Customer Reviews

Paris: The Biography of a City

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1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a very good history of Paris. It is well-written and keeps you engaged throughout. It's not the sort of history that you have to force yourself to keep reading. If you have any interest at all in Paris you will enjoy reading this very much.

One of the techniques he uses, that I really enjoyed, is that he includes highlighted sections where he steps out of the strictly chronological description of what happened when and goes into a deeper description of a particular place, building, or incident. This breaks up the book just enough to keep it from getting tedious, and fills in details just when you want them.

The only complaint that I have is that he is very sketchy on details of what was going on in the rest of the world. Of course, this is a history of Paris, so how much time should he really spend on what was happening elsewhere? Still, it would have been useful to have a little more context; just enough to be better able to place the significant events in Paris with what was happening at the same time in the rest of the world.

Another comment (not a complaint, really), is that I found it absolutely necessary to have an overview map of Paris handy while I was reading. He seems to assume a fair degree of familiarity with the layout of the city. In particular, he frequently describes where something is only by mentioning which Arrondisment it's in, or what major cross streets are nearby. If you know Paris well enough to place things this way, more power to you. I don't, so I found myself frequently referring to a map.

But these are minor criticisms. Overall, this book is excellent and more than worth the cover price for anyone with any interest in Paris.

This is a workmanlike one-volume history of Paris, covering about one thousand years. I would especially recommend it for people deeply interested in urban architecture and city planning given that Professor Jones spends much effort detailing the changing nature and design of the streets and buildings of Paris. Most general readers will find this none too exciting. Those wanting to learn about a specific historical incident, for example the Commune of 1871, will likely read about it in this volume but should just buy one of the many good books that there are sure to be on that given incident. A nice aspect of the book are the many feature boxes that tell interesting tales related to the City of Light that would not fit into the author's general narrative. For the reader who wants a flavor of Paris without the sometimes numbing detail provided by this book, please consider Edmund White's The Flaneur and Alistair Horne's The Seven Ages of Paris.

This book is terribly organized. I'm not sure what happened in writing this book, but it seems clear that Professor Jones did not compile this in the chronological order that it is printed in.

My main complaint is that rather obscure concepts/people/events are repeatedly referred to, and then only later does Jones bother to define them. (I would almost prefer that he not define something at all, rather than offering a definition 100 pages after his first reference to it!) The fact that the book has an index only further infuriated me - clearly the author/publisher knew where all these terms were located throughout the book, yet did not bother to offer a definition in the appropriate/first reference to the concept.

Examples are numerous, but here are a few:
**robe nobility: referenced on pages 139, 152, 183. Defined? (pg. 183)
**sans culottes: first referenced on page 189, defined on page 231.
**Louis-Sebastien Mercier: referenced on pages 11, 138, 178, 189, 200, 204, 212, 213. When did Jones provide information (that he was a "journalist, dramatist and observer of Parisian mores") on just WHO Mercier is? Page 215.

Aside from that, there are some plain old errors. One such is in the text box on Saint Genevieve. Jones mentions that she negotiated with Frankish military chieftains in the 570s and 580s. She died in 512AD, so the negotiations seem improbable. (470s & 480s would be correct, but I should not have to figure that out.)

The redeeming quality of the book is that if DOES offer information on Paris if you are willing to sift through the above mentioned annoyances. And Paris is not such a bad subject.

I understand now that the "biography of a city" genre means, literally, what happened to the city in question throughout its existence. This does not mean the reader will get a historical survey of events within the city. It means the reader will get a more-or-less chronological account of building programs, road building, and changes in sewage infrastructure.

In short: dry reading.

I bought Paris: The Biography of a City on the eve of my trip to Paris, thinking a history of Paris would give me a sense of context. However, history involves people and events. Needless to say, I was sorely disappointed by what I got, and instead read John Roberts's excellent book, The French Revolution. But driven by an obsession with finishing every book I start, I finished reading this book on my return to the U.S.

Taken for what it is, this book is a decent and apparently accurate catalog of Paris's growth since its early years. However, Jones merely mentions in passing major events like the St. Bartholomew's massacre and Napoleon III's coup d'etat, and people like Robespierre and Napoleon Bonaparte, as if the reader already knew all about them.

A city without people is not a city. Likewise, a biography of a city that goes into almost no detail about the people who lived in that city through the ages is hardly a biography. Or at least, hardly a biography worth reading.

This books greatest strength and weakness is that it is one of the most thorough overviews on the city of Paris history that has been written yet. Unlike many it goes into wonderful detail on the early years of Paris and the build up on the Isle de cite. One of the other drawbacks is that the maps of Paris in the back are just okay but if you have a Paris travel book with good maps you will be better served for following the authors descriptions. The downside to the detail is that you can get bogged down very easily and lose the authors main point with all of the detail. The book tends to glaze over the post world war II era and I would have liked more explanation of the reconstruction efforts.
Overall it was an excellent summary of Parisian history and put Paris in the context of the entire country. There are many books like this that offer the biography of the city and I would put this one in the middle of those. It is hard to have a very strong opinion of this book since it was neither amazing nor terrible. For those looking to learn some more about the history of the city or those who want another perspective on French history it is probably worth a read but for the general consumer on European history it is probably worth a pass.

Don't believe the reviews on here. This is actually a very readable book. Perhaps some might find it too scholarly but to my mind that doesn't detract from its readability. Give it a try.

Being from Paris and now living in the US, I looked forward to this book. I thought I would get a review of history and maybe find out new things. The history is OK but very slim in many instances. What disappointed me the most was that there were almost no pictures. It would have been fun, for example, to have both historical illustrations and modern pictures of an area being described in this book. Many things are described but it just is not the same as seeing it in pictures. Most illustrations were obscure and not explained within the context of the book.

All in all, better to get two books - one on history and the other on architecture. Trying to do justice to both does not work.

I found this book disappointing for other reasons than reviewers have already cited. Namely, it's a very poorly-chosen title. It miscues readers that the story will be told in a alternative way. i.e. Paris (a physical place) has a bio, that is literally comprised of the stories of the objects that compose it. I wish Jones had scrapped this book and written that one instead. That one sounds like fun.

I have no idea how the one review below picked that sentence as typical. I couldn't find a similar sentence anywhere in the book. It's not a difficult read at all.

It's also not an compelling one. The title hints at a book where Paris and it's objects will become protagonists: the story of Paris will be told through artifacts. That's some hook! But the book has little to do with relating Paris' `biography' as such. Instead this is just a conventional history of Paris, with multiple pages devoted to incidents that were long ago sufficiently mythologized, and thus well-known. Paris Commune, Eiffel Tower, Sacre Couer, Haussmaninzation etc. Jones covers every topic as `history' leading to a final few sentences about the artifact that remains. It's unfortunate. Simon Schama's history of the revolution (Citizens) is not very different from this, not a city. It's conventional. This is how histories have been written for the entire 20th century.

It also seems like you can't talk about spaces and buildings without talking about architects too. There's barely a word about anyone other than Haussmann. You can't talk about the Pompidou Center without mentioning Archigram, unless you're writing at the level of "travel pamphlet." It's just not possible.

The topic of Paris is aching for someone to discover its hidden humor. I love Paris but it takes itself so seriously that all who deign to describe it unfortunately become humorless themselves.

Throughout history, Paris has been called alternately "Queen of Cities,' 'Capital of Enlightenment, 'City of Modernity,' 'City of Light,' and 'Capital of the Civilized World.' The photos and illustrations (untitled) in each of the twelve chapters are aids to the common American reader.

The Eiffel tower, built for the 1889 Exposition, was named for the construction engineer of the project. It is a major tourist location, attracting 200 million visitors by the 21st century. It is a thousand-feet tall wiht 1,710 steps to its summit. Effel called it a "three-hundred metre flagpole," this 'supreme engineering achievement.'

The 1889 Exposition in Paris attracted 32 million visitors; the 1900 Expositon had 51 million to attend. In Paris, you will find the Arc de Triomphe, Conciergerie, Notre-Dame Cathedral, the Louvre, and Opera Bastille. Other public buildings in the city include the Luxembourg palace, Palais-Royal, UNESCO headquarters, Panthenon, and Sorbonne. The Hotel de Ville houses the city government. Paris is lined with boulevards, broad, tree-planted avenues.

Some notable artists who called themselves the Impressionists include Claude Monet, Degas, Renoir, and Manet (with his scandalous nudes). Paris remains a highly international city. It has its Latin Quarter, similar to New Orleans' French Quarter. Withe high-speed train system, it is three hours from the Mediterrean coast and only two hours from London.

The glass pyramid entrance to the Louvre (1993) is a larger design from one TVA has in Knoxville, Tennessee, between its towers -- right downtown. We also have our own Eiffel Tower, only it's called simply Sunsphere, about the only thing left from the 1982 World's Fair.

During the Middle Ages, its motto was "It floats, not does it sink." It would make a great honeymoon destination.