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Last night I went out on a bateau-mouche. It was cold and rainy and I stood outside the cover, behind the navigator, ignoring the recorded commentary in seven languages so I could see the lighted monuments and landmarks at night. The Eiffel Tower, which does nothing special to me in the daylight, becomes magical at night -- a piece of gold filigree jewelry.
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The Louvre is just a series of mazes, four stories high and several blocks square. I had researched the location of several works in advance so I could do it in a single day, before I became nauseated and visually overloaded. So, first, at a trot, to Victory of Samothrace -- really, the boat she stands in is the most interesting part to me, and the streams of exhausted tourists sitting down to rest their feet on the Audrey Hepburn staircase. Then to Da Vinci's paintings, past the Mona Lisa, in search of the Spanish paintings -- only to find that wing, which I had looked forward to so much, closed down for renovation. Then to Venus de Milo through the Roman head-on-a-stake wing (very interesting!), then to the salon of the Caryatids: Three Graces, startling hermaphrodite, baby strangling goose, bathers, and so forth. Somewhere along the way I encountered real stunners by Delacroix, Ingres, David, LaTour, Vigée-Le Brun, Corot, and, finally, to the Northern wing and the heart-stopping Pietá d'Avignon. Breezed past some not half bad French "Caravaggists" and to one Caravaggio, the Palmreader. The Fragonards I still loathe in person. Watteau is better than I thought.
I don't know why anyone who hasn't studied art or art history would want to go to the Louvre. It's so confusing, like a huge airport with escalators. I like the glass pyramid entrance and the tension it creates against the palace buildings, though.
I notice all the fingers and noses are busted off the statues all over Europe. Very few of the insipid statues in the Tuilleries still have their hands intact, and many are mostly melted by acid rain and appear to be sculpted from sooty toothpaste or wedding cake frosting.
Got up early and headed out to be at the Rodin museum just as it opened. Light rain falling. Working-class guy in a cap came out of a café and kissed his fingertips in approval as I passed, bowed, and then I came upon the museum. Very beautiful building, grounds with gardens, The Thinker surrounded by roses, bronze statues hiding under trees. The Rodin sculptures are more powerful in person when you can follow the directional movements of his chisel.
The presence of Camille Claudel is very strong in the Rodin museum. You see her face over and over again made by Rodin, and his face made by her. What an unbelievable passion between men and women portrayed in both their works. She really was very gifted and it is sometimes difficult to distinguish whose works are whose. Rodin's drawings are, to my eye, every bit as powerful as the sculptures. I loved the contour gesture drawings. Hard to say if Balzac was a real bastard, or not; loved the bullish, big-bellied nude study Rodin made of him. I also enjoyed seeing portraits of Rodin by his contemporaries; I had a very definite sense of him after a couple of hours. Gerard Depardieu is a very good choice to play him. I think Camille Claudel was right not to resist him, to surrender and be swept away into the drama. But it is tragic that she and Rodin's wife had to suffer so much to be in a relationship with him. The Danaïde was definitely my favorite. I was the only one in the room, so the nice guard invited me to touch her. And I did!
Then, on to Musée D'Orsay, bypassing long lines with my previously purchased museum pass. The space itself is great and its previous incarnation as a train station is still discernible architecturally. The collection is the right size, the galleries are constructed on a human scale, and it's laid out chronologically. I much prefer it to the Louvre. So many stand-outs: Tissot, Manet -- but, of course, the pastels and paintings and drawings of Degas and Toulouse-Lautrec are what's most important to me.
On the way back to my hotel, as I walked on the quay of the Seine, I was splashed by a bus -- salud! -- and then I cut my finger on my umbrella. For just a moment then I felt sad and lonely and cold and miserable. But I soon got over it.
Started out early, stopped to buy orange roses, headed off to Cimitière Montmartre. It's a lovely place and wonderful to wander there in the tree-shaded early morning. I found Degas' grave as if guided by radar. Sat down and wrote a note to him and sent it sailing in through a rear opening of his tomb and left the roses at his door.
At some point today a million wondrous things passed before my eyes. Store fronts, mainly, and shop windows, but also an organ grinder with a dachshund and ginger-colored cat asleep in a doll's bed together, their heads on a pillow, tucked in under the covers. I guess the organ grinder gets extra tips for the spectacle! He played "Mack the Knife" when I passed.
No one can tell me where to find an authentic boite where they still play traditional accordion music. They say it's all died out. Still, I sometimes pass old people busking down in the metro playing accordion. Today I saw a very frail, elderly woman playing "Sur les toits de Paris" on her red accordion -- very beautiful. The music follows you down the corridors and tunnels of the metro.
Awoke at 7:00, breakfast in bed (warm croissant! white coffee!) and then off to buy flowers for my heroes and heroines buried at Pére LaChaise. Again, good luck in finding those I sought. To Colette first, black, simple marble stone, lots of fresh flowers there already. Then, accidentally, past Simone Signoret with loads and loads of fresh flowers. Past Rossini and a group of Africans in white robes singing at a relative's grave. To Sarah Bernhardt, very simple, with only a few old flowers. Then to Oscar Wilde to leave pink carnations for Michael -- Wilde's testicles have been broken off! Then to Edith Piaf. Then to Jim Morrison, under police guard and his bust has been removed and the soil of the grave dug into by the fingers of tourists. The whole area of Pére LaChaise near Morrison's grave has been vandalized -- chalked-on, spray-painted, scratched into, champagne and liquor bottles abounding at early light. Finally, to Rachel, my namesake, the famous tragic actress. By then I had left all my flowers and it was time for me to go. I feel so bad in these cemeteries for the Not Famous, for the forgotten dead who have had no fresh flowers and no visitors for a hundred years. Pére LaChaise is not as beautiful and atmospheric as Montmartre. I would prefer to be buried at Cimitiére Montmartre if I were a famous dead Parisian.
Always when you're in Parisian cemeteries you stumble across someone being disinterred. Kind of disturbing, yet I feel my curiosity rising as I try not to look.
Well, Cinderella has just returned from La Coupole, that former stronghold of old Bohème in Montparnasse! Upstairs, there's the bustling, beautiful restaurant with waiters in traditional long white aprons. Downstairs there's the ballroom where everyone over the age of fifty in Paris assembles to dance at weekly afternoon tea dances. I waited in the rain for the opening, then descended a rounded wood staircase where older women changed into the dancing shoes they'd brought with them in shopping bags, then in line to pay my admission and to check my coat and bag. Entrance is 60 francs (US $13) and for that you get a huge cocktail in a hurricane glass once inside. I ordered something made with champagne and it arrived with a fruit and paper umbrella garnish. Then the dancing began on the round dance floor surrounded by columns and this little red-haired girl was assailed by every man in the place, because I was absolutely the baby there. I tried to explain to the gaggle, like Scarlett O'Hara at the barbeque, that I don't know how to ballroom dance, that I was just there to watch. They accepted this reluctantly, accompanied by much hand kissing. I got to watch real Parisians dance tangos and boleros and waltzes -- beautifully! After each song ended, I was assailed again. I loved just watching and getting a sense of what Paris must have been like fifty years ago when these dancers were young. The men here really can dance, but the women really have to follow their lead.
There was one white-haired guy with a crew cut and a face like Patton's dog dancing with his wife, and they were really great dancers. His Italian friend (oiled hair, smelling of some great cologne) would just not give up, and persisted in asking me for every dance as each song presented a change in tempo. Finally, on a slow song, I accepted because I figured I could follow him. He was a very smooth dancer, but, sure enough, I could tell he was getting aroused and he kept putting his cheek to mine and whispering to me how sweet I am. And I kept insisting I wasn't. So after that one dance I said I had to go to the restroom, but I secretly collected my things from the coat check girl and disappeared into the Vavin metro station, an art nouveau one, before my dance partner realized I was gone. The older women at La Coupole were not amused by my presence, siphoning off their dance partners. It looked like there were also a certain number of gigolos hanging out there, hoping to find a wealthy benefactress. You can always tell gigolos by their pastel-colored cashmere socks. Don't ask me why I noticed that.
Before I went to La Coupole I had attempted to visit Les Catacombes, along with every under twenty-five-year-old, black clothes-wearing Goth in Europe, evidently. Mais, it was closed until the end of the month and had a posted notice about work being done on the air conditioning for the comfort of the public. Who cares? It's full of bones and skulls in there, anyway. How comfortable can anyone be?
I don't know why anyone who hasn't studied art or art history would want to go to the Louvre. It's so confusing, like a huge airport with escalators. I like the glass pyramid entrance and the tension it creates against the palace buildings, though.
I notice all the fingers and noses are busted off the statues all over Europe. Very few of the insipid statues in the Tuilleries still have their hands intact, and many are mostly melted by acid rain and appear to be sculpted from sooty toothpaste or wedding cake frosting.
+ + + + + + +
Got up early and headed out to be at the Rodin museum just as it opened. Light rain falling. Working-class guy in a cap came out of a café and kissed his fingertips in approval as I passed, bowed, and then I came upon the museum. Very beautiful building, grounds with gardens, The Thinker surrounded by roses, bronze statues hiding under trees. The Rodin sculptures are more powerful in person when you can follow the directional movements of his chisel.
The presence of Camille Claudel is very strong in the Rodin museum. You see her face over and over again made by Rodin, and his face made by her. What an unbelievable passion between men and women portrayed in both their works. She really was very gifted and it is sometimes difficult to distinguish whose works are whose. Rodin's drawings are, to my eye, every bit as powerful as the sculptures. I loved the contour gesture drawings. Hard to say if Balzac was a real bastard, or not; loved the bullish, big-bellied nude study Rodin made of him. I also enjoyed seeing portraits of Rodin by his contemporaries; I had a very definite sense of him after a couple of hours. Gerard Depardieu is a very good choice to play him. I think Camille Claudel was right not to resist him, to surrender and be swept away into the drama. But it is tragic that she and Rodin's wife had to suffer so much to be in a relationship with him. The Danaïde was definitely my favorite. I was the only one in the room, so the nice guard invited me to touch her. And I did!
Then, on to Musée D'Orsay, bypassing long lines with my previously purchased museum pass. The space itself is great and its previous incarnation as a train station is still discernible architecturally. The collection is the right size, the galleries are constructed on a human scale, and it's laid out chronologically. I much prefer it to the Louvre. So many stand-outs: Tissot, Manet -- but, of course, the pastels and paintings and drawings of Degas and Toulouse-Lautrec are what's most important to me.
On the way back to my hotel, as I walked on the quay of the Seine, I was splashed by a bus -- salud! -- and then I cut my finger on my umbrella. For just a moment then I felt sad and lonely and cold and miserable. But I soon got over it.
+ + + + + + +
Started out early, stopped to buy orange roses, headed off to Cimitière Montmartre. It's a lovely place and wonderful to wander there in the tree-shaded early morning. I found Degas' grave as if guided by radar. Sat down and wrote a note to him and sent it sailing in through a rear opening of his tomb and left the roses at his door.
At some point today a million wondrous things passed before my eyes. Store fronts, mainly, and shop windows, but also an organ grinder with a dachshund and ginger-colored cat asleep in a doll's bed together, their heads on a pillow, tucked in under the covers. I guess the organ grinder gets extra tips for the spectacle! He played "Mack the Knife" when I passed.
No one can tell me where to find an authentic boite where they still play traditional accordion music. They say it's all died out. Still, I sometimes pass old people busking down in the metro playing accordion. Today I saw a very frail, elderly woman playing "Sur les toits de Paris" on her red accordion -- very beautiful. The music follows you down the corridors and tunnels of the metro.
+ + + + + + +
Awoke at 7:00, breakfast in bed (warm croissant! white coffee!) and then off to buy flowers for my heroes and heroines buried at Pére LaChaise. Again, good luck in finding those I sought. To Colette first, black, simple marble stone, lots of fresh flowers there already. Then, accidentally, past Simone Signoret with loads and loads of fresh flowers. Past Rossini and a group of Africans in white robes singing at a relative's grave. To Sarah Bernhardt, very simple, with only a few old flowers. Then to Oscar Wilde to leave pink carnations for Michael -- Wilde's testicles have been broken off! Then to Edith Piaf. Then to Jim Morrison, under police guard and his bust has been removed and the soil of the grave dug into by the fingers of tourists. The whole area of Pére LaChaise near Morrison's grave has been vandalized -- chalked-on, spray-painted, scratched into, champagne and liquor bottles abounding at early light. Finally, to Rachel, my namesake, the famous tragic actress. By then I had left all my flowers and it was time for me to go. I feel so bad in these cemeteries for the Not Famous, for the forgotten dead who have had no fresh flowers and no visitors for a hundred years. Pére LaChaise is not as beautiful and atmospheric as Montmartre. I would prefer to be buried at Cimitiére Montmartre if I were a famous dead Parisian.
Always when you're in Parisian cemeteries you stumble across someone being disinterred. Kind of disturbing, yet I feel my curiosity rising as I try not to look.
+ + + + + + +
Well, Cinderella has just returned from La Coupole, that former stronghold of old Bohème in Montparnasse! Upstairs, there's the bustling, beautiful restaurant with waiters in traditional long white aprons. Downstairs there's the ballroom where everyone over the age of fifty in Paris assembles to dance at weekly afternoon tea dances. I waited in the rain for the opening, then descended a rounded wood staircase where older women changed into the dancing shoes they'd brought with them in shopping bags, then in line to pay my admission and to check my coat and bag. Entrance is 60 francs (US $13) and for that you get a huge cocktail in a hurricane glass once inside. I ordered something made with champagne and it arrived with a fruit and paper umbrella garnish. Then the dancing began on the round dance floor surrounded by columns and this little red-haired girl was assailed by every man in the place, because I was absolutely the baby there. I tried to explain to the gaggle, like Scarlett O'Hara at the barbeque, that I don't know how to ballroom dance, that I was just there to watch. They accepted this reluctantly, accompanied by much hand kissing. I got to watch real Parisians dance tangos and boleros and waltzes -- beautifully! After each song ended, I was assailed again. I loved just watching and getting a sense of what Paris must have been like fifty years ago when these dancers were young. The men here really can dance, but the women really have to follow their lead.
There was one white-haired guy with a crew cut and a face like Patton's dog dancing with his wife, and they were really great dancers. His Italian friend (oiled hair, smelling of some great cologne) would just not give up, and persisted in asking me for every dance as each song presented a change in tempo. Finally, on a slow song, I accepted because I figured I could follow him. He was a very smooth dancer, but, sure enough, I could tell he was getting aroused and he kept putting his cheek to mine and whispering to me how sweet I am. And I kept insisting I wasn't. So after that one dance I said I had to go to the restroom, but I secretly collected my things from the coat check girl and disappeared into the Vavin metro station, an art nouveau one, before my dance partner realized I was gone. The older women at La Coupole were not amused by my presence, siphoning off their dance partners. It looked like there were also a certain number of gigolos hanging out there, hoping to find a wealthy benefactress. You can always tell gigolos by their pastel-colored cashmere socks. Don't ask me why I noticed that.
Before I went to La Coupole I had attempted to visit Les Catacombes, along with every under twenty-five-year-old, black clothes-wearing Goth in Europe, evidently. Mais, it was closed until the end of the month and had a posted notice about work being done on the air conditioning for the comfort of the public. Who cares? It's full of bones and skulls in there, anyway. How comfortable can anyone be?
