Impossible City: Paris in the Twenty-First Century

by Simon Kuper

'Kuper is a shrewd observer [in] this entertaining mix of memoir and anthropology' The Sunday Times

From the bestselling author of Chums comes an explorer's tale of a naïf getting to understand a complex, glittering, beautiful and often cruel city.

Simon Kuper has experienced Paris both as a human being and as a journalist. He has grown middle-aged there, eaten the croissants, taken his children to countless football matches on freezing Saturday mornings in the city's notorious banlieues, and in 2015 lived through two terrorist attacks on his family's neighbourhood. Over two decades of becoming something of a cantankerous Parisian himself, Kuper has watched the city change.

This century, Paris has globalised, gentrified, and been shocked into realising its role as the crucible of civilisational conflict. Sometimes it's a multicultural paradise, and sometimes it isn't. This decade, Parisians have lived through a sequence of terrorist attacks, record floods and heatwaves, the burning of Notre Dame, the storming of the city by gilets jaunes, and the pandemic. Now, as the Olympics come to town, France is busy executing the 'Grand Paris' the most serious attempt yet to knit together the bejewelled city with its neglected suburbs.

This is a captivating memoir of today's Paris without the clichés.

Genres: Nonfiction, France, Travel, History, Audiobook, Memoir, Politics

272 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 11, 2024

About the author

Simon Kuper is a journalist for the Financial Times in England. He was born in Uganda of South African parents and moved to the Netherlands as a child. He studied History and German at Oxford University, and attended Harvard University as a Kennedy Scholar. He has written for The Times, Observer, Guardian and Le Monde, and also writes regularly for the Spectator and Dutch newspapers.

Reviews

[Left Coast Justin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A couple of years ago, a young woman named Karen Cheung wrote a book called "Impossible City" about Hong Kong. A couple of months ago Simon Kuper chose the same name for his book about Paris. Cheung's book was much more convincing.

I'm not obsessed with Paris, though you might think so by looking at my 'read books' shelf. The fact is, it's a city that draws a lot of interesting writers, and while (for example) Toronto or Jakarta might be equally interesting places, you're not likely to find books on those topics at your local library or bookstore. The cover of this book identified the author as an Oxford- and Harvard-trained journalist, so I figured, at the very least, he'd know how to write.

The book starts off strongly, describing his almost-accidental arrival in the city after growing up in The Netherlands and London. Having failed in his bid to enter (so to speak) an ecole horizontale, i.e. winning a French girlfriend, he struggles to learn the language. An apartment in the Marais was still affordable in those days, and he became yet another foreigner in the most cosmopolitan city in Europe. For the first half of the book, he writes interestingly of settling into a city that, despite its problems, is a very nice place to live. Or two cities, actually -- the city within and outside of the périphérique ring road, home to about two million and ten million souls, respectively, with surprisingly little interaction between the two.

Sigh....about halfway through the book, he seems to remember that he's a journalist, and what has been a fairly engaging story so far devolves into a bunch of standalone essays about topics that journalists care deeply about, but I do not. The old-boys network of French politics. How business lunches work. Terrorist attacks. Futbol. Real estate prices. Despite this sudden immersion in facts, the one thing you will search for in vain is what makes Paris an "impossible city."

(I enjoyed Lauren Collins' When in French much more than this one, which is marketed as some sort of fluffy romantic book but which is actually far harder-hitting.)

[Richard Chambers · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a simp for Simon Kuper’s writing but really enjoyed this. Fascinating look at the codes and cultures that make Paris Paris.

Last couple of chapters are worth reading for anyone interested in figuring out how the cities we live in should grow and be places for all citizens - not just the preserves of the super-rich and the tourist.

[Aoife Conway · Rating 3 out of 5]

As someone who has transformed part of my bedroom into a bit of a shrine to Paris (several postcards depicting scenes of the city, a quote from someone now buried in the pantheon, and even a map), I knew going into this book that I’d be biased. I really enjoyed it, even if purely as escapism - the author would reference places in the city of lights and I would feel a smug sense of joy that I not only knew where he was talking about, but would have been able to get there from my appartement in the 5th arrondissement without needing the aforementioned map now on my wall in Dublin.
I treated this book as a portal back to my brief blip of time in paris, which I why I loved the chapters of him just living his life, dealing with Parisian neighbours and going out to dinner and experiencing the culture of the greatest city on earth. On the other hand, I barely skimmed the MANY chapters dedicated to soccer in the city (the author is a sports journalist to be fair). I know the Paris I have in my mind, and like many before me, I want to keep that idealised version. I won’t overstate the obvious - we all know the iconic Edith Piaf song that sums up this exact feeling and way of life - but reading this book made me desperately want to live in Paris again. To reference a masterpiece of cinema, Paris holds the key to my heart (and all of Paris plays a part!).

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Impossible City is an excellent dive into French culture, as easy to digest as a tourist guidebook but with greater depth. Simon Kuper’s collection of essays are each focused on particular aspect of Parisian life, rather than a chronology of the author’s life in the city.

The political structure and scandals of the past few decades are upsetting but relevant, as is the historic divide between Paris and its suburbs - the périphérique. The author offers appropriate historical context throughout, while remaining focused on the impact to modern life.

Overall, I found this book educational and insightful. Simon Kuper’s extensive research and personal anecdotes bring 2024 Paris into sharper focus as we head into the Summer Olympics.

Thanks to PublicAffairs publishing and NetGalley for providing this ARC.

[Ben Donovan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was sold as explaining how the Paris Olympics helped modernize Paris, gave much more Emily in Paris (until the last 3 chapters).

[Saskiasauce · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this preparing the last things for a trip to Paris and finished it just after arriving home. this book describes a modern Paris without the cuteness that has come to be associated with the city through series like Emily in Paris and books like Why French Women Don’t Get Fat.It provides insights in both daily life and political culture, bringing up children and becoming a French citizen. I loved it.

[Kate Southall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Très bon!

[Asanga · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fantastic snapshot of modern Paris and how it got there by an Anglo outsider who made it their home. Punctuated by some witty writing and great turns of phrase. Interesting insights into modern urban planning towards the end and what the legacy of the 2024 Olympics could be.

[Katerina · Rating 3 out of 5]

More like a 3.5 ⭐ I enjoyed his approaching Paris from many different perspectives (sport, dinner, customs, gentrification, politics, sex, etc.) but some of the statements felt like generalisations so take everything with a pinch of salt.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful, succinct look at life in Paris since Kuper’s arrival in 2002. Parts are memoir: conflicts with neighbors in a crowded Marais apartment building, kids’ soccer games in the banlieues, sparkling dinner parties, terrorist attacks. Impossibly cosmopolitan and a little cantankerous, Kuper seems like a perfect fit for Paris, in a way that I don’t think I’d be – it’s fun to live vicariously through him.

The less personal chapters address recent history & social analysis. I was fascinated by the parts about the insular Parisian elite and the threats to their rule, from the gilets jaunes protests to France’s delayed MeToo moment. I also hadn’t really grasped the sheer size of Paris: with 2 million people inside the Périphérique and 10 million more outside it, it’s as big as France’s next 14 largest cities combined (!!!).

Overall, I thought this book was a great window on an interesting time, as Paris threatens to supplant London as Europe’s foremost global city – for better or for worse. 4.5 stars.

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite city is Paris and I thought I knew a lot about the city, its history and quirks. But I was wrong. Simon Kuper is a very talented journalist with a knack for story telling and I learned so much about my favorite city. His perspective as an immigrant among immigrants is so eye opening and his interactions with his children, who are truly Parisians, is relatable to parents of teenagers everywhere. If you love reading about Paris, history and juicy gossip and scandal, this memoir is for you.

[Neil Foster · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kuper does it again

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

all about where duds lives great book

[Tracey Ellis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating insight into Parisian life from an ex-pat point of view, covering all topics from elitism to homelessness in the banlieues. Having lived in Paris, I found this extremely relatable and more interesting than perhaps those who haven’t, but nevertheless, it also shatters some illusions about the city being perfect whilst wonderfully describing its charm.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lot of enjoyable and interesting essays about 21st century Paris--felt mostly like a bunch of short magazine articles, but worthwhile if you're interested in the place!

[Ryan Harris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the tone of this book. Casual, dryly funny, informative. Affectionately critical of Parisian culture through the eyes of a journalist trying to integrate over decades. A portrait of the city changing and globalising. Insights into broader French history.

Quotes and notes:

One day around the start of the century I was walking down a street in Paris, thinking, I'd like to live on this street'. Then a man on an upper storey threw open his front window and stepped out onto his wrought-iron balcony. I thought, 'He lives on this street! Then he called out to a friend on the pavement, in English, in a British accent, and I thought, 'I could live on this street'.
In those days I was living in London in a shared slum above an off-licence. When the new landlord threatened to tear it down, I was faced with the great London question: do I spend a fortune I don't have on a grotty little flat in the suburbs and devote my life to paying off the mortgage?
Around that time, over a cheap Chinese meal, an old friend turned investment banker had let slip that he earned 'a seven-figure package'. I'd felt deflated for days: this was the kind of person I was competing with to obtain my little bit of London. I was then about thirty, and one evening I went to a dinner party with some Londoners who were about forty. They spent the evening talking about renovating their kitchens. I'm as philistine as the next person, but I did leave thinking, 'I don't want to become them'.
I wanted a bit more of the eternal in my life, and a bit less of the material. In fact, my ambitions were simple: to have a nice flat in the centre of a great city and make my living writing. But I was starting to accept that this was unrealistic.
Then a cousin mentioned that his holiday apartment in Paris had cost him about £30,000. 'You're joking, I said.
In London even in those days, £30,000 would just about get you a toilet.
I sensed the glimmerings of a plan. But that was three years ago, he cautioned. 'Now you'd pay double! A couple of days later, I was on the Eurostar train to Gare du Nord station. I stayed in my cousin's flat on the then unfashionable eastern edge of Paris, near the Père-Lachaise cemetery where Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison are buried. It was a nice neighbourhood, but the euro was then roughly on a par with the Iraqi dinar, and I soon realised I could afford something more central. I strayed into tenth arrondissement, just east of the centre, then zeroed in on the Faubourg St-Antoine, the neighbourhood of the artisans who in 1788 had trekked a mile down the road to storm the Bastille prison.
Within days I had paid about £60,000 for a flat in one of those instantly recognisable Parisian buildings. It was made of cream-coloured stone, with wrought-iron balconies and a slate-blue roof. My flat was on the fourth floor of six - the building height settled on by the nineteenth-century town planner Baron Haussmann as the ideal compromise between urban density and human scale. The little street had a bakery, a butcher's, and several cafés and restaurants.

I wonder if I should give up on ownership as a single person. Deposit is one thing, crushing mortgage repayments another. All the rest: taxes, strata. Renting is fine. Yes, making in-built shelves and painting walls would be fun—I'd turn my home into a gallery and library—but do I really aspire to become part of the renovation class? It's all academic anyway; it's more achievable with a partner and if you were ever in that scenario then your speculations today are irrelevant.

I guess we all aspire to make a home in a neighbourhood we love. It's a shame that gets caught up in the culture of wealth and status, rather than security, self-expression and community; which is not to say they are mutually exclusive, who knows. I guess I've never lived in an affordable city, whatever that word means. I live in a social neighbourhood though, which is invaluable.

*

I mostly stuck to my neighbourhood, where restaurateurs and shopkeepers had to treat the regulars well.
It would be a stretch to describe my street as warm and fuzzy like something out of an Edith Piaf song, but within a few months I was granted the eternal ritual of neighbourhood initiation: you walk into a restaurant and the proprietor strides over to shake your hand. It sounds like a cliché of la vieille France, but it really did work like that.
The joy of Paris - as of any good global city - is that you live simultaneously in the great wide world and in your neighbourhood.

:)

*

In Anglo societies, neighbours are potential friends, but in Paris mere geographic proximity is considered too random a basis for friendship. Even lifelong neighbours here are just people who happen to live in your building, and therefore sources of noise and hassle.
Friendship in Paris is doled out sparingly anyway.
France is what sociologists call a 'low-trust' society. The French have the least trust in others of any western Europeans, according to surveys by the European Com-mission. Consistently since 188ı in surveys for the separate European Values Study, fewer than three in ten French respondents say most people can be trusted. That's half the figure of many northern European countries. Building trust with Parisians can take half a lifetime. The result is that friendship, business and politics are conducted within tight groups, whose members have often known each other since school.

I feel like relationships are a function of place and time. For better and worse. You can be passive or active but ultimately it's who’s around you that you form bonds with. I let some friendships happen just as I subtly drive or resist them. Lately for the people I want to be closer to I think it's not so much a case of 'do this, do that' but just thinking 'I should be closer to them' and then when I see them I'm more open and outgoing in a natural and contextual way. Seizing serendipity.

Lately I've been really happy with some of the conversations and interactions I've had in my neighbourhood and at work and being out and about. I don't know if it's a function of me being more open or just my place-based habits fruiting friendships and encounters. I guess this is boring without specifics. This person, that person. I really like the people in my life and I like that they seem to like me in varying degrees and ways. There are gaps and cycles, but I appreciate this and that.

*

After a decade in Paris, I could still only be about 8o per cent of myself in French. I sounded even more stupid and boring than I did in English. In arguments, I could rarely come up with the instant sardonic put-down. In short, I spoke the language to the level that I recognised in countless immigrant shop staff, plumbers, taxi drivers and long-serving Anglos: my French was grammatically flawed, with an impoverished vocabulary, but adequate to most everyday situations.
I had gone from speaking a high-status form of English to a low-status form of French. This gave me a glimpse of what it must be like to be an immigrant or working-class person in Britain or the US: the moment I opened my mouth in Paris, I was treated with condescension. Because of the way I spoke, it was harder for me to insist on my rights or get a hearing; easier for bureaucrats and others to push me aside.

I think learning another language would be a fantastic hobby but only if you actually had a real life practical application or necessity to use it. Hobbies tend to have a healthy balance of obligation and fun.

On the obligation side, though, it would be so painful to not react or joke instantly in one's acquired language, and to be percevied not as one's intelligent self. For Kuper that remained the case after a decade! God, what's the point then almost.

For my trip I really need to start learning some phrases, just for the sake of courtesy and respect.

*

More was done for the bicycle in ten days than in the previous ten years, one cycling activist told me. The city went from three miles of bike paths in the 1990s to more than 150 by the end of the pandemic. Countless Parisians bought bikes, ditching their prejudices that cycling was only for the Tour de France or country holidays.
Tooling around town on my own bike, I kept finding cycle paths that hadn't been there the week before. My mental map of Paris transformed. I finally began to see how the city fitted together, and how small it was. You could ride from the eastern edge to the western edge, through some of the world's best urban landscape, most of it flat, in forty-five minutes.
Places that had been too much of a pain to visit on a packed metro - the Left Bank, or the Tuileries Garden - were suddenly barely a quarter of an hour away. When you sailed along above ground in this beautiful city, overtaking cars stuck in traffic jams, the meanest errand felt like a tourist outing. Soon, the thought of ever returning to the metro routine felt ghastly: being jostled by strangers, listening to their videos, inhaling their germs, and spending dead time underground in artificial light at somebody else's pace.
Videos appeared on global social media of happy Parisians cycling along the car-free rue de Rivoli. But these images were deceptive, like Soviet paintings of peasants enjoying a banquet in nature. Cars still ruled most roads.
Each morning, when I cycled the ten minutes from home to my work-flat along Hidalgo's new paths, my aim was not to get maimed.

Ah the freedom of walking and cycling.

Kuper is essentially describing a lifestyle that's bound to inner Paris rather than metro Paris (though he goes into detail about the banlieues) which would be the equivlant of living in inner Sydney. Though I love the idea of never catching a cold again.

[Jenny OToole · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it! Really gives you a feel for what it’s like to live in Paris as a non-French person.

[Jules Clément · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first time reading Simon Kuper. Found it really easy to follow and loved his style.

This book makes me super excited to visit Paris for the first time. Will definitely be taking this book on my trip and be referencing certain cafes, arrondissement mentioned.

Very interesting dive into the French culture. From the importance of the table to the evolution of the Parisian suburbs, this book gives you a great overall view of the fundamentals of Paris and its evolution in the past few decades.

Really enjoyed reading about its recent transformation from the pandemic to the Olympic Games. Looking forward to discovering Paris by bike.

Also really enjoyed the authors anecdotes illustrating the importance of the “table” socially and politically speaking.

Also found myself really enjoying how football is a big unifier in France for a country with so many different cultures. From creating the champions league, to creating the ballon d’or award, Paris and its suburbs has the biggest pool of football talent in Europe.

[Ira · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like books about people experiencing cities and this is a very fine example of it. The person is a middle aged British sport journalist and the city is Paris where he moved twenty years ago because it was easy and cheap to buy property there (lol).

Anyway, I got a feeling that Mr. Kuper is reflective enough about his privileges and it was very interesting to experience Paris from his point of view. From amazing local dinners, up to the tiny Parisian flats and courtyards.

This book is definitely written from the outsider’s perspective, but without oversimplification I think (me being not French) and it covers a big share of personal experiences but also of complicated topics. From this I learned quite a bit about Parisian elitism, social and spatial segregation in the city, about the local football clubs for district youth and about the context of urbanist interventions exercised in Paris lately. Very current and engaging read.

[Jamie Chaplin · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most well-balanced accounts of a city I have ever read. Simon writes about how the history of the city has shaped what it is today through it's archecture, politics, personal accounts, achievements, and controversies. He dies not shy away from issues Paris has faced while shining a light on its accomplishments. I began reading for a trip to Paris and finished it on the final leg of my return to the UK on the bus. I felt like it really added to my experience there, and like all good travel books, I now feel like I understand the people of Paris a lot better.

[Weiling · Rating 4 out of 5]

In four days, I logged 35 miles on foot “flaneuse-ing” in Paris. I learned to speak and think of Paris’s urban space in terms of “arrondissements,” the districts within the Périphérique that spiral outward from the intra muro, jumping across La Seine back and forth. Simon Kuper’s Impossible City kept me informed not only of where I was, but more importantly, as a mental map of co-living with the past. The past, Kuper notes, is “the population of ghosts who walk by the sides of us current Parisians, and who passed on the city that we are briefly allowed to inhabit.”

The center of Paris today still predominantly sits on its nineteenth-century urban spatial design by Georges-Eugène Haussmann (known as Baron Haussmann, 1809-1891), whom Emperor Napoleon III appointed to carry out a massive urban renewal program of new boulevards, parks, and public works. All buildings, mostly consisting of a facade and an inner courtyard separated from the street noises, are capped at six floors, and diagonal streets intersect with each other. The annexation of the suburban areas doesn’t distribute the political, intellectual, and economic power from the city center—also the center of the entire France—but concentrates power to the elite that inhabits the center even more.

Kuper’s observation of Paris spans from the early 2000s to the present, from the simultaneous perspectives of an English expat, a new immigrant, a parent of three, a neighborhood resident, and a journalist. It offers a useful guide to Paris’s contemporary spatialized tensions around the social caste between the Périphérique, the habitat of a tiny elite self-reproducing in the same colleges and governmental institutions, and the banlieues (suburbs), home to immigrants, the working class, and increasingly, the bobos (bohemian bourgeois) who formed an earlier wave of gentrifying the Périph. These tensions spread into every possible corner of the greater Paris, from immigrants to multiculturalism (through football), terrorism, affordable housing, gentrification, transportation, the rivalry with London, the marriage of politics and intellectualism (in the left bank), and no less stunning, the attitude towards sex.

Paris’s long-term rivalry of cosmopolitanism with London, including the bitter loss of the 2012 summer Olympics bidding, had a plot twist after Brexit. Brexit strikes the key of nationalism, the identity binarism of “us” versus “them” that ignores the plurality of identities one embodies. In Kuper’s case, biographically, he was “a British citizen, born at Mengo hospital in Kampala, emigrated as a baby, now living in France”—a case well-understood by Ugandan ambassadors—and by profession, “a citizen of nowhere, a Dutch football fan, a South African cricket fan.”

When London closed the door behind him, the expat and journalist was already a part of the neighborhood multiculturalism crossing between the Périph and the banlieues, through the multiracial moments of children’s football and also through the horror of terrorist attacks that spurred Islamophobia. On the night of the Bataclan attack that killed 130 lives, Parisians came to stand together outside the bombed concert hall condemning terrorism, but also in what Kuper saw as an “almost miraculous spectacle,” they were involved in conversations. “A group of Orthodox Jewish men in skullcaps was chatting with two bearded Muslims about kosher food and chapters in the Koran.” As an immigrant and adult, the grassroots multiculturalism in Paris is an object of observation that leads to a learned adaptation. But for Kuper’s children, that is just how ordinary Parisians live; how they live, as French children, regardless of their parents’ or grandparents’ complex origins.

The racial bias against people/immigrants of color also unambiguously penetrates the banlieues where playing football on the street is a greater interest and priority than sitting in a classroom. Kylian Mbappé was one of those young players scouted by football franchises. A child to a Cameroonian father and an Algerian mother, Mbappé was raised in Bondy, a northeastern banlieu “built on a forest where highwaymen used to lie in wait for stagecoaches leaving Paris.” Unsurprisingly, many years of racially coded distrust of Black (and Muslim) players on the French national team would go by before the nation and Les Bleus began to reconcile. And a couple more years until Les Bleus beat Croatia 4-2 in the Moscow World Cup and chanted “Vive la France! Vive la Republique!” to the entire nation.

Slow as changes may seem, they are happening. As the Périph becomes more bike-friendly, the banlieues build more metro lines and stations to be more interconnected. The infamous sexual libertarianism and pedaphilia of les “soixante-huitards (‘sixty-eighters’)” elite, revolutionary intellectuals who shook Europe and the world in 1968, are finally getting checked, if still insufficiently, by the ordinaries’ solidarity around the #MeToo movement that landed in Paris in 2020. The elite proves to be not as invincible as they look or used to be. Looking beyond the painful bureaucracy, corruption, and mannerism of Paris, Kuper sees, and hopes his readers can see with him, the hopes of change in the everyday—at children’s birthday parties, on football courts at suburban schools, in cafés, as well as at the big and small essentially Parisian protests on the wide boulevards.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do remember Kuper being all over the media when the Bataclan attacks happened, presumably as the first English speaker living in France on the BBC database, but this short account of 20 years or so living in Paris was interesting, looking at both the big issues and the minutiae of life in central Paris.

This was despite my early reaction to his financial situation - his ability to spend €60k on a Parisian appartment in the early 2000s while claiming relative poverty was typical of well-off writers who are intelligent and have more financially successful friends - and not that of an average person. Putting that to one side, his choice anecdotes gave an insight into the city, and perhaps the biggest surprise to me was that a capital of an egalitarian republic seemed almost as status-conscious as the UK, and had a lot of gatekeeping.

On the other hand, the conversation topics of the arts and politics over personal achievements, and the quality of the food, seemed appealing, while the €6 cups of decent coffee indicated the same gentrification seen in the other global cities of Amsterdam and London. If there was a grander theme of the book, it was that Paris is at a crossroads of becoming another London or a place to support both rich and poor. The intended commitment to social and affordable housing seemed admirable, and Kuper seemed more optimistic that cynical - Birmingham for example has dropped its affordable housing requirement from 40% to 20% to encourage developers to build, and he did hint that local mayors of the suburbs were not all signing up to the high-rise plans.

Having looked for a modern social history of France recently and not found one, the chapters on politicians were interesting, and in the case of the paedophilia excuses, both disturbing and a sign of how much the media bubble is confined by the dominant language - the media bubble itself was commented on and the omerta of the media and key figures showed flaws in a society formed in oppostion to aristocratic ruling. I'm assuming a fair amount was cut as this was tightly written, but it covered both the important and irreverant aspects of life and moved onto something else before it got dull.

I'd be interested to know a bit more what the banlieue life was like day-to-day, and despite the stories of noise and density (the population of the Midlands confined to the area of southwest Birmingham alone) the residential atomosphere it evoked was that of a suburban area rather than a busy city. It was nonetheless an intriguing book in a style I have come to appreciate, where Kuper puts the political background to the small-scale stories to create a broad picture.

[books4chess · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Over the years I have spent on my work street, I have watched Paris change. The man in my building whom I remember as a large commanding father of teenagers now lurches over the pavement alone, sagging to his left, the victim on a stroke... Only a minority of people living in tiny Parisian apartments leave in a coffin”.

Impossible City is a beautiful love letter to Paris, but to the real Paris that has developed over the last 20 years, not the from old movies. Kuper writes from the incredibly privileged space of being an expat with a strong primary passport, a well-paid, flexible job and as someone who, with great luck, purchased a property in central Paris for a mere GBP 60,000 prior to the boom that (almost) echos Londons property market. He owns it though, in a way not often present in these expat-exposé style introductions to living abroad.

“Parisians tended to go to London for work, while Londoners came to Paris to play."

Kuper writes a wonderfully nuanced take to a city that practices laïcité - the division of private life including religious expression from the public - whilst being one of the most multicultural areas based on population within Europe. He covers the vast expanse spiritually between the banlieues (the suburbs) and the Périph, despite the geographical closeness, and the impact this had on his family, as well as the wider social implications.

“Paris suffers from a problem of scarcity: There isn’t enough of it. So plutocrats of various stripes have captured its smartest neighbourhoods. Francophone African dictators, for instance, favour the 8th and 16th arrondissements, plus Neuilly”.

As a Jewish man with the opportunity to raise his children in a culturally and financially rich space, he recognises everything his family benefits from, including a diverse friend group co-existing peacefully within a multicultural community space, whilst having to keep their wits about them as antisemitism continued to rise within the country.

The book reads as an interesting blend - Kuper covers international politics within France including “the crassness of the Le Pens” along with his own personal experiences within the social elite as a journalist. He covers the complexity around the difficulties the city has faced for many years in successfully integrating new communities, and speckles in some wild and wonderful stories about the rules of the rich, and the rules of Parisians specifically. Class is as prominent in Paris as it is in the UK, and it shapes everything from the train you take to work to the party you end up voting.

I also adored Kuper’s take on the entire twenty years of his road to naturalisation. Even at the worst times, he is grateful for the opportunities he has and recognises that things would be very different had he, like many of us, remained in the UK post Brexit and lost the very rights he has instead secured legally and been able to pass onto his three children. I greatly enjoyed reading of Paris through the this new lens, and gained a newfound appreciation for the city I previously only ever sought for transit links, and for the future it may hold following the completion of its current transport projects.

Thank you Profile Books for the copy, it was greatly appreciated.

[Vanessa M · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m teaching French so I'm always looking for some new tools to present French culture. The book is more than a basic 'Brit-living-in-Paris and enjoying buttery croissants at a local cafe.'
Fun facts. I'm a Parisian-born who left for London in 1998 ( but finally moved to Italy because of B.) - the exact opposite of the author. Born as well in 1969, with 3 kids ( inc. a pair of twins...like the author) I decided to take the UK nationality because of Brexit ),likewise the author took the French passport!
Having left Paris for so many years, I enjoyed recognizing the characteristics of my city...High level of negativity and aggressivity of its residents (hate it!) , their scorn for the 'Province' and the 'Banlieues' ( and how anyone from outside Paris hates them!) the dress code diktat, the absolute domination of the Grandes Ecoles and l'ENA ( for public administration).
But I liked reading his views on the Paris of the last 10 years: How immigrants are accepted on the surface but in reality suffer from post-colonialist racism. How the Grand Paris will -in the end -integrate the Banlieues, the profound effect terrorism had on the city psyche. Accelerated gentrification: How Paris is turning into a BoBo and Grands Bourgeois city ( which Anne Hidalgo si trying to compensate)
What I think the author missed is the meritocracy ( which I discovered in a similar book - les italiens): Competent people ( managers, artists,..) are accepted and can flourish in a city like Paris, regardless of their nationality. The love of controversy, creativity, and diversity ( I think the 2024 Olympic game opening ceremony is a perfect demonstration) the love of Parisians for their city landscape and architecture, the love of literature and intellectual discussions ( never seen this to that extent in other cities).
Last but not least Parisian restaurants are interesting because of their creativity, the lunch menu can be great but it s boring!

[Con · Rating 4 out of 5]

Proud citizen of nowhere moves to Paris on a whim and ends up becoming a local. It happens!

Bit by bit he befriends (or learns to live with) prickly French neighbours. His French improves and he gets invited to dinner parties (which wouldn't happen if they didn't think your language was up to it). He interviews all kinds of people, and even crosses the great divide to banlieue via parents at his kids football club.

The book is chronological so you follow the journey from first-impression French stereotypes (I loved the study that found they had '17 different body gestures signifying indifference') through to a deeper understanding of history and politics and culture.

Of course he gets stuck into the grand écoles and the insider world where your mate runs Air France while you're the deputy PM. An interesting point about money - it matters less at elite levels there, because of high tax rates, and because the things you really want (a nice apartment in Paris) aren't bought or sold on the market, they're handed out as favours.

The man was in the Stade de France when the Bataclan attacks happened, and as a journo he could follow events on wifi while the rest of the stadium remained ignorant (phone access was cut to prevent panic). You forget how much shit when down in Paris in the 2010s.

Apparently they're building out the city to give everyone a metro within 10 minutes - also beyond the peripherique. The first real change in Paris in a century. Pushed on by the Olympics. And interesting point that some of the drive to expand the metro has waned, because the temporary bike lanes they introduced during Covid became so successful, so there's less need for roads and even public transport.

Maybe you need a foreigner to write a book about how a city and its day to day culture. For insider it would be like writing about the sky - everybody already knows what it looks like! Outsiders notice the differences.

[Arnoud De Meyer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kuper wrote a highly personal story about his and his family's gradual integration in Paris and in France. As you can read from other reviews, he intended originally only to come from time to time from London to Paris, where he had been able to buy a relatively cheap flat, but he ended up living in Paris and taking on French nationality.

The book start with a few chapters on how he had to cope with the 'codes' of what it is to be a Parisian, and how to integrate into a Parisian neighbourhood. As a regular but part-time Parisian I recognised many of the issues he was flabbergasted about and which he either had to adopt or to find ways to get around it. I enjoyed these chapters and smiled quite regularly. Real integration, as often for expatriates, happened for him when his kids grew up as quasi French and he got to know the parents of their friends. if he would have left it to that, the audience for this book would probably be limited.

But gradually the book evolves into a quasi-sociological analysis of present day Paris and France, e.g. the growing multi-culturalism, the spasm that exists between the Parisian elite and the provinces, the role of sports and in particular soccer (football), the extension of Paris into the suburbs, the creation of Greater Paris, the switch from a city committed to automobile to one that embraces bicycles, etc. This makes it a much more interesting analysis by an insider/outsider for many people interested in how France is evolving.

It is well written (what else would you expect from an FT journalist). I hesitated between 3 and 4 in my evaluation, but ended up with 3 as I found the book entertaining, but not a 'must read'.

[Benny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ik hou van Parijs en Simon Kuper ken ik van Footballing Against the Enemy, lang geleden één van de beste voetbalboeken die ik ooit las. Nu heeft hij een boek over “zijn” Parijs geschreven, daar woont de wereldburger blijkbaar. Wistikveel! Hulde aan mijn geliefde buurtbib om dit boekje op de toonbank te leggen.

Als “nieuwe Parijzenaar” kijkt Kuper met een verfrissende blik naar de lichtstad. Hij belandde er ooit omdat het goedkoper was (is) dan Londen, maar is duidelijk van de stad gaan houden. Als voetbalvader ontdekt hij dat Parijs meer is dan wat er zich binnen de “périphérique” afspeelt en als journalist wil hij de verhalen achter de schermen van de politiek achterhalen. Dat levert een boeiend, maar ook een beetje wisselvallig boek op. Niet elk hoofdstuk is even sterk. De politiekere hoofdstukken over de elitescholen en het ons-kent-ons-wereldje hadden best nog wat aangescherpt mogen worden.

Het boek eindigt hoopvol, maar ook met vragen. Parijs slaagt erin net iets minder onder het massatoerisme te kreunen dan Londen, Amsterdam of Barcelona. Blijft dit duren? Het centrum is onder burgemeester Hidalgo heerlijk autoluw geworden. Blijft dat duren? En – vooral – zullen de infrastructuur- en mobiliteitswerken van “Le Grand Paris” erin slagen om de delen binnen en buiten de périphérique eindelijk te verbinden? Lang leve Parijs!

PS: De Nederlandse vertaling van de titel - Parijs Nu - dekt de lading, maar spreekt veel minder aan dan de oorspronkelijke titel. Waarom toch?

[Stella Grover · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kuper is charming, disarming and convincing. He writes of a Paris I recognise, I am reminded of this city’s dreamlike quality. Except it is real. Though imperfect.

“On visits over the years I’d never got beyond tourist Paris, which is sort of a large facade designed to punish people who transgress against local etiquette.” (Brilliant)

Kuper captures its snobbery, elitism and xenophobia alongside the idyllic slate roofs and Haussmannian steel balconies. Most of all, the tension between les banlieues and the Paris inside the ‘Périph’ anchors Kuper’s book in the context of the 2024 Olympic Games and Paris’ (at first reluctant though it seems eventual embrace of) globalisation.

In a post-Brexit Europe, and one wherein migrant populations have soared in recent decades, Paris has been forced to embrace its multicultural identity. Kuper is optimistic in the city’s opening up to its suburbs and, symbolically and crucially, a cultural identity and heritage that deviates from a city made of poets, artists and political adroitness…

A personal takeaway from Kuper’s retelling was the framing of the French elite’s perverted sexual proclivities, especially as the soixante-huitards’ denunciation of #MeToo (as told by Kuper) embodied a rejection of American values, compounded by a dismissal of a more progressive wave of feminism which threatened France’s epitomising liberal sexual philosophy.

[Marc · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kuper is a Financial Times sports journalists (not my favourite genre) who more or less accidentally bought an appartment in Paris in the first year's of this millenium, when housing prices had already skyrocketed in London. Fortunately this book is not just about sports and the parts that are not about sports are very good. Kuper describes life in Paris, how the elites function (it is a really sick incrowd), how Macron rose to power and how the people within the Blvd Péripherique inhabit a nation of their own, ignorant and not interested in the banlieu and the rest of the country. Somehow Paris still seems to have benefitted from Brexit and is becoming more important, geopolitically, not in the least because the current elite speak decent English. Kuper is quite good at explaining the social codes of the Paris elites, but he is also very much aware of what is going in the banlieue, not least because his children play football and the banlieu excels at that (because there is nothing else to do). It seems the banlieue is doing well and that finally Paris intra muros (you should have taken Latin in highschool) is opening up to it, extending it's subway network into it.

Kuper describes this as can be expected from a first class British journalist, with a sense of humour, attention to detail and knowledge of the broader picture, culturally, historically and politically.

[Raghu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Charming, brilliantly-observed (as only an outsider-insider can) anthropological perspective of modern Paris – fleshed out using the city’s history, politics, social codes (that require some expert deciphering), it's lived-experience (as an Anglo-Dutch expat raising French children), it's sporting life, and how the city finds itself, unexpectedly, as the most dynamic, diverse, and powerful of European cities (now that London has brexited itself).

The book is chock-full of deep insights and delicious details on how the Parisian elite operates, how its largely-immigrant suburbs respond, all the while confirming some and busting other stereotypes -- as well as providing a wonderful travel and eating guide to this “impossible city.”

It also provides a case-study of a modern “metropole” - about the often testy relationship of the expensive, touristy city-center (intra muros - inside the walls, or ring-road nowadays) with its expanding, populous suburbs (banlieues).

Apart from the (very interesting) particulars of this relationship of the heart to its body, there is also much to learn for other worldly metropoles from Paris’s many successes and failures.