Category: BOOKS
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REVIEW No Touching
In France, thinking is sexy and sex something to think about: take Joséphine, mid-thirties philosophy teacher in a tough lycée. Sick of her job, she starts moonlighting as an exotic dancer…
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REVIEW L’Arc de Triomphe, Wrapped
Bulgarian-born US artist Christo had the idea to wrap the Arc de Triomphe in fabric as far back as 1962, but permission wasn’t granted until 2019…
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REVIEW Vaux-le-Vicomte: A Private Invitation
He was the man whose lifestyle landed him in jail. Nicolas Fouquet made a colossal fortune as Louis XIV’s Superintendent of Finances…
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REVIEW Exteriors
Written in the 80s and 90s, Annie Ernaux’s public spaces diary turns everyday scenes in the métro, supermarket and cashpoint queue into literary vignettes…
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REVIEW Samaritaine
Like the recently reopened Paris store whose story it tells, this handsome title from US-based publisher Assouline is awash with Art Deco gorgeousness and chic…
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Picturing a revolution
It lasted just 72 days, but as a case study in the sheer untamable messiness of history, it’s hard to do better than the Paris Commune of 1871.
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REVIEW Paris
The Hungarian-born French photojournalist Paul Almasy had a long, illustrious and global career as a war correspondent, chronicler for UNESCO…
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Edward Thomas’s ‘Owl’: missing a feather?
One evening of heat, unseasonal heat – it was late May – I was sitting in the book room with the window wide open, and I heard a tawny owl calling from the trees…