, Gordon Heath’s L’Abbaye on Rue de l’Abbaye and Inez Cavanaugh’s Chez Inez, a soul food restaurant on Rue Champollion. As a young, gay black man growing up in the 1980s, I found this to be the first novel I’d encountered with the subject of homosexuality placed front and center and written by anyone who remotely resembled me.
Baldwin worked on his first novel, “Go Tell It on the Mountain,” at the cafe.   This interview was conducted in the two places dearest to James Baldwin’s struggle as a writer. Baldwin moved to Paris in 1948. Baldwin has maintained a grip on my imagination ever since my freshman year of college, when I read his novel “Giovanni’s Room.” Set in 1950s Paris, the novel tells the story of an ill-fated love affair between the narrator, David, a young American ex-soldier, and a darkly handsome Italian barman named Giovanni. Walid and I took a table on the large bustling terrace. The suburbs of Paris such as Montreuil, St.-Ouen, Aubervilliers and St.-Denis as places where artists and writers were currently moving. When open, the column shows the ten books that were used to placemark "Baldwin's Paris." Baldwin was only 24 when he arrived in Paris, with just $40 in his pocket. To my left a continuous stream of cars, motorcycles, taxicabs and bikes flowed steadily down the broad, tree-lined Boulevard St.-Germain, while on my right, the ponderous row of classic stone facades was pleasantly broken up by stylishly quaint bookstores, shops, sidewalk cafes and side streets meandering toward the Seine. He was especially critical of Hoover and the FBI. James Baldwin wasn’t the only American writer who spent time in the City of Light. Café de Flore sits on the corner of the Boulevard St.-Germain and the Rue St.-Benoît.

In “Giovanni’s Room” Baldwin describes Les Halles as a place with “choked boulevards and impassible streets, a place where leeks, cabbages, oranges, apples, potatoes, cauliflowers stood gleaming in mounds all over, in the sidewalks and streets in front of metal sheds.” The restaurants, bars and cheap workmen’s cafes that Baldwin spoke of with such joy were demolished and replaced in 1977 by an underground transportation hub and shopping district — a modern monstrosity of metal and mirrored glass whose underground tunnels connect an intricate series of Métro and suburban train lines, while housing a subterranean shopping center. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case with Les Halles. These cafés, like Baldwin’s other favorite meeting places, Le Montana on Rue St Benoit, L’Abbaye and Chez Inez on the Rue Champollion, were not the rather bourgeois and expensive establishments we find today, but were slightly decadent, maybe even a touch louche. In 1970, Baldwin with his partner, Bernard Vassell, moved to an old farmhouse in St Paul de Vence. To further my search, I had invited the expatriate African-American novelist — and Baldwin enthusiast — Jake Lamar to join me at Les Deux Magots, hoping he would catch any gaps in my itinerary.

I didn’t even attempt to get in. Forgotten your details? He had however already befriended Richard Wright in Greenwich Village who had helped him gain his first fellowship. Having spent nearly a decade living in Paris, I’d eaten at Les Deux Magots many times. A doctor by profession, Algerian and French by birth and citizenship, Walid happens to be an avid Baldwin reader, and so midway through our meal, I asked his thoughts on the possible whereabouts of a young James Baldwin in contemporary Paris. James Baldwin fulfilled his dream of living in Paris beginning in 1948. Both have rich intellectual and literary histories, boasting a list of luminaries — writers, artists, actors and philosophers that include Ernest Hemingway, Alain Delon, Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Pablo Picasso and Albert Camus. A second fellowship enabled his move to France. Thematiek. I discovered the smartly gentrified, red brick and masonry townhouses hidden in the alleyways near the Place des Fêtes. And yet I couldn’t actually picture a young James Baldwin living in any of these places.

One bright afternoon in Paris, on the terrace of the cafe Deux Magots, in St.-Germain-des-Prés, I found myself engaged in an increasingly animated conversation about the writer James Baldwin … I revisited the African markets at Château Rouge and toured a handful of galleries and artists’ workshops housed in old factories, garages and warehouses in the trendier corners of Montreuil, one of the eastern suburbs of the city. I even visited the northern suburbs of Paris, investigating La Maladrerie, an elegantly conceived public housing project in Aubervilliers, where writers and artists’ studios were located alongside general housing. That night the spectacle of Pigalle made it easy to imagine the scenes of decadence and freedom Baldwin described when reminiscing about his trips to the area. CLICK HERE to create your password. In the fall of 1998, a few months shy of the 50th anniversary of Baldwin’s arrival, I, too, finally moved to Paris, settling in a quaint — if not cramped — one-bedroom apartment on the Left Bank, in the Fifth Arrondissement. Of Baldwin’s main hangouts there, the Montana is one of the few that still exist and is currently one of the most exclusive clubs in Paris. In 1948 New Jersey, he walked into a restaurant where he knew he would be denied service. Similarly founded in the late 1890s, both cafes are adorned with Art Deco details, red moleskin banquettes, mahogany tables and mirrored walls.

When the waitress explained that black people were not served there, Baldwin threw a glass of water at her, which shattered against the mirror behind the bar. He lived in the Rue Verneuil, (Serge Gainsbourg’s home for years), hooking up immediately with Richard Wright in Les Deux Magots on the first night he arrived.
During his teenage years, Baldwin began to realize that he was gay. Great recommendation!


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