Montmartre: Paris's Village of Art and Sin

Great Parisian Neighborhoods #2

by John Baxter

In the second portrait of his series Great Parisian Neighborhoods, award-winning raconteur John Baxter leads us on a whirlwind tour of Montmartre, the hill-top village that fired the greatest achievements of modern art while also provoking bloody revolution and the sexual misbehavior that made Paris synonymous with sin

High on the northern edge of Paris, Montmartre has always attracted bohemians, political radicals, the searchers for artistic inspiration as well as those hungry for pleasure. In its winding, windmill-shadowed streets, which, only fifty years before, saw the anarchist rising of the Commune, Renoir, Picasso and van Gogh seized a similar freedom to remake painting, while, in the tenderloin of Pigalle, Toulouse-Lautrec drew the cancan dancers of the Moulin Rouge, celebrating a hedonism that titillated the world,

In Montmartre, bestselling author and IACP Award winner John Baxter lifts the curtain on a district that visitors to Paris seldom see.  From the tumbledown workshops of the Bateau Lavoir in which Picasso and Braque created Cubism to Clichy's Cabaret of Nothingness where guests dined at coffins under lamps of human bones, the whole of this mysterious enclave is ours to explore.

For visitors and armchair travelers alike, Montmartre captures the excitement and scandal of a fascinating quarter that condenses the elusive perfumes, colors and songs of Paris.


 

Genres: Travel, France, History, Nonfiction, Paris

256 pages, Paperback

Published April 18, 2017

About the author

John Baxter (born 1939 in Randwick, New South Wales) is an Australian-born writer, journalist, and film-maker.

Baxter has lived in Britain and the United States as well as in his native Sydney, but has made his home in Paris since 1989, where he is married to the film-maker Marie-Dominique Montel. They have one daughter, Louise.

He began writing science fiction in the early 1960s for New Worlds, Science Fantasy and other British magazines. His first novel, though serialised in New Worlds as THE GOD KILLERS, was published as a book in the US by Ace as The Off-Worlders. He was Visiting Professor at Hollins College in Virginia in 1975-1976. He has written a number of short stories and novels in that genre and a book about SF in the movies, as well as editing collections of Australian science fiction.

Baxter has also written a large number of other works dealing with the movies, including biographies of film personalities, including Federico Fellini, Luis Buñuel, Steven Spielberg, Stanley Kubrick, Woody Allen, George Lucas and Robert De Niro. He has written a number of documentaries, including a survey of the life and work of the painter Fernando Botero. He also co-produced, wrote and presented three television series for the Australian Broadcasting Commission, Filmstruck, First Take and The Cutting Room, and was co-editor of the ABC book programme Books And Writing.

In the 1960s, he was a member of the WEA Film Study Group with such notable people as Ian Klava, Frank Moorhouse, Michael Thornhill, John Flaus and Ken Quinnell. From July 1965 to December 1967 the WEA Film Study Group published the cinema journal FILM DIGEST. This journal was edited by John Baxter.

For a number of years in the sixties, he was active in the Sydney Film Festival, and during the 1980s served in a consulting capacity on a number of film-funding bodies, as well as writing film criticism for The Australian and other periodicals. Some of his books have been translated into various languages, including Japanese and Chinese.

Since moving to Paris, he has written four books of autobiography, A Pound of Paper: Confessions of a Book Addict, We'll Always Have Paris: Sex and Love in the City of Light, Immoveable feast : a Paris Christmas, and The Most Beautiful Walk in the World : a Pedestrian in Paris.

Since 2007 he has been co-director of the annual Paris Writers Workshop.

Reviews

[Loren · Rating 4 out of 5]

John Baxter leads tours of Paris. This book is his second in the Great Parisian Neighborhoods series. Having read it, I would love to read more of his Neighborhood books -- and take one of his tours. He's a great storyteller, explaining the history in a way that builds and interlocks all the stories and characters. While this is a perfect armchair travel read, it makes me want to go back to Paris and wander.

My only complaint -- and this is probably just me -- is that it doesn't spend enough time in graveyards.

[Paul Myers · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Baxter has added another book in his Parisian odyssey and it is a good one about an engaging subject. Baxter is a master of the Paris vignette that weaves culture and history together. I took notes for my upcoming trip to Paris which is one of the delights of Baxter's books. They are perfect guidebooks for charting your own walks through Paris and seeing the history that is on every block.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

I learned a lot from this book, but it was hard to wade through at times. I should mention that I had a galley copy, so it was not a completed book - mine was lacking the map (very important!) and index (which would have been very useful in writing a review). There was only one mistake in the text that I found.

I visited Montmartre when I was a naive 20 year old. I wish I had understood the significance of the place before I visited. So many famous people lived and worked there. This book makes me want to go back to visit to better understand.

This book is arranged in a different kind of way. It has one main chapter and then a type of sub-chapter that explains something in more detail or aspect. I liked it. It kept me interested. The sub-chapters are shorter and more personable, for the most part.

I enjoyed reading about the likes of Taulouse-Lautrec, Dali, Picasso, Piaf, J. Baker, and more. Each of their sections was relatively short because of the scope of the book.

There were parts of the book, mostly the singer parts that I was just bored to death with and read as fast as I could. First of all, name-dropping. If you aren't familiar with the names, then this section is very difficult to get through. Parts of the book are like that...you have to wade through all these names of people you've never heard of. I spent three months in France and got a degree in French, but I never heard of these modern people (the book is basically from 1830 to the 1960's).

I enjoyed reading about the cabarets, the artists, the uprisings, and the war. Quite interesting. I also like the afterword because the author explains a little more why he is living in Paris when he's not from France.

I recommend this book to anyone who has been to France and to Paris and to Montmartre or anyone who wants to visit and know some of the history behind it.

Edit June 13: I changed my rating from 3 to 4 stars because I've talked to many people about the things I've read in it. I'm still fascinated by the stories.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I had to pick a favorite quartier in Paris it would be a tossup between Montmartre and Le Marais. Returning to Paris this spring, spending one day in Montmartre and one day in Le Marais, I decided to read John Baxter's Montmartre: Paris's Village of Art and Sin to give me more insight about this charming and somewhat seedy and sinister little neighborhood. I read most of the book on the train from Amsterdam to Paris's Gare de l'Est and the rest on a journey from Gare de l'Est to Strasbourg.

There is an assemblage of familiar characters - Toulouse-Lautrec, the Surrealists, Henry Miller, the American ex-pats of the Lost Generation - and a few new ones that I was introduced to. The book was filled with information about the history of Montmartre and some, though not all, of its famous landmarks (Sacre Coeur, Moulin Rouge, Au Lapin Agile). But where this little travel book excelled at giving information it lacked in what was perceived as a strong and at times overbearing moralistic position of the author.

As an observer and teller of anecdotes Baxter excels, but the tone at times struck a nerve. We can't win 'em all, but we will, as they say, always have Paris -and at its heart, Montmartre.

[Shanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was hoping to learn more about things to do and see in present-day Montmartre but almost everything in the book has been demolished or closed. I did find the history of the village and wished that some of the chapters had not ended so abruptly. The “walking tour” included is just a general map that you could find online most likely so if you are looking for interesting things to look at it might be easier to find a different book.

[Mason Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun, breezy read of stories and history about the Montmartre quarter of Paris. Not the same old stories, though of course some of the characters (Toulouse-Lautrec, Edith Piaf, Picasso, etc) make appearances. Baxter tells fun stories of various times, from the 19th century through WWII.

[Angelica McBeath · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can’t believe I enjoyed a non fiction book about a small little area in Paris. Baxters flow of interesting information made this book à must read. I did not like his misogynistic undertones- otherwise this book would have received 5 stars

[Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Baxter's learned anecdotes wash over the reader and leave a warm sense of familiarity and sentiment. you'll find yourself longing for the old days even if you've never been to Montmartre.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won't natter on about another John Baxter Paris book but he did mention Jean Renoir's movie French Can Can (twice) so I got it from the library and I'm glad I did.

[Jean Cerfontaine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyable journey into the past of Montmartre and the rich tapestry of characters who called it home over the decades. Two thumbs up

[Rochelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Always reckon on Montmartre.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really not Baxter's best work--too much of a mishmash. Hard to follow and not nearly as engaging as the neighborhood must be.

[Richard Anderson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lively, enjoyable read about one of my favorite topics.

[Olga Vannucci · Rating 5 out of 5]

A place where everyone could be
Outside what's called propriety.

[Susan Quinn · Rating 4 out of 5]

The vignettes in here take different historical bits of Montmartre and bring them to life.

A short book, an easy read. Entertaining.

[Helynne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have visited Paris several times, but I continue to be amazed at how John Baxter knows every nook and cranny of the city as well as so many historical anecdotes in Parisian history. This author has written several books about Paris, and needless to say, I learn new things about the City of Light—historical tidbits, interesting characters, places to explore, art to savor— every time I read one. For example, I taught Marcel Aymé’s short story “Le Passe-Muraille” or the “Walker-Through Walls” many times in my French literature classes, and I knew that the story takes place in Montmartre, but I never knew before reading this book that there exists a Place Marcel Aymé in the quartier, which honors the author, and that it contains a sculpture (erected in 1989) of Aymé’s famous character Dutilleul stuck half-way in and out of a wall. So cool. The history of Montmartre is fascinating from its ancient days as the site of the legendary Saint-Denis’s headless walk through the area (cradling his severed head, which still preached Christian doctrine to startled hearers), to the siege of the Franco-Prussian War and the doomed Commune of 1871, to the artists, entertainers, and cabarets that made the area a center of art, sensuality, and sex. Built not only up a hill, but also on top of abandoned tunnels of old gypsum quarries (the mineral mined to make the appropriately named plaster of Paris), the land was so porous and unstable that Baron Haussmann gave up on trying to attempt any modernization in the region in the mid-19th century. Slum dwellers in other areas, uprooted by Haussmann’s projects, settled in Montmartre, and were on hand during the siege and Commune after which 20,000 rebels were killed, imprisoned or deported. The majestic, white domed Cathedral of Sacré-Cœur, built to honor Archbishop Georges Darboy, who was martyred during the uprising, became a monument to all victims of the Commune, whatever their politics. And since World War I delayed the completion of the cathedral until 1919, the church became a memorial for those lost during the Great War as well. Baxter tells the bittersweet story of real-life Parisian courtesan Marie Dupléssis from 1840s, who was the inspiration of Alexandre Dumas, fils’s novel/play La Dame aux Camélias and later, Verdi’s La Traviata. Both Dumas and Dupléssis are buried at the Montmartre Cemetery, which is the third largest in Paris. (The cemetery began in 1789 as an abandoned gypsum quarry in which to dump those executed by guillotine—Ew). Baxter also describes the beginnings of famous cabarets and cafés such as Le Moulin Rouge, Le Chat Noir (immortalized by the haughty black cat in Théophile Steinlen’s poster), Le Lapin Agile (a hangout of Modigliani, Picasso, Utrillo, and other artists and cartoonists) and the Bal des Quatz’arts (called “a riot, a revival of paganism”) and how the female customers and dancers—a new phenomenon—caught the attention of Van Gogh, Picasso, Toulouse-Lautrec and Renoir. (Baxter includes a nice essay about how Van Gogh‘s advice influenced Lautrec’s use of color). Then there is Place Pigalle , named for 18th-century sculptor Jean-Baptiste Pigalle, later called “Pig Alley” by U.S. GIs during and after World War II (an apt enough moniker considering the array of prostitutes, gigolos, cross-dressers, and grifters who hang out there). Edith Piaf, who was all of 4’8” tall, was discovered at Pigalle, singing as a small child with a huge voice. And there is Clignancourt—“the city of stuff”—on the outskirts of Montmartre, which has become la Marché des Puces (flea market) of Saint-Ouen. “Amid the junk, there are treasures to be found” (146). Obviously, there are more treasures to be found in this book, too numerous to mention.

[Felicity]

Any other time in my life I would have finished this book as I enjoyed the first half and have enjoyed others by the same author. My reading time right now, needs to be, only for books I can’t put down.

[Deb · Rating 5 out of 5]

I imagined every step. A quirky history of one of my favourite places. Makes me want to go back.

[Judy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't know any of the history before. I enjoyed learning about this area of Paris.

[Donna Shaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

Paris is a fascinating city and filled with both history and art. This book gives a you a peek of both.