A novella of poetic vignettes, I had to be in the right mood to enjoy these. In the right frame of mind, they're romantic, nostalgic and evocative. In the wrong frame, they sound like a fatuous elitist wailing about beautiful buildings being torn down for the vulgar reason of improving the lives of Paris' inhabitants. ( )

A very intimate travel guide to Green's Paris - stairways are haunted and buildings corrode, but memories linger. Green's city is full of associations and he often waxes poetic about it. He laments its gradual dissolution and glories in its magnificent pathos. ( )

Julian Green, in the francophone world known as Julien Green, was an American author, born in 1900, who lived most of his life in Paris. As he wrote most of his books in French, he has remained obscure to the English-speaking readership of the anglophone world, although, actually, quite a number of his works have been translated into English. Bilingual and fluent in English, Green translated some of his French works into English himself. Besides a large number of novels, short stories and plays, Julian Green is best known for his diaries, published as Journal, (Engl: Diary spanning the largest part of the Twentieth Century between the years 1919–98, in 19 volumes published in French, from 1938 to 2001.

Written in French, and published in 1984, is the short work Paris. It is an hommage to the city of his birth and hometown, the capital of France. The elegance of the edition in the Penguin Modern Classics series is that it is a bilingual edition, printing the French text and the English translation on opposite pages. The translation is not made by the author, but by J.A. Underwood.

Paris by Julian Green consists of 19 vignetes, describing parts of the city or buildings. It is a very personal and intimate portrait of the city. Green is not interested in places which traditionally attract many foreigners, such as Mont Martre. His descriptions often involve details which would go unnoticed to the temporary resident or traveller. Thus, Green remembers Notre Dame by the great canvas to cover the empty window where the great rose window was replaced in 1940 or the lost cries of peddlers selling chickweed for the little birds. Rather than describing landmark buildings, Green chooses less well-known corners of the cities, steps and stairways, and the Church of the Val-de-Grâce. Describing the influence of modernity on the city of Paris, Green chooses to remember the demolished old Palais du Trocadéro rather than the Eiffel Tower. A photo of the demolition in 1930, witnessed by the author is included.

The bilingual Penguin edition of Paris includes 16 B/W plates, photos taken by the author of some of the apartments he lived in and iconic places of Paris, but also sculptures which caught his eye, such as 'The Shadow' by Rodin, cherubs and tritons on the monuments and fountains of Paris. The edition is complemented with explanatory notes and biographical details. ( )

http://kaggsysbookishramblings.wordpress.com/2012/07/19/paris-in-july-paris-by-j... ( )

This is a book of reminiscences of Julian Green's life in Paris. Green was an American who lived almost his entire life in Paris, and did serve on the Académie Française. This book is bilingual, with Green writing in French and the translation handled by J. A. Underwood. The book reflects Green's love of Paris and has a beautiful visual sense to it. Black and white photographs taken by the author help illustrate the book. There are chapters with themes as Green 'strolls' through the city reflecting on what he sees. He joins historical references with apt descriptions, and his feeling of the area. One might see these as random jottings, but they always seem engrossing. I read this at the same time as Georges Perec's "An Attempt at Exhausting a Place in Paris." Perec confines himself to the district around St-Sulpice, whereas Green wanders everywhere. But both cast their eyes on things that we casual observers would miss and they round out our experience of Paris. I did find that the French frequently read better than the English, but I am not fluent in French, and mostly read the English. This is a book for anyone who wants a more rounded look at Paris than a travel book could give. ( )