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Parisian Lives: Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, and Me
National Book Award-winning biographer Deirdre Bair explores her fifteen remarkable years in Paris with Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir, painting intimate new portraits of two literary giants and revealing secrets of the biographical art.
In 1971 Deirdre Bair was a journalist and recently minted Ph.D. who managed to secure access to Nobel Prize-winning author Samuel Beckett. He agreed that she could write his biography despite never having written--or even read--a biography herself. The next seven years of intimate conversations, intercontinental research, and peculiar cat-and-mouse games resulted in Samuel Beckett: A Biography, which went on to win the National Book Award and propel Deirdre to her next subject: Simone de Beauvoir. The catch? De Beauvoir and Beckett despised each other--and lived essentially on the same street. While quite literally dodging one subject or the other, and sometimes hiding out in the backrooms of the great caf�s of Paris, Bair learned that what works in terms of process for one biography rarely applies to the next. Her seven-year relationship with the domineering and difficult de Beauvoir required a radical change in approach, yielding another groundbreaking literary profile.
Drawing on Bair's extensive notes from the period, including never-before-told anecdotes and details that were considered impossible to publish at the time, Parisian Lives is full of personality and warmth and give us an entirely new window on the all-too-human side of these legendary thinkers.
In 1971 Deirdre Bair was a journalist and recently minted Ph.D. who managed to secure access to Nobel Prize-winning author Samuel Beckett. He agreed that she could write his biography despite never having written--or even read--a biography herself. The next seven years of intimate conversations, intercontinental research, and peculiar cat-and-mouse games resulted in Samuel Beckett: A Biography, which went on to win the National Book Award and propel Deirdre to her next subject: Simone de Beauvoir. The catch? De Beauvoir and Beckett despised each other--and lived essentially on the same street. While quite literally dodging one subject or the other, and sometimes hiding out in the backrooms of the great caf�s of Paris, Bair learned that what works in terms of process for one biography rarely applies to the next. Her seven-year relationship with the domineering and difficult de Beauvoir required a radical change in approach, yielding another groundbreaking literary profile.
Drawing on Bair's extensive notes from the period, including never-before-told anecdotes and details that were considered impossible to publish at the time, Parisian Lives is full of personality and warmth and give us an entirely new window on the all-too-human side of these legendary thinkers.
368 pages, Hardcover
First published November 12, 2019
166 people are currently reading
4897 people want to read
About the author
Deirdre Bair
17 books156 followersDeirdre Bair received the National Book Award for Samuel Beckett: A Biography. Her biographies of Simone de Beauvoir and Carl Jung were finalists for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Simone de Beauvoir biography was chosen by The New York Times as a Best Book of the Year. Her biographies of Anaïs Nin and Saul Steinberg were both New York Times Notable Books.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 127 reviews
February 24, 2025
Deirdre Bair has written many biographies, including the biography of Anais Nin, Jung and Al Capone. This book is her Parisian memoir in which she recounts her travels and sojourn in Paris in order to write the biographies of Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir.
In this book she tells us about her meetings and interviews with each author and their friends and acquaintances and the difficulties she faced and overcame in writing the biographies.
I have read her Beckett biography which won National Book Award in 1981 and found her portrayal of my beloved author and philosopher who was one of the most secretive and private of all writers, excellently done.
In this book she tells us about her meetings and interviews with each author and their friends and acquaintances and the difficulties she faced and overcame in writing the biographies.
I have read her Beckett biography which won National Book Award in 1981 and found her portrayal of my beloved author and philosopher who was one of the most secretive and private of all writers, excellently done.
July 1, 2020
3.5 stars
As a biographer's memoir of her time spent with two of the most influential cultural figures of the 20th century, Parisian Lives holds exactly the kind of novelty and allure that I find hard to resist.
Both Beckett and Beauvoir produced works that brought about massive shifts in literary, cultural, and political attitudes throughout the west, and continue to remain relevant and highly revered to this day. But what unites these two very different people, who happened to dislike each other even as they lived (by some estimates) at the opposite ends of the same street, is biography — or rather their biographer, Deirdre Bair, whose unique experience of working with them as a complete novice to the genre is what made me dive hook, line, and sinker into this book.
While I don't particularly recommend Bair's style of writing, which struck me as a bit too impersonal for a memoir of these proportions, I found Parisian Lives enjoyable on the whole. As a book that isn't entirely about Beckett and Beauvoir, it reveals them in a humane and humanising light that's rare to find in the existing scholarship on their lives and work: him with his silences and strictly controlled relationships; her with her doubts, discontent, and unacknowledged greatness.
Whereas the writing of Beckett's biography (an ambitious project, the first of its kind and also her very first attempt at writing one) takes up nearly two-thirds of this book, the account of working with Beauvoir reveals a deeper emotional connect in addition to further insights on the past. Journeying through the process of writing about these living giants; albeit amidst much difference of personality and circumstance; Bair also offers valuable insight into the nature of Biography itself, of what writing one can take (and take away).
However, what I found most valuable in this book is what it says about the way women in writing were treated in the 70s and 80s. While Beauvoir was either ill-regarded after Sartre's death or reduced to a feminist icon; Bair had to struggle through much ostracisation, hostility, innuendo, and academic politics at the hands of institutions, individuals, the all-male canon of Beckett scholars, and many others who disregarded her merits and capabilities on account of her sex, and on plenty of occassions tried to discredit her. Parisian Lives, in many ways, also reveals the kind of pressures — both psychological and otherwise — which women had to endure at the time of the second wave, where they "can have it all, but only after [they] agreed to do it all".
As a biographer's memoir of her time spent with two of the most influential cultural figures of the 20th century, Parisian Lives holds exactly the kind of novelty and allure that I find hard to resist.
Both Beckett and Beauvoir produced works that brought about massive shifts in literary, cultural, and political attitudes throughout the west, and continue to remain relevant and highly revered to this day. But what unites these two very different people, who happened to dislike each other even as they lived (by some estimates) at the opposite ends of the same street, is biography — or rather their biographer, Deirdre Bair, whose unique experience of working with them as a complete novice to the genre is what made me dive hook, line, and sinker into this book.
While I don't particularly recommend Bair's style of writing, which struck me as a bit too impersonal for a memoir of these proportions, I found Parisian Lives enjoyable on the whole. As a book that isn't entirely about Beckett and Beauvoir, it reveals them in a humane and humanising light that's rare to find in the existing scholarship on their lives and work: him with his silences and strictly controlled relationships; her with her doubts, discontent, and unacknowledged greatness.
Whereas the writing of Beckett's biography (an ambitious project, the first of its kind and also her very first attempt at writing one) takes up nearly two-thirds of this book, the account of working with Beauvoir reveals a deeper emotional connect in addition to further insights on the past. Journeying through the process of writing about these living giants; albeit amidst much difference of personality and circumstance; Bair also offers valuable insight into the nature of Biography itself, of what writing one can take (and take away).
However, what I found most valuable in this book is what it says about the way women in writing were treated in the 70s and 80s. While Beauvoir was either ill-regarded after Sartre's death or reduced to a feminist icon; Bair had to struggle through much ostracisation, hostility, innuendo, and academic politics at the hands of institutions, individuals, the all-male canon of Beckett scholars, and many others who disregarded her merits and capabilities on account of her sex, and on plenty of occassions tried to discredit her. Parisian Lives, in many ways, also reveals the kind of pressures — both psychological and otherwise — which women had to endure at the time of the second wave, where they "can have it all, but only after [they] agreed to do it all".
June 7, 2019
Earlier this year, Michael Peppiatt’s The Existential Englishman: Paris Among the Artists was published; the book displays namedropping and some Parisian familières, and ended up as quite the end note of what can be written about celebrities, and Paris. It is the kind of book that most people will forget about when asked of their favourite autobiographies, six months after having read it.
Enter Deirdre Bair.
I did not know of her before reading this book; I’d not even read her biography on Wikipedia.
The start of the book is catchy without trying to be too engaging. It’s clear that the writer is both experienced and knows rhythm; if writing a book is similar to pacing oneself for running a marathon well, this one holds up almost throughout.
Almost.
Somewhere between meeting Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir, there is a lull. It is slight, and on the whole can be forgotten. This is my only complaint about the book, and mind you, I’m reviewing an uncorrected advance copy of the book.
Au contraire, Bair writes of her own family in a commendable way, never delving into the sappy or drab. Professing the same kind of verve, she describes her own problems with deciding to become a biographer without knowing how to become one. She even asked Beckett how to, in a roundabout way:
Reading about Bair’s conquests with Beckett, it’s easy to want to read her book about him. What makes it even more interesting is how Beckett didn’t let her behind the scenes of his machinations:
It’s clear to the reader—without Bair trying to blow her own trumpet—that the author has jumped through quite a few hoops to have her Beckett biography published, by Jove. It’s even impressive that she contacted Richard Ellman, who’d had his own Beckett biography published before Bair did hers:
It’s easy to think back to those days when readers were everywhere, publishing houses possessed greater cultural power than they do today, and how authors were discussed by multitudes of people while they were writing novels. It’s also, sadly, easy to consider how Bair was subject to abject sexism, which led to rumours being spread, which, in turn, nearly led to her book not being published.
Then, Simone de Beauvoir.
I love this part from Bair’s initial meeting with de Beauvoir:
The following paragraphs didn’t surprise me in the least, given that de Beauvoir’s one of the most notable existentialists:
I adore this quote from Beckett to Bair after she’d mentioned the “Becketteers”:
I also loved what Bair wrote about writing a biography and trying to stay level-headed in some way:
In regards to this book, I hope Bair is more than content. She should be, I think. Then again, I was born just before her Beckett biography was published. This book contains many pointers to what a writer—biographer or not—should consider.
First and foremost, this book is a tale of the ups and downs of writing about human beings, and what those human beings bring to the table while and how you write about this. This is a laudable and highly recommendable memorial of extraordinary times in the life of a very considerate and apparently skilled biographer.
Enter Deirdre Bair.
I did not know of her before reading this book; I’d not even read her biography on Wikipedia.
“So you are the one who is going to reveal me for the charlatan that I am.” It was the first thing Samuel Beckett ever said to me on that bitter cold day, November 17, 1971, as we sat in the minuscule lobby of the Hôtel du Danube on the rue Jacob.
The start of the book is catchy without trying to be too engaging. It’s clear that the writer is both experienced and knows rhythm; if writing a book is similar to pacing oneself for running a marathon well, this one holds up almost throughout.
Almost.
Somewhere between meeting Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir, there is a lull. It is slight, and on the whole can be forgotten. This is my only complaint about the book, and mind you, I’m reviewing an uncorrected advance copy of the book.
Au contraire, Bair writes of her own family in a commendable way, never delving into the sappy or drab. Professing the same kind of verve, she describes her own problems with deciding to become a biographer without knowing how to become one. She even asked Beckett how to, in a roundabout way:
All this went through my mind in a matter of seconds as I dropped my head into my hands and said, “Oh dear. I don’t know if I’m cut out for this biography business.” His demeanor changed immediately, as did his tone of voice. “Well, then,” he replied, “why don’t we talk about it?”
Reading about Bair’s conquests with Beckett, it’s easy to want to read her book about him. What makes it even more interesting is how Beckett didn’t let her behind the scenes of his machinations:
Beckett was famous for never interpreting, analyzing, or explaining anything about his writings, particularly the plays. Although he would discuss modes of interpretation, MacGowran said, Beckett always fell back on the same final comment when questions got too close to the one he hated most: “What did you mean when you wrote X?” He brought such discussions to a quick end with “I would feel superior to my own work if I tried to explain it.”
It’s clear to the reader—without Bair trying to blow her own trumpet—that the author has jumped through quite a few hoops to have her Beckett biography published, by Jove. It’s even impressive that she contacted Richard Ellman, who’d had his own Beckett biography published before Bair did hers:
Richard Ellmann, then at Yale, told me he would never grant me an interview because if he had anything to say about Beckett, he would write it himself.
It’s easy to think back to those days when readers were everywhere, publishing houses possessed greater cultural power than they do today, and how authors were discussed by multitudes of people while they were writing novels. It’s also, sadly, easy to consider how Bair was subject to abject sexism, which led to rumours being spread, which, in turn, nearly led to her book not being published.
A cadre of Beckett specialists—the “Becketteers,” as I called them (all references to Mouseketeers are intentional), white men in secure academic positions of power and authority—formed my primary opposition. They were representative of a larger struggle in academia between the establishment and the perceived threat of women like me and my Danforth GFW colleagues, who were now competing for the same academic positions as the usual male candidates.
For the Becketteers in particular, I was a brazen example, the “mere girl” who had “invaded the sacrosanct turf of the Beckett world.” One or two younger members who were brave enough to speak to me privately asked if I was completely ignorant of the pecking order, while in public they shunned me so they could “keep on the good side of the powers that be.”
One of them surreptitiously motioned for me to join him as he sneaked behind a pillar in a hotel lobby at a Modern Language Association conference. “You are a pariah and I can’t be seen talking to you,” he said with a swagger, clearly feeling brave for engaging in this little clandestine conversation. His childish glee left me (unusually) speechless and unable to think up a quick riposte.
When I found my voice, I said I did not understand why I was being ostracized, since my two publications about Beckett had been received positively within the academic world. “Yes,” this man said, “in the academic world. But that’s not the Beckett world.”
Then, Simone de Beauvoir.
I love this part from Bair’s initial meeting with de Beauvoir:
I began to make stuttering conversation, starting with my thanks that she would give me time on her birthday. Her quizzical look as she replied let me know I was not making a very positive first impression. “Why not?” she said. “What is a birthday anyway but just another day?” I didn’t know what to say to that, but she didn’t pause long enough to let me answer as she asked, “Shall we get to work?”
I had assumed that this was to be a brief getting-acquainted session and I had not brought anything with me; I had no notebook or tape recorder, and I had not prepared any questions. My only preparation had been to practice how to tell her, in my best French, that I had to go home on the twelfth to teach during the spring semester and would not be able to begin serious interviews until at least the summer, and then only if my schedule allowed enough time for me to prepare myself with serious reading and research during the term.
I stammered something about how I did not wish to impose upon what I was sure would be a festive evening, so I had not brought any work materials with me. She snorted in derision. There was to be no celebration, she told me; her friend Sylvie would be coming later with something for dinner, but until then we should probably get started. I fished in my bag for something to write on and could find only my date book, so I pretended it was a notebook.
I got a reprieve of sorts from asking questions because she launched right in to tell me how we were going to work: “I will talk, and I will tell you what has been important in my life—all the things you need to know. You can write them down, but you must also bring a tape recorder, and I will have one, too. We can discuss what I tell you if you need me to explain it, and that will be the book you need to write. That will be the one you publish.”
I remember clearly how I lowered my head into my hands and said out loud, “Oh dear.” I had the sinking sensation that the book was dead and done before I even got started. “What is the matter?” she demanded. “What is wrong?” I was so flustered that I could not think in French and asked her if I could reply in English. She said of course, because she read and understood the language far better than she spoke it. “That is not how I worked with Samuel Beckett,” I told her, and then I proceeded to explain how he had given me the freedom to do my research, conduct my interviews, and to write the book that I thought needed to be written.
I told her how we had agreed that he would not read it before it was published, and I even told her how he had said he would neither help nor hinder me, which his family and friends interpreted as his agreement to cooperate fully. I told her that, having worked in such extraordinary circumstances, I didn’t see how I could work any other way. I hoped that she would be generous and gracious enough to give me whatever help I asked for, but that she would also allow me the independence to construct a full and objective account of her life and work.
The following paragraphs didn’t surprise me in the least, given that de Beauvoir’s one of the most notable existentialists:
And so we began. I thought I would ease into my questioning by asking about her earliest childhood memories, but she went first because she wanted to thank me. “Women come from all over the world to write about me, but all they want to write about is The Second Sex.”
Here she pounded one fist into the other open hand as she said, “I wrote so much else. I wrote philosophy, politics, fiction, autobiography . . .” She seemed to be pausing to catch her breath after every genre, and then she said, “You are the only one who wants to write about everything. Everyone else only wants to write about feminism.”
It threw me off-balance, but I did not have the luxury of reflecting on her generous appraisal until after I left, when I grasped the truth in it. During the 1970s and 1980s she had been slotted into the niche of feminist icon—all well and good, but she did not want to be there in perpetuity. Aware of her many different contributions to culture and society and extremely proud of them, she wanted posterity to acknowledge all her accomplishments.
I adore this quote from Beckett to Bair after she’d mentioned the “Becketteers”:
I talked so much that my wineglass was left mostly untouched, but it was getting late, so I started to gather my things.
Until then he had not said anything specific about the Becketteers’ behavior, but I think he was alluding to it when he volunteered one of the last things he ever said to me: “You must never explain. You must never complain.”
Indeed, there have been many times since then when I have been ready to lash out in retaliation for a bad review or an unkind comment, but every time I have remembered these words and I have never explained and never complained.
I also loved what Bair wrote about writing a biography and trying to stay level-headed in some way:
Joyce provided an example (one that he cribbed from Flaubert, but never mind) that I followed for everything I wrote: “The artist, like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails.” (I did keep myself refined out of existence, but I was never indifferent and didn’t bite my nails; I just picked at my cuticles.)
Pascal had the perfect pensée to help me open up and confide my own experiences to the permanence of print. When he thought about how his life was “swallowed up . . . in the eternity that precedes and will follow it,” he “[took] fright.”
When I began to write biography, I was, like Pascal, “stunned to find myself here rather than elsewhere . . . Who sent me here? By whose order and under what guiding destiny was this time, this place, assigned to me?” It led me to ask myself what had ever made me think that Samuel Beckett “needed” a biography and I was the one to write it?
Saint Augustine provided the answer for what drew me to Beauvoir: I had become “a question to myself. Not even I understand everything that I am.” And Rousseau gave me hope that sustained me during each biography, but especially within this bio-memoir: “My purpose is to display a portrait in every way true to nature, and the person I portray will be myself. Simply myself.”
If I managed to do that, then I have succeeded, and I am content.
In regards to this book, I hope Bair is more than content. She should be, I think. Then again, I was born just before her Beckett biography was published. This book contains many pointers to what a writer—biographer or not—should consider.
First and foremost, this book is a tale of the ups and downs of writing about human beings, and what those human beings bring to the table while and how you write about this. This is a laudable and highly recommendable memorial of extraordinary times in the life of a very considerate and apparently skilled biographer.
Read
December 15, 2019Deirdre Bair has written a book
about the process of writing two other books
about people who wrote a lot of books.
And that, my friends, is just too much excavation for my simple brain to endure.
If you're interested in how one goes about writing biographies, this might interest you. I think I'd rather just read the actual biographies she wrote, one of which won the National Book Award. Samuel Beckett
about the process of writing two other books
about people who wrote a lot of books.
And that, my friends, is just too much excavation for my simple brain to endure.
If you're interested in how one goes about writing biographies, this might interest you. I think I'd rather just read the actual biographies she wrote, one of which won the National Book Award. Samuel Beckett
December 15, 2019
"Obviously I would need to start a different set of folders, and I went right out to buy them. The only color I had not yet used was purple, so green gave way to purple and that's what the final version became." You guys, this is the start of a chapter, and a perfect illustration at how dull this memoir is. It's about her process writing two famous biographies. Don't get me wrong, it has it moments, but overall I cannot recommend.
I don't understand why it's called "Parisian Lives" as there is so little of Paris here. There is no sense of place whatsoever. It should have been called "Validating Source Material" or "Reconciling Versions of Events." In the first half when she is writing Beckett's biography, the text is dominated with tedious and arbitrary name drops. Perhaps this would be interesting if you were heavily aware of actors, publishers and poets in 1970s Europe. In one page alone I count 12 name drops: Nathalie Sarraute, Maurice Girodias, Iris Owens, Richard Seaver, Austryn Wainhouse, Jane Lougee, Alexander Trocchi, Christopher Logue, Jack Kahane, Hugh Guiler, Henry Miller, Anais Nin. They are just names, no character sketches or context.
There's some interesting stuff for sure. The stories of the misogyny she dealt with in academic circles in both American and Europe are infuriating. There's some interesting Simone de Beauvior stuff. But overall there's too much detail about note-taking, travel arrangements, interview delays, etc.
I don't understand why it's called "Parisian Lives" as there is so little of Paris here. There is no sense of place whatsoever. It should have been called "Validating Source Material" or "Reconciling Versions of Events." In the first half when she is writing Beckett's biography, the text is dominated with tedious and arbitrary name drops. Perhaps this would be interesting if you were heavily aware of actors, publishers and poets in 1970s Europe. In one page alone I count 12 name drops: Nathalie Sarraute, Maurice Girodias, Iris Owens, Richard Seaver, Austryn Wainhouse, Jane Lougee, Alexander Trocchi, Christopher Logue, Jack Kahane, Hugh Guiler, Henry Miller, Anais Nin. They are just names, no character sketches or context.
There's some interesting stuff for sure. The stories of the misogyny she dealt with in academic circles in both American and Europe are infuriating. There's some interesting Simone de Beauvior stuff. But overall there's too much detail about note-taking, travel arrangements, interview delays, etc.
December 24, 2024
An absolute joy. Bair recounts her experience of writing definitive biographies of Beckett and de Beauvoir. We learn a great deal about the subjects, intellectual Paris in the later 20th, the process of writing a scholarly biography, and Bair herself. Along the way, we also see what life was like for early second-wave feminists. Bair does not sugarcoat the exhausting experience of "having it all" and shares the very real barriers men (and some women) erected to keep women from succeeding. Highly recommended.
March 26, 2020
I thoroughly enjoyed Deirdre Bair's memoir of her years writing her first 2 biographies, of Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir. An important part of her early story is that she'd never written a biography before. Especially not a heavy duty one like Beckett's would require. So she had to learn as she progressed. I remember knowing at the time that someone was writing his biography and had even read that there was some resistance to it from Beckett himself. That wasn't exactly true. Bair writes that while he didn't wholeheartedly approve of her researching his life and work, he did cooperate when he was available. His reluctance was felt in his tyrannical hold on friends and family whose interviews and letters she needed. Each trip to Paris and Dublin unfolded almost as adventure. Her accounts of meeting the individuals in the huge cast of characters making up the Beckett circle are engaging. And in the years of research and writing she had to travel back and forth between Dublin and Paris and Philadelphia where she was teaching at the University of Pennsylvania while juggling a full family life at the same time.
Simone de Beauvoir was an easier subject, if temperamental. De Beauvoir had admired Bair's biography of Beckett and welcomed the book she'd write about her. Bair was attracted to de Beauvoir as subject because she held her work promoting feminism in high esteem. In fact, Bair references her feminist sympathies many times in the book. She's sprung from the feminist seed de Beauvoir has sown, and that can't be a bad thing.
Part of Bair's story also relates the ups and downs of her personal academic career. While she wrote the 2 biographies she was struggling for tenure and a full professorship. During the writing of her Beckett book, and after, she had to tolerate a certain amount of disparagement from other Beckett scholars and from male academics in general who thought she was intruding into their scholastic bailiwick and overstepping her own qualifications. Most of the time she holds her own against the slings and arrows and snubs.
Of the 2 biographies that are her subject here, I was eager for that on Beckett, way back many years ago. I liked it. Later I read the biography James Knowlson wrote (he was one of those who snubbed Bair) and thought it perhaps treated him a little too gently. I preferred Bair's book. I haven't read her biography of de Beauvoir, but now I think I will.
In the meantime I appreciate her memoir of the years spent writing the 2 biographies. Her experiences and her views gained from her work are always interesting. And her observations of Beckett and de Beauvoir and those who were part of their stories are probably invaluable to anyone interested in them. Good book.
Simone de Beauvoir was an easier subject, if temperamental. De Beauvoir had admired Bair's biography of Beckett and welcomed the book she'd write about her. Bair was attracted to de Beauvoir as subject because she held her work promoting feminism in high esteem. In fact, Bair references her feminist sympathies many times in the book. She's sprung from the feminist seed de Beauvoir has sown, and that can't be a bad thing.
Part of Bair's story also relates the ups and downs of her personal academic career. While she wrote the 2 biographies she was struggling for tenure and a full professorship. During the writing of her Beckett book, and after, she had to tolerate a certain amount of disparagement from other Beckett scholars and from male academics in general who thought she was intruding into their scholastic bailiwick and overstepping her own qualifications. Most of the time she holds her own against the slings and arrows and snubs.
Of the 2 biographies that are her subject here, I was eager for that on Beckett, way back many years ago. I liked it. Later I read the biography James Knowlson wrote (he was one of those who snubbed Bair) and thought it perhaps treated him a little too gently. I preferred Bair's book. I haven't read her biography of de Beauvoir, but now I think I will.
In the meantime I appreciate her memoir of the years spent writing the 2 biographies. Her experiences and her views gained from her work are always interesting. And her observations of Beckett and de Beauvoir and those who were part of their stories are probably invaluable to anyone interested in them. Good book.
May 10, 2020
WOW! a memoir of a biographer of some of the most prominent thinkers and writers of the 20th century. this was such a unique reading experience!!! so many details, observations, and revelations. LOVED IT!
December 31, 2019
My sister gifted me this book for my birthday knowing that I worked on a Beckett-related research project during my senior year of college - not to mention my love for Paris and feminism at large (extremely well-gifted, I must say). I started the book in a bit of a fan-girl/pretentious nerd haze as I read name after name that I'd learned about in my time at the Beckett project. I had spent hours of that last year at Emory reading letters from Beckett to these people. Never before had I felt quite so directly connected to a book, or a non-fiction book at least.
After this initial realization, I began to settle into the book and was able to appreciate it more for its more immediate purpose as a memoir of the esteemed biographer, Deirdre Bair. Most of the book explains the process of writing biographies for Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir, and throughout her account, she describes her struggles as a woman in her field, as well as her many triumphs. Several times throughout her account, she honestly admits the difficulties she ran into in trying to find success with her career while raising two kids and having a successful marriage. As a 23-year-old teacher who can hardly find time for myself, this was a refreshing and reassuring read. Bair doesn't sugarcoat, and I appreciated it. "Having it all" was by no means easy, but she often succeeded and fully admits that sometimes it was simply impossible for both aspects of her life to strike a balance - but that was just fine.
The content of Parisian Lives also offered reliable insight into the life of a writer and professor. Although she wrote for such big names, it was by no means glamorous work. Again, she approaches this subject with authenticity, not to mention with a whole lot of helpful advice on how to go about writing and researching.
Most impressively, she is somehow able to explain so much about herself solely through her interactions with these two figures and their "Parisian lives". She hardly ever explicitly includes details from her personal life or divulges too many opinions on matters aside from the ones that are truly relevant. It is apparent throughout her memoir that she is, indeed, an incredible biographer. Like she states in this book, the mark of a successful biography is that the reader wants to find out more about its subject's work and the history that surrounded them. According to this definition, Deirdre Bair absolutely succeeds with Parisian Lives: Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, and Me
After this initial realization, I began to settle into the book and was able to appreciate it more for its more immediate purpose as a memoir of the esteemed biographer, Deirdre Bair. Most of the book explains the process of writing biographies for Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir, and throughout her account, she describes her struggles as a woman in her field, as well as her many triumphs. Several times throughout her account, she honestly admits the difficulties she ran into in trying to find success with her career while raising two kids and having a successful marriage. As a 23-year-old teacher who can hardly find time for myself, this was a refreshing and reassuring read. Bair doesn't sugarcoat, and I appreciated it. "Having it all" was by no means easy, but she often succeeded and fully admits that sometimes it was simply impossible for both aspects of her life to strike a balance - but that was just fine.
The content of Parisian Lives also offered reliable insight into the life of a writer and professor. Although she wrote for such big names, it was by no means glamorous work. Again, she approaches this subject with authenticity, not to mention with a whole lot of helpful advice on how to go about writing and researching.
Most impressively, she is somehow able to explain so much about herself solely through her interactions with these two figures and their "Parisian lives". She hardly ever explicitly includes details from her personal life or divulges too many opinions on matters aside from the ones that are truly relevant. It is apparent throughout her memoir that she is, indeed, an incredible biographer. Like she states in this book, the mark of a successful biography is that the reader wants to find out more about its subject's work and the history that surrounded them. According to this definition, Deirdre Bair absolutely succeeds with Parisian Lives: Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, and Me
December 5, 2019
Deirdre Bair's memoir is the interrelated stories of writing biographies of Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir and Bair's own journey of discovery while launching her academic career, a process often in conflict with her success writing biographies that became blockbuster successes. It is a fascinating tale of how to research and write biography while observing that the process of researching and writing about great writers itself brings stunning growth and insight to the author. The reader gets to share in this journey of personal revelation.
What Bair achieved by writing great biography was to reach rather different heights from the rather pedestrian hills of normal academic life, even that of life at a top university. That is mostly because the biographies themselves turned out to have such reach.
The stories relating to both Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir are different but equally compelling. These stories are page turners, full of fascination. The saga of the McGreevy letters illuminating troubling aspects of Becket's sexual tensions and conflicts reads like the high-stakes drama it was. If there is one surprising thing, it is the smallness of so many people in the entourages surrounding the towering personalities--and some of the large and generous personalities in the same social solar system. A lot of these mini-tales make amusing reading about human vanity; others provide gripping reading. This is about research in the real world of challenging people, not turning the pages in the special collections reading room.
There is an undertone throughout that Bair clearly delineates. One is the extensive sexual harassment she encountered, which although distasteful she swats away. The other is gender discrimination of men's privileged position and women being out-of-their station. Less raunchy and distasteful but potentially more invidious. So Bair seems to be navigating continuously between the crashing breakers of one and the whirlpools of the other -- therefore the odyssey.
The final chapters of the Beauvoir story, and Jean-Paul Satre, are riveting, shocking, and will change how one looks at these two luminaries. In Beauvoir's case, her work is a substantial accomplishment above and beyond her personal shortcomings and gives her legacy the greatness that her growing reputation is earning her work. But for the two existentialists, when the candles burned brightly, they burned.
And of course lots of lovely vignettes about Paris, a city of burning candles.
What Bair achieved by writing great biography was to reach rather different heights from the rather pedestrian hills of normal academic life, even that of life at a top university. That is mostly because the biographies themselves turned out to have such reach.
The stories relating to both Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir are different but equally compelling. These stories are page turners, full of fascination. The saga of the McGreevy letters illuminating troubling aspects of Becket's sexual tensions and conflicts reads like the high-stakes drama it was. If there is one surprising thing, it is the smallness of so many people in the entourages surrounding the towering personalities--and some of the large and generous personalities in the same social solar system. A lot of these mini-tales make amusing reading about human vanity; others provide gripping reading. This is about research in the real world of challenging people, not turning the pages in the special collections reading room.
There is an undertone throughout that Bair clearly delineates. One is the extensive sexual harassment she encountered, which although distasteful she swats away. The other is gender discrimination of men's privileged position and women being out-of-their station. Less raunchy and distasteful but potentially more invidious. So Bair seems to be navigating continuously between the crashing breakers of one and the whirlpools of the other -- therefore the odyssey.
The final chapters of the Beauvoir story, and Jean-Paul Satre, are riveting, shocking, and will change how one looks at these two luminaries. In Beauvoir's case, her work is a substantial accomplishment above and beyond her personal shortcomings and gives her legacy the greatness that her growing reputation is earning her work. But for the two existentialists, when the candles burned brightly, they burned.
And of course lots of lovely vignettes about Paris, a city of burning candles.
November 2, 2020
I have nothing but deep respect for Deirdre and, having read her biographies of Samuel Beckett and Simone de Beauvoir, this intense breakdown of the work that went into these books captured in this book has made me appreciate her work more. The detailed rituals of research, writing and the literal spilling of the tea in both cases was phenomenal. She came up against so many obstacles and recounts everything from soured academics, tense stand offs with her subjects to terrible 'Becketteers' who accused her of sleeping with him and dragged her reputation down into the sewer, just because she did her job and demystifed 'Saint Sam'. It took her over 17 years to create these works and having read the behind the scenes, we all need to take a moment and appreciate her as a terrific biographer in her own right.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 28, 2019
"Parisian Lives: Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, and Me: A Memoir" is a beautifully written book that pulls you in slowly but deeply. It isn't just about writing about two famous authors but the memoir writer's life as well and what it takes to be a biographer. I would recommend this book to fans of Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, as well as biographies in general.
I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy free of charge. This is my honest and unbiased opinion of it.
I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy free of charge. This is my honest and unbiased opinion of it.
April 28, 2020
One of the better memoirs I've read about writing, without excessively glorifying the writing process as so many authors do when reflecting on their craft.
February 10, 2020
3.75 stars
I quite enjoyed reading this book. I found many parts of Bair's career-- especially the sexism she faced in academia, the lengths she had to go to in order to write both books, and the biography-writing process-- quite interesting. As someone who has been particularly interested in feminism (I likely picked up this book originally for the Simone de Beauvoir aspect), Bair's journey into a more sure and bold woman and author during the 70's and 80's was a highlight for me. I did also enjoy finding out more about Beckett and de Beauvoir, especially their personalities and their relationships with Bair.
Two things in particular that almost caused me to give it 3 stars. First, the marketing (the title, the cover, etc.) is a bit misleading. Yes, this book is about Samuel Becket and Simone de Beauvoir who were living in Paris, but "Parisian Lives" seems like a marketing ploy... (although I admit it likely worked on me). However, I can see this causing some to be disappointed. There is some scenes in Paris and passages about Paris, but the author spends much more time explaining the lengths she had to go to in order to get to Paris (grants, grants, grants). Second, there was a bit too much repetition that I think could have been edited out. Certain sentences / situations kept being repeated that it felt a bit tedious at times (like repeating why she was now using purple paper for her final draft again in almost the exact same wording, as if we had missed it 20 pages before).
Again, just be aware of what you are getting into with this book so you are left disappointed. While it may have some flaws, I think it is still a worthwhile read.
I quite enjoyed reading this book. I found many parts of Bair's career-- especially the sexism she faced in academia, the lengths she had to go to in order to write both books, and the biography-writing process-- quite interesting. As someone who has been particularly interested in feminism (I likely picked up this book originally for the Simone de Beauvoir aspect), Bair's journey into a more sure and bold woman and author during the 70's and 80's was a highlight for me. I did also enjoy finding out more about Beckett and de Beauvoir, especially their personalities and their relationships with Bair.
Two things in particular that almost caused me to give it 3 stars. First, the marketing (the title, the cover, etc.) is a bit misleading. Yes, this book is about Samuel Becket and Simone de Beauvoir who were living in Paris, but "Parisian Lives" seems like a marketing ploy... (although I admit it likely worked on me). However, I can see this causing some to be disappointed. There is some scenes in Paris and passages about Paris, but the author spends much more time explaining the lengths she had to go to in order to get to Paris (grants, grants, grants). Second, there was a bit too much repetition that I think could have been edited out. Certain sentences / situations kept being repeated that it felt a bit tedious at times (like repeating why she was now using purple paper for her final draft again in almost the exact same wording, as if we had missed it 20 pages before).
Again, just be aware of what you are getting into with this book so you are left disappointed. While it may have some flaws, I think it is still a worthwhile read.
July 22, 2020
What could have been potentially been quite an interesting read was, unfortunately, not.
It feels like Bair can't quite decide if she wants to write about Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir (SdB) or herself. What we're left with, as I see it, is a confused narrative bursting with unnecessary flourishes and tangents. More often than not, this bio-memoir seems to act solely as way for Bair to express her gratitude to a long, long list of individuals related to the main players. It gets old very quickly.
This frustrated me the most:
It feels like Bair can't quite decide if she wants to write about Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir (SdB) or herself. What we're left with, as I see it, is a confused narrative bursting with unnecessary flourishes and tangents. More often than not, this bio-memoir seems to act solely as way for Bair to express her gratitude to a long, long list of individuals related to the main players. It gets old very quickly.
This frustrated me the most:
May 24, 2023
I began this book because of my interest in Simone de Beauvoir. Deirdre Bair offers a glimpse into Simone's life and that of Samuel Beckett as she wrote her biographies of them (which I now need to go read), but I was just as fascinated by Bair's description of what it was like to be a female scholar during the 70's and 80's. She was swimming against the current through the whole process, and I admire her persistence and bravery.
March 30, 2020
Sometimes the right book at the right time just falls into your lap - such is the case with this one. Originally, I was interested in reading Bair's biography of Simone de Beauvoir when I saw that she had recently published this book - after looking through the description, it sounded like something I might enjoy, so I decided to give it a try.
I was surprised by how much I connected with this book; hearing Bair describe the trials and tribulations of getting a PhD while being a mom and a wife, the toils of working in the academe, constant feelings of guilt for not being 100% at home and available for your husband and children...plus, constantly having to explain yourself to people who question how you can work so far away from home. Her experiences really resonated with me on multiple levels. For this reason, I felt the real joy of this book was when Bair reflected on her own life through the lens of her time working with Beckett and de Beauvoir. At times she really let herself go "deep" in describing her emotions of the time, but sometimes I was also left wanting a little more or feeling like Bair cut herself off before she shared too much. I was a little disappointed by this, but as she said herself in the book - putting herself too much into her work was something she constantly was trying to avoid, so it makes sense that it would be difficult even in a memoir.
Last, although Bair comments towards the end of the book that women have come a long way since the late 1970s and 1980s when she was working through the challenges of working on these two biographies, I was surprised to realize how little really has changed. Perhaps people are slightly more forgiving today when it comes to women working outside the home and men are slightly less misogynistic; however, the academic politics, the sidelining of women in the academe and the extra barriers we have to jump over - all of that is still taking place and seems (from my perspective) relatively unchanged. However, hearing how Bair was able to successfully overcome many of these constraints gave me some optimistic feelings and inspired me to personally keep moving forward in my own work to pursue my research passion and build my own path forward.
I was surprised by how much I connected with this book; hearing Bair describe the trials and tribulations of getting a PhD while being a mom and a wife, the toils of working in the academe, constant feelings of guilt for not being 100% at home and available for your husband and children...plus, constantly having to explain yourself to people who question how you can work so far away from home. Her experiences really resonated with me on multiple levels. For this reason, I felt the real joy of this book was when Bair reflected on her own life through the lens of her time working with Beckett and de Beauvoir. At times she really let herself go "deep" in describing her emotions of the time, but sometimes I was also left wanting a little more or feeling like Bair cut herself off before she shared too much. I was a little disappointed by this, but as she said herself in the book - putting herself too much into her work was something she constantly was trying to avoid, so it makes sense that it would be difficult even in a memoir.
Last, although Bair comments towards the end of the book that women have come a long way since the late 1970s and 1980s when she was working through the challenges of working on these two biographies, I was surprised to realize how little really has changed. Perhaps people are slightly more forgiving today when it comes to women working outside the home and men are slightly less misogynistic; however, the academic politics, the sidelining of women in the academe and the extra barriers we have to jump over - all of that is still taking place and seems (from my perspective) relatively unchanged. However, hearing how Bair was able to successfully overcome many of these constraints gave me some optimistic feelings and inspired me to personally keep moving forward in my own work to pursue my research passion and build my own path forward.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 24, 2020
Que livro legal. Deirdre Bair é biógrafa de Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, mais para frente Jung e Anaïs Nin. Nestas memórias, ela conta como foi o início da carreira (como ela decidiu ser biógrafa) e os contatos que teve com Beckett e Beauvoir. Por si só, já é interessante de imaginar a figura desses autores, quando ela conta de suas conversas e tal. Mas o outro grande fator que faz esta leitura muito boa é o relato de sua experiência como mulher: todos os preconceitos que ela passou. Por exemplo: "como é que você simplesmente ABANDONA seus filhos, para trabalhar?" (duvido que um homem tenha ouvido esta) ou então "Quantas vezes você teve que dar pro Beckett pra ele te contar isso?" ou então o tanto de homem querendo levá-la para o quarto, em troca de informações. O incômodo não é apenas sexualmente: o quanto ela foi diminuída profissionalmente e também academicamente por ser mulher, enquanto via de perto que seus colegas homens não tinham os mesmos obstáculos. Relato muito bom de três pessoas interessantíssimas.
June 7, 2021
A memoir of the time an American Woman wrote biographies of 2 French people that have influenced the literary and philosophical world.
3.5. It was going to be rounded to a 3, but I do like intelligent people and - Deidre Bair, I see what you did there. I see how, by the end of the book I have decided to finally read Murphy that has been languishing for years on my bookshelf and also some of SDB. Always putting the subjects first. It would appear a biographer is the closest thing to a selfless martyr in the literary world.
The loss of star - I felt the whole thing was a little too superficial for my usual tastes. Grants, flights, jobs, the subjects friends and pretend friends, annoying house guests, I felt they filled the pages a lot. I get they were crucial, but I didn’t enjoy that. Felt a bit like a tabloid those sort of details. Not my thing really.
Considering the people involved, I thought a bit more detail on their thoughts and them as people was warranted. I can see her intention was to get us to read the bios, and can understand that.
3.5. It was going to be rounded to a 3, but I do like intelligent people and - Deidre Bair, I see what you did there. I see how, by the end of the book I have decided to finally read Murphy that has been languishing for years on my bookshelf and also some of SDB. Always putting the subjects first. It would appear a biographer is the closest thing to a selfless martyr in the literary world.
The loss of star - I felt the whole thing was a little too superficial for my usual tastes. Grants, flights, jobs, the subjects friends and pretend friends, annoying house guests, I felt they filled the pages a lot. I get they were crucial, but I didn’t enjoy that. Felt a bit like a tabloid those sort of details. Not my thing really.
Considering the people involved, I thought a bit more detail on their thoughts and them as people was warranted. I can see her intention was to get us to read the bios, and can understand that.
June 26, 2025
Fascinating and deeply insightful book about the author's initiation into writing biography, first with Samuel Beckett and then with Simone de Beauvoir. It tells us as much about the times, especially for women who were audacious enough to want to "have it all" and the nature of biography itself as it does about the author's subjects. Looking back with the clarity of hindsight at Bair's early development as a writer and an academic both, it's amazing to see the extent to which society and culture influence both experiences, often in her case for the worse. But that she persisted in the face of detractors, obstacles of her own making and the many curve balls she had to dodge is a testament to her determination and resilience.
May 26, 2021
What a transportive read. It follows nearly two decades of the author’s life that she spent working first on Samuel Beckett’s biography and then Simone de Beauvoir’s. Deirdre travels to Paris, she interviews them (!), spends time with them, she interviews their friends and family over many, many years. She writes, she rewrites. She faces criticism ( it’s a time when women’s writing is not taken very seriously), she works hard to write biographies which are honest an unbiased. We read about her anxieties, her exhaustion, struggling to balance work and home. This is a memoir and such an interesting one. To read about her interactions with the greats— was surreal. Also to just learn about her journey ( I wish there was more of that— my only grouse). Please read. Worth it.
December 16, 2019
I love to read a book about something I never considered before. Here the topic is how to go about writing a biography of a living person. What's amazing here is that the author figured it out as she did it, and after the fact shares her process and thoughts with us. She started as a young, married mother of two writing her dissertation on Samuel Beckett and continued on to write Beckett’s first biography. Shortly thereafter, she spent a decade researching and writing a biography of Simone de Beauvoir. And now she tells her story of that period in her life. This was the '70s and '80s, and much of her writing reflects the sexism she encountered (especially in academia), the feminist movement of that time, and her personal struggles with her conflicting roles.
Ironically, she says that feels that her role as a literary biographer is to make you want to read the author's work. If that is so, she has succeeded with this memoir — I am now anxious to read these two biographies.
Ironically, she says that feels that her role as a literary biographer is to make you want to read the author's work. If that is so, she has succeeded with this memoir — I am now anxious to read these two biographies.
June 5, 2020
i really liked this. i enjoy books about a writer's process and i was also very interested in the details of the interactions between the author, Beckett and Beauvoir. I think I'm going to read the author's bio of Beauvoir if our library ever fully reopens and in the meantime I'm going to reread de Beauvoir's memoirs. I have been meaning to do this anyway since my mother died. Also there is the new translation of The Second Sex which has been on my list for some time. That has to wait for the university lib to get back to normal though so god knows when that will be.
May 24, 2021
I always had deep love for the genre of biographies and memoirs. This one is a perfect combo to look into the backstage in making of the first and being the second at the same time. Brilliant work.
November 6, 2022
4.5 stars
I delightful autumn read that made me happy to realize how far we‘ve come for women in the work place since the 70s (even though there‘s still quite a way to go!)
I delightful autumn read that made me happy to realize how far we‘ve come for women in the work place since the 70s (even though there‘s still quite a way to go!)
July 18, 2023
أسلوب لذيذ فعلااا
October 9, 2023
3.5 Not a page turner but enjoyable! It made me feel capable to take on a big project because writing a biography is in fact a big project. I played QuizBowl this weekend and both de Beauvoir and Beckett came up so it made it all worth it (those are the only questions I got right)
October 16, 2024
loved it, thanks paola 🥰
August 12, 2019
I received this book from the Goodreads Giveaway program. The stories told in this biography/memoir/creative process compilation is very unusual and entertaining. I really like good biographies and memoirs that are told well and have enlightening information and this book delivers. Ms Bair has a very wonderful way of keeping a vast amount of history and personal information flowing and compelling you to read further. You also find empathy for her and her subjects caught in a candid look at a living persons intricate life. "Parisian Lives:" is a remarkable and enjoyable look a three very interesting and colorful people plus a lesson in how absorbing and consuming a biographers life can be. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes biography and writing done superbly.
December 4, 2019
DNF. Read 100 pages, skimmed rest.
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