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Métronome : L'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien
Saviez-vous que la Lutèce des origines ne se situait pas sur l'île de la Cité, mais à Nanterre ? Que les derniers combattants gaulois massacrés par les Romains reposent sous la tour Eiffel ? Que les vestiges de la première cathédrale de Paris se trouvent sous le parking d'un immeuble moderne du Ve arrondissement ? Au fil de ses découvertes, Lorànt Deutsch vous emmènera vers ce qui fut le Pont-au-Change, ancêtre de la Bourse, puis chez ce bistrotier qui entasse ses bouteilles dans une cellule de la Bastille sauvée de la destruction, et tout au long des rues où se cachent des trésors que vous ne soupçonniez pas. Une promenade captivante, où défilent les seigneurs alliés comme les princes rebelles, et tout ce qui a forgé le pays. Vous verrez s'ériger des murailles contre l'envahisseur, s'agiter l'Église, s'imposer les marchands, s'ébrouer les artistes, l'Université s'installer sur des ballots de paille place Maubert, le peuple de Paris se soulever - violent, sanglant, emblématique -, et se construire ainsi toute l'histoire de France.
397 pages, Paperback
First published September 3, 2009
155 people are currently reading
789 people want to read
About the author
Lorànt Deutsch
52 books28 followersLorànt Deutsch est né dans l'Orne à Alençon d'un père hongrois et d'une mère parisienne ; il grandit à Sablé-sur-Sarthe . Il découvre la comédie au centre culturel de cette ville mais se passionne d'abord pour le football. À douze ans, il est recruté par le FC Nantes dans le cadre Sport-études. Deux ans plus tard, il abandonne et part chez ses grands-parents à Paris. C'est dans une MJC qu'il prend goût au théâtre. Plus tard, sa sœur l'inscrit au théâtre Mouffetard dans le Ve arrondissement.
Après cinq ans de recherche et d'écriture, Lorànt Deutsch présente le 9 septembre 2009 son premier livre, Métronome, l'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien , tiré à huit mille exemplaires par l'éditeur Michel Lafon . Fort de son succès, il sera réimprimé maintes fois ; six mois après sa sortie, plus de 330 000 exemplaires étaient vendus 6 et plus de 500 000 en octobre 2010, date à laquelle a été publiée une version illustrée de l'ouvrage.
Il se marie avec la comédienne Marie-Julie Baup le 3 octobre 2009. Le couple accueille son premier enfant, une petite fille prénommée Sissi, fin décembre 2010.
Après cinq ans de recherche et d'écriture, Lorànt Deutsch présente le 9 septembre 2009 son premier livre, Métronome, l'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien , tiré à huit mille exemplaires par l'éditeur Michel Lafon . Fort de son succès, il sera réimprimé maintes fois ; six mois après sa sortie, plus de 330 000 exemplaires étaient vendus 6 et plus de 500 000 en octobre 2010, date à laquelle a été publiée une version illustrée de l'ouvrage.
Il se marie avec la comédienne Marie-Julie Baup le 3 octobre 2009. Le couple accueille son premier enfant, une petite fille prénommée Sissi, fin décembre 2010.
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June 26, 2024
The Métro subway system of Paris continually carries residents, commuters, tourists, travelers, and visitors beneath the streets of the French capital – 4 million people per day, 1.5 billion per year. The Art Nouveau style of a number of the Métropolitain station entrances reinforces the visitor’s sense that in Paris, everything is a work of art. The Métro is a vast circulatory system for the life of Paris; and for Lorànt Deutsch, the Métro is at the very heart of the city.
Deutsch, an actor with extensive credits in French theatre, cinema, and television, adopts in Metronome a novel strategy for narrating the life and history of La Ville Lumière, the City of Light. The book’s subtitle in its English translation is A History of Paris from the Underground Up; and each chapter of this 21-chapter book is linked not only with a specific century, but also with a specific Métro station, starting with the Parisii (the Celtic tribal nation that gave the city its name), on what is now the Île de la Cité in the first century A.D., and proceeding all the way forward to the Grande Arche of La Défense here in the 21st century.
For instance, the chapter on the 4th century A.D. takes its title from the Saint-Martin Métro station, and also has the title “Paris, Imperial Residence.” This chapter focuses on how the area along rue Saint-Martin was once the residence of the Roman emperor Julian. The future emperor began living in the city then known as Lutetia from January of 358 A.D., and “Not only was Julian the first lover of Paris, he was its first bard” (p. 47), writing rapturously about the beauty of the Île de la Cité and the pure waters of the Seine River. Deutsch points out that one can’t visit the palace where Julian resided – “Of the actual residence, nothing remains” – but adds that “the location has remained a palace across the centuries. Today it is the location of the city’s Palais de Justice” (p. 50).
Similarly, the seventh-century chapter focuses on the Saint-Germain-des-Prés Métro station and bears the title “From One Abbey Emerges Another.” The focal character here is the Frankish king Dagobert I, who lived from 603-639 A.D. The deeply religious Dagobert believed that Saint Denis had promised to protect him through life in return for the construction of a sumptuous tomb, and therefore built a richly appointed reliquary for Saint Denis in the church that bears his name. When Dagobert was dying, at the age of 35, he asked to be buried at Saint Denis, becoming the first Frankish king to be interred there.
And, in a good example of Deutsch’s fondness for vivid and unusual stories of Paris life, the author of Metronome shows the unusual way in which 13th-century monks chose to honor, in sculptural form, the 7th-century king who had founded the church and made it magnificent, but who was also notorious for his womanizing ways:
The soul of the king, pictured as a naked child with a crown, is carried off to hell in the clutches of demons. Happily, Saint Denis, Saint Martin, and Saint Maurice succeed in delivering his soul, take him to heaven, and gain him admission into paradise. The message is clear: Dagobert deserved to go to hell, and only the intercession of the saints miraculously prevented this. (p. 102).
Deutsch lets the reader know that one can still see this “rather peculiar tomb” in Saint Denis Church today; and it is interesting to wonder what the Frankish king would think of this odd tribute. Perhaps he would simply toss off a glass of Champagne, have a good laugh over it, and send for one of his mistresses.
Paris’s history is full of examples of historical irony, as demonstrated by Chapter 11, “The Millennium Myth,” with its focus on the 11th century and the Arts et Métiers Métro station. Deutsch explains that “Until the Revolution, this stop is where the Saint-Martin-des-Champs priory had stood…on the very spot where Saint Martin had kissed and cured a leper” (p. 153). Historical myth-making to the contrary, the year 1000 A.D. was evidently not a time of end-of-the-world hysteria; rather, it was a time whose deeply religious people wanted “to purge the Church of its abuses and rediscover the way to God” (p. 154). The construction of Saint-Martin-des-Champs was part of that impulse.
But revolutions have a way of changing things; and 700 years later, “During the Revolution, the priory was turned into the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, which visitors can still find at 292 Rue Saint-Martin” (p. 164). The original builders of the priory might not be amused that their sacred and religious building is now the Musée des Arts et Métiers, with its thoroughly secular focus on science and technology; but Deutsch seems thoroughly amused by the manner in which life in Paris always takes on a trajectory of its own, no matter the agenda of the builder of any particular building.
Yet things get much more grim, and anything but amusing, in the chapter on the 14th century and the Hôtel de Ville stop. This, the site of Paris’s City Hall, is associated with the gruesome violence that King Philippe V, or “Philippe the Fair,” perpetrated against the Knights Templars because he envied their wealth and their independence. On Friday, October 13, 1307 – the original Friday the 13th – Philippe’s soldiers surrounded the Templars in their Paris headquarters, the Temple enclosure, and compelled them to surrender.
Tortured into giving false confessions, the Templars recanted at their sentencing before Notre Dame, and their leader, Jacques de Molay, was sentenced to be burned alive. All de Molay asked was that he be turned to face Notre Dame Cathedral before the fires were lit, so that he could die looking upon something holy and sanctified. The execution took place "in what is today Vert-Galam Square, meaning the eastern point of today’s Île" [de la Cité], and the condemned de Molay declared that “misery will visit those who have wrongly condemned us”; and as Deutsch notes, “Some believe the curse was effective” (p. 205). The remainder of the century that historian Barbara Tuchman calls “the calamitous 14th century” gave Paris, and France, the Hundred Years’ War and the Black Death.
And Chapter 17 (“Invalides”) shows how a trip to the great military hospital of Les Invalides, opened in 1674 during the reign of the “Sun King” Louis XIV, shows the modern visitor how a home for the French nation’s wounded war veterans was at the same time a way for Louis XIV to indulge his perpetual penchant for self-glorification:
Today, after plunging through the cour d’honneur you are immediately plunged into the middle of these men destroyed by war, as the interior has on the whole been remarkably well preserved: the staircase, beams, and corridors remain as they were at the end of the seventeenth century. On the ground floor were the refectories for the wounded soldiers, as well as their dormitories. Today the refectories house the Museum of the Army, but one can still make out in its vast proportions a sense of the original purpose, while admiring the frescoes glorifying Louis XIV’s military victories. (p. 253)
Deutsch is methodically fair in devoting equal time and space to each century of Paris’s history. Consequently, if you are strongly interested in Paris’s 18th-century history of la Révolution française, or the turmoil of Napoleonic times, or the tragedy of the two World Wars, then you may be somewhat frustrated to observe that Chapter 18 (“Bastille”), Chapter 19 (“République”), and Chapter 20 (“Champs-Élysées-Clemenceau”) are no longer than the earlier chapters dealing with Franks and Merovingians and Capetians. But perhaps Deutsch wants to emphasize that, as far as he’s concerned, all the chapters of Paris’s history are equally important for anyone wanting to understand the life of this great city.
The book is well-suited for Paris visitors, with maps, sidebars, and photographs that complement well the main line of the book’s text and take one, step by step, to different landmarks of Paris’s history. Perhaps it is for that reason that, when my wife and I made our most recent visit to Paris, I noticed so many people near Métro stations holding a copy of Metronome. (A DVD adaptation of the book was also prominently on display in many Paris gift shops.) While the subtitle for the English translation is suitable, I rather prefer the book’s original French subtitle -- L'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien. It is indeed a history not just of Paris, but of all of France, set to the rhythm of the Paris Métro.
I found Metronome not in Paris, but rather at Flyleaf Books, a great independent bookstore in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, while preparing for a trip from Raleigh-Durham to Paris. And on this Bastille Day, I consider what fun it would be to take three weeks, travel each day to a different station of the Métropolitain, and explore a different Paris neighborhood with Deutsch’s pleasant and diverting book in hand. Un beau jour, peut-être. One fine day, perhaps…
Deutsch, an actor with extensive credits in French theatre, cinema, and television, adopts in Metronome a novel strategy for narrating the life and history of La Ville Lumière, the City of Light. The book’s subtitle in its English translation is A History of Paris from the Underground Up; and each chapter of this 21-chapter book is linked not only with a specific century, but also with a specific Métro station, starting with the Parisii (the Celtic tribal nation that gave the city its name), on what is now the Île de la Cité in the first century A.D., and proceeding all the way forward to the Grande Arche of La Défense here in the 21st century.
For instance, the chapter on the 4th century A.D. takes its title from the Saint-Martin Métro station, and also has the title “Paris, Imperial Residence.” This chapter focuses on how the area along rue Saint-Martin was once the residence of the Roman emperor Julian. The future emperor began living in the city then known as Lutetia from January of 358 A.D., and “Not only was Julian the first lover of Paris, he was its first bard” (p. 47), writing rapturously about the beauty of the Île de la Cité and the pure waters of the Seine River. Deutsch points out that one can’t visit the palace where Julian resided – “Of the actual residence, nothing remains” – but adds that “the location has remained a palace across the centuries. Today it is the location of the city’s Palais de Justice” (p. 50).
Similarly, the seventh-century chapter focuses on the Saint-Germain-des-Prés Métro station and bears the title “From One Abbey Emerges Another.” The focal character here is the Frankish king Dagobert I, who lived from 603-639 A.D. The deeply religious Dagobert believed that Saint Denis had promised to protect him through life in return for the construction of a sumptuous tomb, and therefore built a richly appointed reliquary for Saint Denis in the church that bears his name. When Dagobert was dying, at the age of 35, he asked to be buried at Saint Denis, becoming the first Frankish king to be interred there.
And, in a good example of Deutsch’s fondness for vivid and unusual stories of Paris life, the author of Metronome shows the unusual way in which 13th-century monks chose to honor, in sculptural form, the 7th-century king who had founded the church and made it magnificent, but who was also notorious for his womanizing ways:
The soul of the king, pictured as a naked child with a crown, is carried off to hell in the clutches of demons. Happily, Saint Denis, Saint Martin, and Saint Maurice succeed in delivering his soul, take him to heaven, and gain him admission into paradise. The message is clear: Dagobert deserved to go to hell, and only the intercession of the saints miraculously prevented this. (p. 102).
Deutsch lets the reader know that one can still see this “rather peculiar tomb” in Saint Denis Church today; and it is interesting to wonder what the Frankish king would think of this odd tribute. Perhaps he would simply toss off a glass of Champagne, have a good laugh over it, and send for one of his mistresses.
Paris’s history is full of examples of historical irony, as demonstrated by Chapter 11, “The Millennium Myth,” with its focus on the 11th century and the Arts et Métiers Métro station. Deutsch explains that “Until the Revolution, this stop is where the Saint-Martin-des-Champs priory had stood…on the very spot where Saint Martin had kissed and cured a leper” (p. 153). Historical myth-making to the contrary, the year 1000 A.D. was evidently not a time of end-of-the-world hysteria; rather, it was a time whose deeply religious people wanted “to purge the Church of its abuses and rediscover the way to God” (p. 154). The construction of Saint-Martin-des-Champs was part of that impulse.
But revolutions have a way of changing things; and 700 years later, “During the Revolution, the priory was turned into the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, which visitors can still find at 292 Rue Saint-Martin” (p. 164). The original builders of the priory might not be amused that their sacred and religious building is now the Musée des Arts et Métiers, with its thoroughly secular focus on science and technology; but Deutsch seems thoroughly amused by the manner in which life in Paris always takes on a trajectory of its own, no matter the agenda of the builder of any particular building.
Yet things get much more grim, and anything but amusing, in the chapter on the 14th century and the Hôtel de Ville stop. This, the site of Paris’s City Hall, is associated with the gruesome violence that King Philippe V, or “Philippe the Fair,” perpetrated against the Knights Templars because he envied their wealth and their independence. On Friday, October 13, 1307 – the original Friday the 13th – Philippe’s soldiers surrounded the Templars in their Paris headquarters, the Temple enclosure, and compelled them to surrender.
Tortured into giving false confessions, the Templars recanted at their sentencing before Notre Dame, and their leader, Jacques de Molay, was sentenced to be burned alive. All de Molay asked was that he be turned to face Notre Dame Cathedral before the fires were lit, so that he could die looking upon something holy and sanctified. The execution took place "in what is today Vert-Galam Square, meaning the eastern point of today’s Île" [de la Cité], and the condemned de Molay declared that “misery will visit those who have wrongly condemned us”; and as Deutsch notes, “Some believe the curse was effective” (p. 205). The remainder of the century that historian Barbara Tuchman calls “the calamitous 14th century” gave Paris, and France, the Hundred Years’ War and the Black Death.
And Chapter 17 (“Invalides”) shows how a trip to the great military hospital of Les Invalides, opened in 1674 during the reign of the “Sun King” Louis XIV, shows the modern visitor how a home for the French nation’s wounded war veterans was at the same time a way for Louis XIV to indulge his perpetual penchant for self-glorification:
Today, after plunging through the cour d’honneur you are immediately plunged into the middle of these men destroyed by war, as the interior has on the whole been remarkably well preserved: the staircase, beams, and corridors remain as they were at the end of the seventeenth century. On the ground floor were the refectories for the wounded soldiers, as well as their dormitories. Today the refectories house the Museum of the Army, but one can still make out in its vast proportions a sense of the original purpose, while admiring the frescoes glorifying Louis XIV’s military victories. (p. 253)
Deutsch is methodically fair in devoting equal time and space to each century of Paris’s history. Consequently, if you are strongly interested in Paris’s 18th-century history of la Révolution française, or the turmoil of Napoleonic times, or the tragedy of the two World Wars, then you may be somewhat frustrated to observe that Chapter 18 (“Bastille”), Chapter 19 (“République”), and Chapter 20 (“Champs-Élysées-Clemenceau”) are no longer than the earlier chapters dealing with Franks and Merovingians and Capetians. But perhaps Deutsch wants to emphasize that, as far as he’s concerned, all the chapters of Paris’s history are equally important for anyone wanting to understand the life of this great city.
The book is well-suited for Paris visitors, with maps, sidebars, and photographs that complement well the main line of the book’s text and take one, step by step, to different landmarks of Paris’s history. Perhaps it is for that reason that, when my wife and I made our most recent visit to Paris, I noticed so many people near Métro stations holding a copy of Metronome. (A DVD adaptation of the book was also prominently on display in many Paris gift shops.) While the subtitle for the English translation is suitable, I rather prefer the book’s original French subtitle -- L'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien. It is indeed a history not just of Paris, but of all of France, set to the rhythm of the Paris Métro.
I found Metronome not in Paris, but rather at Flyleaf Books, a great independent bookstore in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, while preparing for a trip from Raleigh-Durham to Paris. And on this Bastille Day, I consider what fun it would be to take three weeks, travel each day to a different station of the Métropolitain, and explore a different Paris neighborhood with Deutsch’s pleasant and diverting book in hand. Un beau jour, peut-être. One fine day, perhaps…
June 22, 2021
I liked the premise, less so the result - especially when I several times looked up anecdotes presented in the book as fact and found them to very often be not all that well substantiated (it is not supported by many historians that Jeanne d'Arc was of royal blood, and it is very much under debate if Ragnar Lodbrok ever was in Paris, or if he even is a real, historical figure - to give just two examples).
And though I do get that the books is meant to be light and accessible, I prefer my non-fiction books without "!" and " ... ". I can deduce myself when something is meant to be eye-catching or thought-provoking.
And though I do get that the books is meant to be light and accessible, I prefer my non-fiction books without "!" and " ... ". I can deduce myself when something is meant to be eye-catching or thought-provoking.
January 10, 2015
The Métro subway system of Paris constantly carries residents, commuters, tourists, travelers, and visitors beneath the streets of the French capital – 4 million people a day, 1.5 billion a year. The Art Nouveau style in which a number of the Métropolitain station entrances were designed reinforces the visitor’s sense that in Paris, everything is a work of art. The Métro is a vast circulatory system for the human life of Paris; and for Lorànt Deutsch, the Métro is at the very heart of the city.
Deutsch, an actor with extensive credits in French theatre, cinema, and television, adopts in Metronome a novel strategy for narrating the life and history of the City of Light. The book’s subtitle in its English translation is A History of Paris from the Underground Up; and each chapter of this 21-chapter book is linked not only with a specific century, but also with a specific Métro station. Thus, the first chapter, “Caesar’s Cradle,” focuses on the Cité station; and as Deutsch tells the story of Paris’s beginnings, of the Parisii people who were the first known inhabitants of what we now call the Île de la Cité, he also guides us to historical and cultural sites around the station that are associated with Paris’s 1st-century history. And so Deutsch proceeds, century by century and station by station – with the 16th century, par exemple, being linked with the Palais-Royal-Musée de Louvre station, as the portion of Paris around the Louvre saw some of its most important growth and development during that century.
Deutsch is methodically fair in devoting equal time and space to each century of Paris’s history. Consequently, if you are strongly interested in Paris’s 18th-century history of la Révolution française, or the turmoil of Napoleonic times, or the tragedy of the two World Wars, then you may be somewhat frustrated to observe that Chapter 18 (Bastille), Chapter 19 (République), and Chapter 20 (Champs-Élysées-Clemenceau) are no longer than the earlier chapters dealing with Franks and Merovingians and Capetians. But perhaps Deutsch wants to emphasize that, as far as he’s concerned, all the chapters of Paris’s history are equally important for anyone wanting to understand the life of this great city.
The book is well-suited for Paris visitors, with maps, sidebars, and photographs that complement well the main line of the book’s text and take one, step by step, to different landmarks of Paris’s history. Perhaps it is for that reason that, when my wife and I made our most recent visit to Paris, I noticed so many people near Métro stations holding a copy of Metronome. (A DVD adaptation of the book was also prominently on display in many Paris gift shops.) While the subtitle for the English translation is suitable, I rather prefer the book’s original French subtitle -- L'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien. It is indeed a history not just of Paris, but of all of France, set to the rhythm of the Paris Métro. What fun it would be to take three weeks, travel each day to a different station of the Métropolitain, and explore a different Paris neighborhood with Deutsch’s pleasant and diverting book in hand. Perhaps someday.
Deutsch, an actor with extensive credits in French theatre, cinema, and television, adopts in Metronome a novel strategy for narrating the life and history of the City of Light. The book’s subtitle in its English translation is A History of Paris from the Underground Up; and each chapter of this 21-chapter book is linked not only with a specific century, but also with a specific Métro station. Thus, the first chapter, “Caesar’s Cradle,” focuses on the Cité station; and as Deutsch tells the story of Paris’s beginnings, of the Parisii people who were the first known inhabitants of what we now call the Île de la Cité, he also guides us to historical and cultural sites around the station that are associated with Paris’s 1st-century history. And so Deutsch proceeds, century by century and station by station – with the 16th century, par exemple, being linked with the Palais-Royal-Musée de Louvre station, as the portion of Paris around the Louvre saw some of its most important growth and development during that century.
Deutsch is methodically fair in devoting equal time and space to each century of Paris’s history. Consequently, if you are strongly interested in Paris’s 18th-century history of la Révolution française, or the turmoil of Napoleonic times, or the tragedy of the two World Wars, then you may be somewhat frustrated to observe that Chapter 18 (Bastille), Chapter 19 (République), and Chapter 20 (Champs-Élysées-Clemenceau) are no longer than the earlier chapters dealing with Franks and Merovingians and Capetians. But perhaps Deutsch wants to emphasize that, as far as he’s concerned, all the chapters of Paris’s history are equally important for anyone wanting to understand the life of this great city.
The book is well-suited for Paris visitors, with maps, sidebars, and photographs that complement well the main line of the book’s text and take one, step by step, to different landmarks of Paris’s history. Perhaps it is for that reason that, when my wife and I made our most recent visit to Paris, I noticed so many people near Métro stations holding a copy of Metronome. (A DVD adaptation of the book was also prominently on display in many Paris gift shops.) While the subtitle for the English translation is suitable, I rather prefer the book’s original French subtitle -- L'histoire de France au rythme du métro parisien. It is indeed a history not just of Paris, but of all of France, set to the rhythm of the Paris Métro. What fun it would be to take three weeks, travel each day to a different station of the Métropolitain, and explore a different Paris neighborhood with Deutsch’s pleasant and diverting book in hand. Perhaps someday.
February 3, 2016
Un libro entretenido, sin otra pretensión que la de ser un recorrido sentimental del autor por París, ligando estaciones de metro, o más bien los nombres de las mismas, con la anécdota histórica que siglo a siglo ha construido París. Es un libro encantador para cualquiera que conozca algo París y que, como el autor, la ame. No se busque, porque tampoco la pretende Deutsch precisión histórica y mucho menos exhaustividad. No es tampoco una guía de París pero si que hará que se disfrute mucho más la próxima visita.
September 23, 2020
Overview of the history of Paris, with 21 metro stations as focal point, each covering one century of Parisian history. The formula is nice, but it does not always work. Above ground every now and then there appears to be hardly anything on the history of the corresponding century. Deutsch adds some nice discoveries, but he is a real master in telling the well known stories and he does it well.
June 3, 2012
Books about Paris are often written in a very academic way. The difference of this book is that it deals with the history of the city in a distinctive way. Laurant Dutsh is telling us the story of Paris throught he history of the subway. The author is a guide like no other that will tell you unique anecdotes about the city and who will take you to untouristic places where you will discover the remains of medieval Paris.
However, I would suggest Le Metronome Illustré better, because it is not always easy to follow Dutsh's description about this or that street without actually going to the street (which you cannot realistically do unless you are very patient because he describes hundreds of cities). The alternative is indeed this illustrated book in which you can find the corresponding pictures to complicated and technical descrpition.
Overall, I really enjoyed the book, even though it is not easy to carry on if you don't have a background in french history, but anyway I learnt a lot about the city where I live.
October 10, 2015
Pleasant enough read (despite a very sloppy Swedish translation), though pales next to what someone like Peter Ackroyd has done for the other burg across the channel; Deutsch is too hung up on buildings and kings to ever write much about life in the city itself, and at times feels almost as dismissive towards the ordinary parisians as the noblemen whose lives he finds much more interesting. That my edition completely lacks illustrations and maps doesn't help. But sure, it gets the job done, acts as a guide both to the city and how history has left its marks in the present, and teases enough anecdotes and stories to make you want to dig deeper.
Personal aside: The next time someone over here mumbles "You know, in France they wouldn't stand for this, they'd take to the streets and build barricades" I'll just shrug and reply that I'm fairly happy about living somewhere where it's not a given that every conflict is resolved through violence.
Personal aside: The next time someone over here mumbles "You know, in France they wouldn't stand for this, they'd take to the streets and build barricades" I'll just shrug and reply that I'm fairly happy about living somewhere where it's not a given that every conflict is resolved through violence.
August 14, 2024
I'm sorry, but Métronome is a bit of a maladroit malarkey mélange. The history specifically is just a bunch of baseless baloney and balderdash. On top of that, I found the whole thing about the metro stations to be pretty extraneous and gimmicky. They did not play as much of a role as I was led to believe, and they could actually disrupt the flow. It takes me a couple of pages to get invested and to be able to keep reading in French, but then he starts talking about the topography of metro stations and the surrounding area, or something as banal as a parking garage, and I lose focus, but that may just be me. Maybe if you were to visit the places he describes it could be interesting, but (at least in the early chapters) they are often only tangentially related to the history. The metro stations just feel very forced is all.
I think that if Deutsch just cut the crap and stuck to the historical anecdotes, however apocryphal they may be, and maybe some descriptions of historically interesting places that are not as much of a stretch, he would potentially have had a really good children's history of Paris at hand, in which case the spurious historical grounding could be excused. Métronome definitely reads more like legend than history. The entertainment value of the historical anecdotes and their good storytelling is the book's one saving grace, which is why I give it two stars rather than just one, and it is a very light read, frustrations apart. It must also be said that the descriptions of places in Paris get more interesting as the book progresses, and do not generally have much to do with metro stations (or parking garages). I particularly enjoyed the chapters on the Hundred Years' War – although you will have to suspend your aversion to the overt French nationalist propagandistic tinge throughout the book (whenever the Parisians support the Armagnacs, it is because the Burgundians are very bad, and when they support the Burgundians, it is because they are deceived) and to the conspiracy theory Deutsch promulgates of Joan of Arc actually being Charles' half sister and cousin – and the descriptions of the Hôtel de Bourgogne were not too bad either.
But what really grinds my gears is not the spurious historical basis per se, but the fact that the book is ridden with random historical claims and factoids, that are impressionistic and extremely tenuous at best, or just plain falsehoods at worst, which do not even add to the story. There is absolutely no reason for them. Deutsch seems to make (possibly subconscious?) inferences and use them as a sort of literary seasoning to spice up the text, stating them as absolute fact, without bothering to check their validity. He even has the gall to completely make stuff up (at least so it seems), and then put it between quotation marks as if he is citing some historical source – without ever listing a source of course. Deutsch is just saying stuff. You cannot take anything he says at face value. I have compiled a handful of examples that really stood out to me and eroded his credibility for me most into a little list:
I was suspicious when Deutsch told the story of Constantine's victory at the Milvian Bridge (p. 67). He just succinctly paraphrases the dream, not disambiguating the "cross" Constantine is supposed to have dreamt up from an ordinary crucifix, whereas it is supposed to have been a Chi-Rho christogram or something of the kind (described by Eusebius as "a cross of light imposed over the sun", which Deutsch turns into a mere cross in the sky). It is disappointing to see him not give one of Christianity's most prominent symbols a place in its own origin story. I am not sure whether Deutsch deliberately simplified the story, or whether he understood the cross to be a plain crucifix. Moreover, Deutsch tells us that the dream cross was seen above the melee during the battle, which I find very peculiar to say the least – seems to be one of his inventions.
"The works were ginormous and took 107 years, hence the expression 'to wait for 107 years' (and hence the number of this page... funny coincidence, no?)." (p. 114) This one is by the by.
"The terrorised populations" did not "call their assailants Normans" at first, but then "quickly learnt to give them the name they give themselves: Vikings." (p. 168) Viking comes from an Old Norse word simply meaning something like "pirate raider", and it was not used very much at that. In Old English, at least, Norse raiders could be called anything from æsċmenn or sċeġmenn ("light-shipmen") to flotmenn ("floaty men") to sǣþēofas ("seathieves") in their capacity as raiders, not even Norse per se, besides wīcingas – which situation I believe to be similar in Old Norse – and as a people group were usually referred to as Northmen, heathens, or Danes. Viking, though based on an Old Norse word, is rather a Victorian exonym, not a contemporary endonym; the Vikings did not generally call themselves that, nor did we quickly take up that name. It seems to me his (subconscious?) thought process went something like: "Viking looks like a Norse word to me, therefore it must be what the Vikings called themselves over Northmen, and the people must have picked up on this and borrowed the word for us to have it," so he just added this detail to make the text a little more interesting, without bothering to check whether his assessment is actually correct.
More generally you should not take Deutsch' word on any of the etymologies. A couple are correct, many are not, some I cannot even find any source for and I can only assume are folk etymologies he heard somewhere. The fact that he does not bother to check is a huge red flag, as it reflects poorly on his integrity and his understanding of scholarship. To me Deutsch gives the impression of one of those "historians just read stuff, then retell the stories and come up with plausible scenarios, you can never know for sure, you weren't there, history is written by the victors, lessons of history" types that does not realise there is actual scholarship and then just stuff people say.
There are a lot tenuous statements like: "But really Italy is the inheritor of Lotharingia" (as opposed to the Low Countries and Switzerland), which you cannot prove or disprove objectively, really, but which an honest historian would not be quick to make.
Deutsch quotes Hugh Capet's "pompous title" after his coronation as "king of Francs, Bretons, Danes, Aquitainians, Goths, Spaniards, and Vascons", and then goes on to pick it apart (p. 198). Despite of Deutsch' picking it apart, this title seemed very odd to me, so I looked around online and from what I gather the only royal title Capet ever styled himself is, in full: "By the Grace of God, King of the Franks". I do not know where Deutsch gets his "pompous title" from.
On the Réveillon riot, Deutsch states as a fact that a dozen policemen were killed, and "almost a hundredfold from among the ranks of the insurgents" (p. 347). This is likely exaggerated, and the death toll was most likely closer to 25 (reports vary a lot, as there was a lot of "fake news", to coin a phrase). Not to mention the fact that some rioters may have been killed by the fact that some of the "good bottles" they looted actually contained chemicals for the wallpaper factory. (I have noticed that different languages' wikipedia articles have vastly different takes on the Réveillon riot, so maybe I should cut Deutsch some slack here.)
For me, the real icing on the cake of my reading experience was when I brought up these points to my mother and grandmother, who had both read the book before, and I would be met with exactly those sophistic attitudes of: "Well how do you know? You weren't there. How do you know your source isn't wrong?" As if some random actor who writes a book on history is a credible source and proper scholarship is no better. The worst of it was when my mother said: "Experts contradict each other all the time! One guy on YouTube/Instagram says one thing, and another says something contradictory!" As if anyone who talks a lot about a certain topic online and claims to be an expert is automatically so. (It is really quite shocking the stuff she watches and believes.) I cannot begin to describe how much this precipitated my frustrations with this book – which led me to take a break from it for a bit – but I digress.
To make a long story short, I do not recommend this book for its spurious history shot through with random inaccuracies and sloppy execution in trying to connect the desperate historical anecdotes through metro stations and architecture.
I think that if Deutsch just cut the crap and stuck to the historical anecdotes, however apocryphal they may be, and maybe some descriptions of historically interesting places that are not as much of a stretch, he would potentially have had a really good children's history of Paris at hand, in which case the spurious historical grounding could be excused. Métronome definitely reads more like legend than history. The entertainment value of the historical anecdotes and their good storytelling is the book's one saving grace, which is why I give it two stars rather than just one, and it is a very light read, frustrations apart. It must also be said that the descriptions of places in Paris get more interesting as the book progresses, and do not generally have much to do with metro stations (or parking garages). I particularly enjoyed the chapters on the Hundred Years' War – although you will have to suspend your aversion to the overt French nationalist propagandistic tinge throughout the book (whenever the Parisians support the Armagnacs, it is because the Burgundians are very bad, and when they support the Burgundians, it is because they are deceived) and to the conspiracy theory Deutsch promulgates of Joan of Arc actually being Charles' half sister and cousin – and the descriptions of the Hôtel de Bourgogne were not too bad either.
But what really grinds my gears is not the spurious historical basis per se, but the fact that the book is ridden with random historical claims and factoids, that are impressionistic and extremely tenuous at best, or just plain falsehoods at worst, which do not even add to the story. There is absolutely no reason for them. Deutsch seems to make (possibly subconscious?) inferences and use them as a sort of literary seasoning to spice up the text, stating them as absolute fact, without bothering to check their validity. He even has the gall to completely make stuff up (at least so it seems), and then put it between quotation marks as if he is citing some historical source – without ever listing a source of course. Deutsch is just saying stuff. You cannot take anything he says at face value. I have compiled a handful of examples that really stood out to me and eroded his credibility for me most into a little list:
I was suspicious when Deutsch told the story of Constantine's victory at the Milvian Bridge (p. 67). He just succinctly paraphrases the dream, not disambiguating the "cross" Constantine is supposed to have dreamt up from an ordinary crucifix, whereas it is supposed to have been a Chi-Rho christogram or something of the kind (described by Eusebius as "a cross of light imposed over the sun", which Deutsch turns into a mere cross in the sky). It is disappointing to see him not give one of Christianity's most prominent symbols a place in its own origin story. I am not sure whether Deutsch deliberately simplified the story, or whether he understood the cross to be a plain crucifix. Moreover, Deutsch tells us that the dream cross was seen above the melee during the battle, which I find very peculiar to say the least – seems to be one of his inventions.
"The works were ginormous and took 107 years, hence the expression 'to wait for 107 years' (and hence the number of this page... funny coincidence, no?)." (p. 114) This one is by the by.
"The terrorised populations" did not "call their assailants Normans" at first, but then "quickly learnt to give them the name they give themselves: Vikings." (p. 168) Viking comes from an Old Norse word simply meaning something like "pirate raider", and it was not used very much at that. In Old English, at least, Norse raiders could be called anything from æsċmenn or sċeġmenn ("light-shipmen") to flotmenn ("floaty men") to sǣþēofas ("seathieves") in their capacity as raiders, not even Norse per se, besides wīcingas – which situation I believe to be similar in Old Norse – and as a people group were usually referred to as Northmen, heathens, or Danes. Viking, though based on an Old Norse word, is rather a Victorian exonym, not a contemporary endonym; the Vikings did not generally call themselves that, nor did we quickly take up that name. It seems to me his (subconscious?) thought process went something like: "Viking looks like a Norse word to me, therefore it must be what the Vikings called themselves over Northmen, and the people must have picked up on this and borrowed the word for us to have it," so he just added this detail to make the text a little more interesting, without bothering to check whether his assessment is actually correct.
More generally you should not take Deutsch' word on any of the etymologies. A couple are correct, many are not, some I cannot even find any source for and I can only assume are folk etymologies he heard somewhere. The fact that he does not bother to check is a huge red flag, as it reflects poorly on his integrity and his understanding of scholarship. To me Deutsch gives the impression of one of those "historians just read stuff, then retell the stories and come up with plausible scenarios, you can never know for sure, you weren't there, history is written by the victors, lessons of history" types that does not realise there is actual scholarship and then just stuff people say.
There are a lot tenuous statements like: "But really Italy is the inheritor of Lotharingia" (as opposed to the Low Countries and Switzerland), which you cannot prove or disprove objectively, really, but which an honest historian would not be quick to make.
Deutsch quotes Hugh Capet's "pompous title" after his coronation as "king of Francs, Bretons, Danes, Aquitainians, Goths, Spaniards, and Vascons", and then goes on to pick it apart (p. 198). Despite of Deutsch' picking it apart, this title seemed very odd to me, so I looked around online and from what I gather the only royal title Capet ever styled himself is, in full: "By the Grace of God, King of the Franks". I do not know where Deutsch gets his "pompous title" from.
On the Réveillon riot, Deutsch states as a fact that a dozen policemen were killed, and "almost a hundredfold from among the ranks of the insurgents" (p. 347). This is likely exaggerated, and the death toll was most likely closer to 25 (reports vary a lot, as there was a lot of "fake news", to coin a phrase). Not to mention the fact that some rioters may have been killed by the fact that some of the "good bottles" they looted actually contained chemicals for the wallpaper factory. (I have noticed that different languages' wikipedia articles have vastly different takes on the Réveillon riot, so maybe I should cut Deutsch some slack here.)
For me, the real icing on the cake of my reading experience was when I brought up these points to my mother and grandmother, who had both read the book before, and I would be met with exactly those sophistic attitudes of: "Well how do you know? You weren't there. How do you know your source isn't wrong?" As if some random actor who writes a book on history is a credible source and proper scholarship is no better. The worst of it was when my mother said: "Experts contradict each other all the time! One guy on YouTube/Instagram says one thing, and another says something contradictory!" As if anyone who talks a lot about a certain topic online and claims to be an expert is automatically so. (It is really quite shocking the stuff she watches and believes.) I cannot begin to describe how much this precipitated my frustrations with this book – which led me to take a break from it for a bit – but I digress.
To make a long story short, I do not recommend this book for its spurious history shot through with random inaccuracies and sloppy execution in trying to connect the desperate historical anecdotes through metro stations and architecture.
January 28, 2020
Une histoire de Paris classée par thématique chronologique, chaque époque correspondant à une station de métro.
Ayant vécu en banlieue et visité Paris de nombreuses fois, j'ai retrouvé les quartiers, les musées, les cathédrales de ma jeunesse. Je pensais connaître à peu près tout sur Paris mais ce n'est pas le cas. Il y a toujours un détail ou une anecdote qui nous a échappé, peu importe le guide que vous avez utilisé. Ce qui est vraiment bien dans ce livre c'est qu'il donne l'adresse exacte de tel vestige, de tel lieu, de tel rempart qui vous aurait échappé en temps normal. Du coup, je m'en veux de ne pas avoir lu le livre à l'époque. Ca doit être génial pour un habitant d'Ile de France de livre chaque chapitre en partant de la station de métro correspondante. Ce serait l'idéal pour profiter de ce livre et de voir les marques de l'histoire et du temps in situ.
(certaines périodes historiques manquent et certains passages un peu subjectifs...c'est dommage)
Ayant vécu en banlieue et visité Paris de nombreuses fois, j'ai retrouvé les quartiers, les musées, les cathédrales de ma jeunesse. Je pensais connaître à peu près tout sur Paris mais ce n'est pas le cas. Il y a toujours un détail ou une anecdote qui nous a échappé, peu importe le guide que vous avez utilisé. Ce qui est vraiment bien dans ce livre c'est qu'il donne l'adresse exacte de tel vestige, de tel lieu, de tel rempart qui vous aurait échappé en temps normal. Du coup, je m'en veux de ne pas avoir lu le livre à l'époque. Ca doit être génial pour un habitant d'Ile de France de livre chaque chapitre en partant de la station de métro correspondante. Ce serait l'idéal pour profiter de ce livre et de voir les marques de l'histoire et du temps in situ.
(certaines périodes historiques manquent et certains passages un peu subjectifs...c'est dommage)
June 16, 2025
Prochaine sortie sur Paris je vous préviens je ferme pas ma bouche
#d'abordlemetropuislespontsetmaintenantça
#shesobsessed
#quequelqu'unl'arrête
#d'abordlemetropuislespontsetmaintenantça
#shesobsessed
#quequelqu'unl'arrête
January 29, 2019
3.5 stars
I loved the premise of this book — unpacking the history of Paris through its Metro stations. Incredibly clever. However, the execution wasn't without flaws.
The positive: 1. I have to commend the translator, Timothy Bent. This is an excellent English translation. There are no weird word choices or uncomfortable verb tenses.
2. The text is well written and extremely accessible. Lorànt Deutsch composes a fairly strong history without alienating his readers by being overly-wordy or pretentious in his vocabulary.
3. Deutsch has command of two millennia of Parisian history. The sheer scope of the knowledge, and his ability to keep the monarchical lines straight is impressive. While my main interests are in 17th century France and beyond, I learned a ton about Roman, medieval, and Renaissance history. This book would best be read while in Paris, as the author gives you exact streets and directions to find the objects and places he speaks of.
The negative: Two millennia of history does not fit well into a 300 page book. Many moments are mentioned (like the Paris Commune) but not elaborated on. The book became more choppy as we entered the 18th century. Since history was so much better recorded than in the time periods of earlier chapters, the short scope of the book could not keep up with the historical records. And instead of focusing on one or two moments in each century, Deutsch tries to mention as many as he can. While this gave me a lot of new things to research (Napoleon's elephant statue, the "apaches", Viking attempts to take Paris, etc.), it didn't go into detail about anything.
I was unsurprised to research the author and discover that he is a conservative Catholic and a monarchist. Or a "leftist monarchist," which is total bs. Apparently he arbitrarily supports Orléanist claims to the throne, which were illegitimate from the start, but I digress...
The book has a heavy Catho-monarchical bent. While for most of Parisian history the Church and the crown did rule the life of the people, it doesn't mean that that was just. Deutsch downplays the Revolution(s) and disparages the Commune. It may be shortsighted of me, but I couldn't take seriously a French author who isn't Republican in this day and age.
Regardless, this book made me long to return to Paris.
I loved the premise of this book — unpacking the history of Paris through its Metro stations. Incredibly clever. However, the execution wasn't without flaws.
The positive: 1. I have to commend the translator, Timothy Bent. This is an excellent English translation. There are no weird word choices or uncomfortable verb tenses.
2. The text is well written and extremely accessible. Lorànt Deutsch composes a fairly strong history without alienating his readers by being overly-wordy or pretentious in his vocabulary.
3. Deutsch has command of two millennia of Parisian history. The sheer scope of the knowledge, and his ability to keep the monarchical lines straight is impressive. While my main interests are in 17th century France and beyond, I learned a ton about Roman, medieval, and Renaissance history. This book would best be read while in Paris, as the author gives you exact streets and directions to find the objects and places he speaks of.
The negative: Two millennia of history does not fit well into a 300 page book. Many moments are mentioned (like the Paris Commune) but not elaborated on. The book became more choppy as we entered the 18th century. Since history was so much better recorded than in the time periods of earlier chapters, the short scope of the book could not keep up with the historical records. And instead of focusing on one or two moments in each century, Deutsch tries to mention as many as he can. While this gave me a lot of new things to research (Napoleon's elephant statue, the "apaches", Viking attempts to take Paris, etc.), it didn't go into detail about anything.
I was unsurprised to research the author and discover that he is a conservative Catholic and a monarchist. Or a "leftist monarchist," which is total bs. Apparently he arbitrarily supports Orléanist claims to the throne, which were illegitimate from the start, but I digress...
The book has a heavy Catho-monarchical bent. While for most of Parisian history the Church and the crown did rule the life of the people, it doesn't mean that that was just. Deutsch downplays the Revolution(s) and disparages the Commune. It may be shortsighted of me, but I couldn't take seriously a French author who isn't Republican in this day and age.
Regardless, this book made me long to return to Paris.
December 28, 2015
Le développement chronologique de l'histoire de Paris à travers les stations de métro est vraiment bien fait. Le petit bémol du livre est, selon moi, qu'il doit être bien plus drôle et agréable à lire si on est parisien. Les 5 premières pages de chaque chapitre sont consacrées à parcourir les vestiges de l'histoire autour d'une station de métro. C'est difficile à suivre et à imaginer quand on n'est jamais passé soit-même devant ces endroits et les anecdotes consistant à découvrir un bout de muraille dans un parking souterrain sont moins croustillante si on n'est jamais passé devant le-dit parking. Le reste des chapitre est, sinon, plus accessible à ceux qui ne connaissent pas bien Paris puisqu'il traite généralement de grands passages de l'histoire de france accompagné de faits anecdotiques.
April 10, 2016
It's hard to be disappointed by books about Paris because I feel I always learn at least one or two cool facts that make reading those books worthwhile. But being the train and metro junkie that I am, perhaps my expectations of Lorant Deutsch's Metronome were a bridge too far for our author to deliver.
What I expected: A selection of various metro stations around Paris, with an explanation of the history behind those stops and perhaps a commentary on the neighborhoods around the station. Beyond that perhaps we would learn about the history of the RATP and how the Paris Metro got built and how its maintained.
What I got: An amateurish history of Paris, which uses various metro stops as jumping off points for forays into that history. Worse, it's punctuated by lower-quality photos than tourists take every day on their smartphones.
Skip.
What I expected: A selection of various metro stations around Paris, with an explanation of the history behind those stops and perhaps a commentary on the neighborhoods around the station. Beyond that perhaps we would learn about the history of the RATP and how the Paris Metro got built and how its maintained.
What I got: An amateurish history of Paris, which uses various metro stops as jumping off points for forays into that history. Worse, it's punctuated by lower-quality photos than tourists take every day on their smartphones.
Skip.
June 24, 2016
Lorant Deutsch har skrivit en otroligt rolig guidebok till Paris historia. Det är en bok där vart och ett kapitel är tillägnat ett århundrade i Paris historia med början vid det första århundradet och slutar i det tjugonde.
Deutsch leder oss genom historien genom att åka tunnelbana genom Paris och guidar oss till rester som vittnar om händelser i historien. Och det är i en anmärkningsvärt omfattning han lyckas hitta platser och rester av byggnadsverk även i de avlägsna århundradena.
De här är ingen stor litterär upplevelse men det är en inspirerande reseguide till Paris. Och jag kan verkligen tänka mig att bara i sällskap med den här boken åka till Paris och gå i Deutsch fotspår.
Deutsch leder oss genom historien genom att åka tunnelbana genom Paris och guidar oss till rester som vittnar om händelser i historien. Och det är i en anmärkningsvärt omfattning han lyckas hitta platser och rester av byggnadsverk även i de avlägsna århundradena.
De här är ingen stor litterär upplevelse men det är en inspirerande reseguide till Paris. Och jag kan verkligen tänka mig att bara i sällskap med den här boken åka till Paris och gå i Deutsch fotspår.
April 10, 2015
Not bad.
I advise not to read it in one shot : it can be pretty boring, especially when 70% of the book is dedicated to the antiquity n middle age(so to say, not the best part of Paris).
I think it can also be pretty better to read it at the exact place where it is described.
Otherwise, it's a very good document, the writing is easy, we don't get lost.
To Paris lovers ;)
I advise not to read it in one shot : it can be pretty boring, especially when 70% of the book is dedicated to the antiquity n middle age(so to say, not the best part of Paris).
I think it can also be pretty better to read it at the exact place where it is described.
Otherwise, it's a very good document, the writing is easy, we don't get lost.
To Paris lovers ;)
December 30, 2022
Het is al weer een tijdje geleden dat ik een boek na ongeveer 80% heb opgegeven. Hoewel zeker geen slecht boek is het niet voor mij. De eerste circa tien eeuwen (opgedeeld in 20 hoofdstukken met eeuwen en corresponderende Parijse stations) waren goed te doen en op momenten ook zeker vermakelijk, interessant en met vlagen meeslepend.
Vooral uit ergernis echter heb ik geen behoefte verder te lezen. De auteur is erg sensatiebelust en zijn veel toegepaste "..." en "!" wennen zelfs na 300 pagina's niet. Naar mijn smaak te belerend (een goed historische verhaal spreekt voor zichzelf) en ontoepasselijk.
Daarnaast bevat het boek veel ergerlijke kleine fouten, al dan niet door vertaling, zoals foutieve jaartallen en namen (Galileo in plaats van Galen?). Vervelender zijn de grote historische misvattingen, zoals een soort Gallisch nationalisme in de late oudheid en dubieuze en al dan niet speculatieve historische theorieën.
Ik begrijp de allure van opgepoetste inlevingsverhalen maar dit was geen boek voor mij.
Vooral uit ergernis echter heb ik geen behoefte verder te lezen. De auteur is erg sensatiebelust en zijn veel toegepaste "..." en "!" wennen zelfs na 300 pagina's niet. Naar mijn smaak te belerend (een goed historische verhaal spreekt voor zichzelf) en ontoepasselijk.
Daarnaast bevat het boek veel ergerlijke kleine fouten, al dan niet door vertaling, zoals foutieve jaartallen en namen (Galileo in plaats van Galen?). Vervelender zijn de grote historische misvattingen, zoals een soort Gallisch nationalisme in de late oudheid en dubieuze en al dan niet speculatieve historische theorieën.
Ik begrijp de allure van opgepoetste inlevingsverhalen maar dit was geen boek voor mij.
October 17, 2021
On retrouve des écrits racontant l'histoire de Paris en suivant une histoire cinglée par siècles ou époques et pas vraiment par stations de métros comme ça nous l'était promis dans le synopsis. Ça ne m'a pas vraiment dérangé, j'ai apprécié les différentes anecdotes présentes dans le livre et ce n'est pas bien compliqué de faire la part des choses. On retrouve tout de même l'ambiance parisienne avec ces figures historiques et monuments irremplaçables. Par contre, Deutsch parle beaucoup (trop) de religion et ce n'est pas ce que je venais chercher. Alors bien sûr, la France étant été un pays catholique très pratiquant pendant des siècles, tout cela est lié mais ça faisait beaucoup pour un seul livre.
Lorànt Deutsch a une plume incroyable, il faut le dire. J'avais l'impression de le retrouver, de l'entendre parler avec ces tonalités abracadabrantes dans ce bouquin !
En soit, je n'ai pas été encensée par ce livre mais j'ai bien aimé l'écriture de l'auteur et l'ambiance ressentie en lisant.
Lorànt Deutsch a une plume incroyable, il faut le dire. J'avais l'impression de le retrouver, de l'entendre parler avec ces tonalités abracadabrantes dans ce bouquin !
En soit, je n'ai pas été encensée par ce livre mais j'ai bien aimé l'écriture de l'auteur et l'ambiance ressentie en lisant.
June 30, 2023
Hoogst vermakelijk!
February 22, 2017
Proposta muito interessante, mas com tantas idas e vindas fica confuso e cansativo para quem (como eu) não conhece muito da história da França.
June 10, 2015
Schitterende opzet en bijzonder vlot geschreven. Ik begon het dan ook te lezen in de Thalys op weg naar Parijs. Het is heerlijk om de geheimen van twintig eeuwen Parijs te leren kennen met dit boek. Maar er zijn twee grote gemiste kansen: Lorànt Deutsch gebruikt bijzonder weinig egodocumenten om de sfeer te scheppen, oké het is mijn dada maar hij had er veel meer met kunnen doen. Daarnaast is zijn reis langs de twintig eeuwen en evenveel metrohaltes te voorspelbaar. In hoofdstuk 19 kiest voor de revolutie van 1848 en niet voor de complexere Parijse Commune, in hoofdstuk 14 vertelt hij over de paus van Avignon, maar niet over de pest in de Franse hoofdstad... Soms wat te eenzijdig en vooral de aanpak is origineel, de inhoud niet altijd.
Maar wel echt genoten van dit boek, vooral omdat elke eeuw evenwaardig wordt beschreven. Elke eeuw een halte, elke eeuw een hoofdstuk. Aanrader, maar best in Parijs zelf lezen!
Maar wel echt genoten van dit boek, vooral omdat elke eeuw evenwaardig wordt beschreven. Elke eeuw een halte, elke eeuw een hoofdstuk. Aanrader, maar best in Parijs zelf lezen!
August 30, 2011
L'écriture est parfois un peu agaçante, mais pas dénuée d'un certain romantisme finalement assez rafraîchissant.
L'auteur nous transmet sa passion de l'histoire des pierres, de la ville, de la capitale et de la France... Intéressant de se perdre dans les ruelles de l'Histoire, de pouvoir retrouver des trésors architecturaux, des pavés mérovingiens, des clins d'oeil de bâtisseurs qui ont traversé les troubles successifs. On se régale franchement.
Par delà l'histoire de la capitale, c'est un survol accéléré mais toujours intéressant de l'histoire de France et de sa construction.
Complété par le livre présentant les photos et illustrations des différents chapitre, c'est un véritable guide historico-touristique !
L'auteur nous transmet sa passion de l'histoire des pierres, de la ville, de la capitale et de la France... Intéressant de se perdre dans les ruelles de l'Histoire, de pouvoir retrouver des trésors architecturaux, des pavés mérovingiens, des clins d'oeil de bâtisseurs qui ont traversé les troubles successifs. On se régale franchement.
Par delà l'histoire de la capitale, c'est un survol accéléré mais toujours intéressant de l'histoire de France et de sa construction.
Complété par le livre présentant les photos et illustrations des différents chapitre, c'est un véritable guide historico-touristique !
March 23, 2018
Paris et la France: vie héroïque
Chaque chapitre dédié à un arrêt de métro différent, chaque arrêt dévoilant un siècle d’histoire… Ainsi construit, le livre permet un survol des 2000 ans de vie de Paris et, par ce biais, de l'histoire de France. L’auteur, transformé en guide touristique, promène le lecteur par les rues et à travers les décennies de la ville. Le récit historique s’en sort pimentée par la mythologie, les hagiographies, les traditions et légendes populaires, et aussi par certains ragots salaces ou contes sanglantes. Un tome intéressant pour organiser une nouvelle visite ou se souvenir d’anciennes promenades dans la Ville Lumière, mais qui reste historiquement trop léger surtout dans la chronique des derniers deux siècles.
Chaque chapitre dédié à un arrêt de métro différent, chaque arrêt dévoilant un siècle d’histoire… Ainsi construit, le livre permet un survol des 2000 ans de vie de Paris et, par ce biais, de l'histoire de France. L’auteur, transformé en guide touristique, promène le lecteur par les rues et à travers les décennies de la ville. Le récit historique s’en sort pimentée par la mythologie, les hagiographies, les traditions et légendes populaires, et aussi par certains ragots salaces ou contes sanglantes. Un tome intéressant pour organiser une nouvelle visite ou se souvenir d’anciennes promenades dans la Ville Lumière, mais qui reste historiquement trop léger surtout dans la chronique des derniers deux siècles.
May 22, 2015
Deutsch takes us on a walking tour of French history using metro stations as his organizing structure. The book is part history lesson, part tour guide and part obsessive search for the hidden remnants of lost structures. Did you know that one cell from the Bastille still exists? It's in the cellar of a cafe.
June 9, 2015
3,5/5
Un livre assez original. J'ai aimé voyager dans Paris à travers ses stations de métro. A chaque station l'auteur nous révèle une partie de l'histoire de Paris/la France ou une anecdote.
J'ai eu du mal à rentrer dedans. J'ai trouvé que parfois c'était beaucoup trop détaillé ou au contraire trop superficiel.
Néanmoins le livre m'a quand même donné envie de (re)visiter la ville.
Un livre assez original. J'ai aimé voyager dans Paris à travers ses stations de métro. A chaque station l'auteur nous révèle une partie de l'histoire de Paris/la France ou une anecdote.
J'ai eu du mal à rentrer dedans. J'ai trouvé que parfois c'était beaucoup trop détaillé ou au contraire trop superficiel.
Néanmoins le livre m'a quand même donné envie de (re)visiter la ville.
December 17, 2011
Un voyage original dans le l'Histoire de France au gré des stations de Métro parisiennes.
Pour un fan d'histoire et de trains, ce livre est forcement captivant même si parfois le style est approximatif et donne envie de sauter les paragraphes.
Pour un fan d'histoire et de trains, ce livre est forcement captivant même si parfois le style est approximatif et donne envie de sauter les paragraphes.
August 7, 2015
I liked this hybrid of travelguide, historybook and personal musings, but found myself constantly checking things on maps, in reference books and on the internet. I recently found out that an illustrated edition of this book exists. I wish I had bought that edition instead....
February 15, 2021
Um bom livro para um overview da evolução de paris. Ele tenta trazer 2000 anos de história em capítulos bem digeríveis. Não consegue tão bem. Mas é uma boa introdução e abre questionamentos que outros livros poderiam resolver.
June 28, 2010
Given to me by a friend this last week...really interesting. A history of Paris and France through 21 centuries.
July 3, 2016
An awesome overview of Paris history by metro stop. Anecdotal and easy to read.
March 29, 2018
Livre sans prétention, sympathique à lire, rempli d’anecdotes sur les stations du métro parisien.
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