Paris: A Journey Through Time

by Leonard Pitt

How would Paris look if images from its glorious past were placed side-by-side with photographs of the city today? In A Journey Through Time, Leonard Pitt does just this.

With a stunning array of archival and contemporary photos he peels away the many layers of old Paris to document the city's transformation with events such as the demolition of a section of rue Beaubourg in 1975 and its eventual reconstruction into modern condos and a shopping center, or the narrow cobblestoned rue du Four becoming the wide, paved street we know today bustling with automobiles and bicycles. Along with these photos from the past and present come detailed maps for walking tours with old schematics and plans for construction that may or may not have been carried out, illustrating the strange ways that a city can develop over hundreds of years.

Painstakingly researched, A Journey Through Time is a tour through Paris, seen through the lens of photographers who lived during each golden age of demolition and construction, and compiled into one tremendous account of the true hidden Paris.

Genres: History, France, Travel, Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Debbie Robson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Paris: A Journey Through Time by Leonard Pitt is definitely painstakingly researched and gorgeously illustrated. For me, researching Paris in the 1860s this book is the Holy Grail. I am now a little closer to working out where my character Lena Dubois will live. Definitely the Left Bank and hopefully in the first section covered by the book - Maubert and Saint-Severin. The other sections are Boulevard Saint-Germain and Montagne Saint-Genevieve, From Odeon to Saint Germain-des-Pres, Rue Beaubourg and Nearby Streets, Rue Etienne-Marcel, Avenue de l’Opera and Les Halles.
This book has also been my introduction to the incredible Paris photographer Charles Marville who chronicled the old Paris and Georges-Eugene Haussmann, the prefect of the Seine Department who instituted a massive program of new boulevards which of course swept away a lot of the streets photographed by Marville and others.
In this book (with before and after photos) you actually find out how those changes occurred: what streets were lost completely or nearly completely, what buildings were lost or saved and all the changes that came about to give us the Paris of today. For a researcher this is an invaluable tool. I can place my character Lena in a certain street, possibly Rue Galande and know that her granddaughter won’t be able to find the street in 1924. I have also discovered some wonderful buildings I hope to feature in my next novel. I will be returning this book to the library soon confident I’ll find myself borrowing it again frequently.

[Lesley Bell · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best thing about this book are the many, many archival pictures, with clear maps - but I still pull out the Michelin Paris Atlas to sort out views. And Google Earth to understand contemporary views. You have to really want to understand how this city has changed over time, and L. Pitt takes you through that.

[Sharon Salonen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I loved the old pictures of Paris streets and the now vs. then shots, though I wish there were more text relating to the history of the areas changed and/or demolished. Some explanation of Haussmann and the various renovation plans of Paris would have been helpful.