One of the more rewarding books written about the Paris of modernism.

Mary Ellen Jordan Haight reconstructs the city through the writers, artists and salons that made the Left Bank the centre of twentieth-century literary culture. Organised as a series of walks through different neighbourhoods, it follows the streets once inhabited by Stein, Alice B. Toklas, Sylvia Beach, Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, e.e. cummings and countless others, placing their lives back into the physical geography that shaped them.

Originally published in 1988, before literary tourism became an industry, the book has an old-fashioned thoroughness that remains valuable. Period photographs, historical notes, maps and anecdotes transform familiar Parisian streets into a living archive of modernist experimentation. Whether used as a guide while wandering Paris or read from an armchair, it offers a vivid sense of how cafés, bookshops, apartments and chance encounters became the backdrop to some of the twentieth century's most influential writing. An ideal companion for readers of Gertrude Stein, modernism, Parisian history, or anyone fascinated by literary places.

1988 Peregrine Smith first edition paperback. Very good condition with light shelf wear and a clean, bright interior.