Syllabus for English 2398/4391: Paris as Place
Summer 2007 - Glories of France Program
Dr. Lisa Verner
lverner@uno.edu
GOALS: This goals for this course include 1-providing the student with a basic understanding of the
history and geography of the city of Paris; 2-an investigation into the mythology and iconography of the
City of Lights and its romantic associations in the minds of many westerners; 3-the production of essays
that combine a close reading of texts about Paris with the student’s observations of Paris itself into
coherent and interesting argumentative writing.
REQUIREMENTS: This class requires attendance in all classes, participation in class discussion, and
three papers.
Attendance and Participation: Attendance is required in all classes unless the student has a significant
medical emergency. The student is expected to read all assigned material and to participate in all class
discussions every day; class participation counts for 10 % of the student’s final grade. A significant
portion of this 10% is based on the student’s brief oral report on the setting of one of our stories that the
student visits on our field trip to Paris.
Papers: This course requires three essays, each worth 30% of the student’s grade. Whereas I would
prefer to have these essays typed, I recognize the logistical impossibility of requiring them to be typed.
Therefore, each essay must be written neatly in blue or black ink on lined notebook paper on one side of
the page; I will leave it up to the student whether or not to skip lines. Since handwriting size varies, it is
difficult to impose a page length, but the goal is between 600 and 800 words, which would be about 3
double-spaced typed pages, for 2000-level papers, and 1000-1200 word, about 5 double-spaced pages,
for 4000-level papers.
Honors Option: Students in UNO’s Honors Program have the option to take Paris As Place for honors
credit. In addition to regular class requirements, the student will choose a novel set in Paris about which
s/he will write an 8-10 page paper due three weeks after our return from Montpellier. Students taking the
honors option at the 4000-level will be required to use at least three outside sources in their papers. The
student will be required to discuss his/her chosen novel with the instructor periodically while we are in
France, either individually or in a group setting with other honors students. Because the instructor will also
have to read the student’s chosen novel, it is important that the student consult with the instructor and
receive her approval of the student’s choice by June 15, 2007. Please email me at lverner@uno.edu to
discuss your choice or to arrange a meeting. Possibilities for the novel include (but are not limited to):
Victor Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Les Miserables; Emile Zola, The Ladies Paradise (Au
Bonheur des Dames), The Fat and the Thin (The Belly of Paris), The Kill; Colette, Claudine In Paris; Abbe
Prevost, Manon Lescaut (set in 18th-century Paris and south Louisiana!); Jules Verne, Paris in the
Twentieth Century; Guy de Maupassant, Bel-Ami; and Honore de Balzac, The Wrong Side of Paris.
REQUIRED TEXTS
Paris Tales, trans. and ed. Helen Constantine, Oxford UP, 2004; ISBN 019280574.
(Required for 4000-level students only) Seven Ages of Paris, Alistair Horne, Vintage Books, 2002; ISBN
1400034469.
Daily Schedule of Readings
Wednesday, July 4: Introduction to class; in-class reading Paris by Duras (handout).
Thursday, July 5: Maupassant’s Nightmare and A Parisian Adventure.
Friday, July 6: Nerval’s The Green Monster.
Monday, July 9: Green’s In Notre Dame and Perec’s The Runaway.
Tuesday, July 10: Balzac’s The Last Napoleon and Reda’s Rue du Commerce.
Wednesday, July 11: Daeninckx’s The Man with the Collecting-Box and excerpts from Bemelmans’
When You Lunch with the Emperor: I Love You, I Love You, I Love You and Star of Hope (handout).
Thursday, July 12: Excerpts from Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast: A Good Café on the Place St.
Michel; Shakespeare and Company; and People of the Seine (handout).
Friday, July 13-Sunday, July 15: Field Trip to Paris!
We will be in Paris on Bastille Day, which is a mixed blessing. On the one hand, what better opportunity
to observe what Paris finds worth celebrating and in what manner the quintessential French national
holiday is marked; on the other hand, everything is closed. We must therefore be prepared to adapt our
plans to the circumstances as they arise. Since you are required to report on your “place” on Monday and
to incorporate your impressions of your “place” into paper one, I have assembled the following list of
locations related to the stories we will have read in the first two weeks of class:
Notre Dame Cathedral is the setting for Green’s story and unavoidable in any case. You will find it
accessible on Friday and Sunday, but remember that you may have to stand in line, so I would advise
going in the early morning or late afternoon when the heat is not so bad; also remember that this IS a
church, so mass is conducted frequently, especially on Sunday. Be respectful. You might even want to
attend mass, but in any case, keep your voice down and wear appropriate clothing. I do NOT advise
climbing the bell tower, although of course you are welcome to do so, but expect a very long, hot wait in
line. The view of the front of the cathedral is iconic, but don’t forget to look at it from the back as well.
There is a fairly pleasant, surprisingly uncrowded park behind Notre Dame where you can marvel at the
flying buttresses.
Hemingway when he first moved to Paris lived, worked and recreated on the Left Bank. His first
apartment was located at 74 rue du Cardinal Lemoine and his studio was just around the corner at 39 rue
Descartes; you will not be able to go inside these buildings, but you can observe the neighborhood
around them. You can, however, go to Shakespeare & Co., and you should. It is located just across the
river from Notre Dame, at 37 rue de la Bucherie, open daily (although probably not on Bastille Day) noonmidnight. This is not Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare & Co., which was located at 12 rue de l’Odeon, now a
clothing store, but is a kind of eccentric, illegitimate heir to it and a truly bizarre, Bohemian kind of
bookstore with an eclectic and inexpensive assortment of English language books, the perfect affordable
souvenir or gift for the literarily inclined; make sure the check-out person stamps the inside front cover of
whatever you purchase with the Shakespeare & Co. logo. Note that the last time I was there, they only
accepted cash. Should you find yourself parched after shopping, you may wish to spend the money you
saved on cheap books at Hemingway’s favorite haunt, Harry’s New York Bar at 5 rue Daunou. Finally,
observe the booksellers of whom Hemingway writes in People of the Seine up and down the quais
around Notre Dame.
The Catacombs, which are pertinent in Nerval’s The Green Monster, are in theory open 10-5 TuesdaySaturday, but I seriously doubt they will be open on Bastille Day, and our schedule on Friday may not
allow time to explore them. If, however, we can manage a visit, the entrance is at 1 pl. Denfert-Rochereau
in Montparnasse on the Left Bank and the admission fee is 5 euros. I have never been, but my better half
tells me it takes about an hour, it is not very well lit, and he recommends close-toed shoes. Not for the
squeamish.
The Sorbonne is the setting for The Man with the Collecting Box. The university itself will of course be
closed for Bastille Day, but conveniently the area around the Sorbonne is the chief concern of the story.
Maupassant’s Nightmare concerns a walk around several popular and important areas of Paris that you
will not be able to avoid: Champs-Elysees, the Arc de Triomphe, Les Halles (note the topiary sculptures!),
place de la Bastille, and the Seine itself.
Bemelmans’ description of his adventures with Barbara and Georges also take the reader around
important and fashionable areas of the city: Champs-Elysees again, Blvds. Raspail and Montparnasse,
Gare St. Lazare and Gare du Nord, La Madeleine, and the Ritz at 15 pl. Vendome (which also houses
Hemingway’s Bar).
Whereas it might be a good idea to take notes on your “place,” as we all have a tendency to think we will
remember details that we promptly forget, I do not want you to obsess about it. Mostly, I want you to
absorb and reflect on your surroundings. Consider what you thought your chosen “place” would be like
when you read the story and whether or not your “place” conforms to your expectations. How does the
physical reality of your “place” effect your reading of the story?
Monday, July 16: Discuss our excursion to Paris, its various parts, and individual students’ reports on
their story’s setting. If time permits, begin Echenoz’s Plan of Occupancy.
Tuesday, July 17: Continue Echenoz’s Plan of Occupancy; Marsan’s Blind Experiment. Paper one due.
Wednesday, July 18: Gavalda’s What Goes On in Saint-Germain; excerpt from Platt’s French or Foe?:
Plaisir: Flirting, Food, Language and Love (handout).
Thursday, July 19: Grenier’s The House in the Place des Fetes and Saumont’s Iena.
Monday, July 23: Zola’s Squares and Colette’s Montmartre Cemetery and Flora and Fauna in Paris.
Tuesday, July 24: Butor’s The Gare Saint-Lazare.
Wednesday, July 25: Conde’s Family Portrait; paper two due.
Thursday, July 26: Chedid’s The Joyful Death of Fassola and Ravalec’s Feeding the Hungry.
Monday, July 30: Fargue’s The Twentieth Arrondissement and Fleischman’s The Adventure.
Tuesday, July 31: Beigbeder’s Manuscript Found at Saint-Germain-des-Pres.
Wednesday, August 1: Wrap up readings, catch up on any readings missed.
Thursday, August 2: Paper three due.
Paper Assignments
Paper Assignment One: This assignment is slightly more complicated than the other two as it directly
involves your impressions of Paris itself in addition to the texts of the stories we are reading. You will
choose one (or more) of the stories we are reading in the first two weeks of class; you will explore the
setting of that story while we are in Paris on our second weekend (see the back of our anthology for a
convenient map of the stories’ locations); and you will incorporate your observations about the location of
the story into your analysis of the story. I’m leaving this assignment very open-ended because it is so
subjective, but your story analysis needs to be focused and argumentative. Feel free to ask me for help
as you construct your thesis and approach. Papers at the 2000-level should be 3 pages minimum in
length, while those at the 4000-level should be 5 pages minimum and should incorporate material from
Seven Ages of Paris as well as Paris Tales and/or the handouts. For those who are at a loss for a topic,
consider the following:
1-Maupassant and Bemelmans use many of the same streets and landmarks in their accounts, but
Maupassant entitled his The Nightmare while Bemelmans invests his stories with a delighted flippancy,
even as he writes of the criminal element of Paris. Based on your experience of the environs of Paris to
which both authors refer, who captures the spirit of the city more accurately?
2-Using Bemelmans’ I Love You, I Love You, I Love You, and Perec’s The Runaway, construct a child’s
view of Paris. How might a child’s experience differ from that of an adult, and why?
3-It has been noted, by people more knowledgeable than myself, that the French have a maddening and
schizophrenic attitude toward money. On the one hand, the subject is taboo in polite society, and the
discussion of salaries and prices is consider the kind of gauche topic of interest only to Americans. On the
other hand, almost everything in Paris is hugely expensive and the city is the proud capital of haute
couture. [This contradiction is best epitomized, I think, by the fact that websites for designers like Louis
Vuitton and Dior are full of pictures of beautiful items, but it is impossible to find out how much they cost!]
Document and analyze the role of money in Paris through your own experience and the works we have
read, such as Reda’s Rue du Commerce, Balzac’s The Last Napoleon, Nerval’s The Green Monster,
Bemelmans’ Star of Hope, and Duras’ Paris.
4-We cannot help but notice that non-French writers, like Bemelmans and Hemingway, are far less critical
of Paris than long term French residents, such as Duras, Balzac, and Maupassant. Document the
shortcomings and the glories of Paris according to these authors and, considering your own experiences
in the city, discuss which point of view seems more accurate to you; but remember that your own position
as tourist may well influence your feelings on the subject.
5-For 4000-level students: using the pertinent passages from Horne’s Seven Ages of Paris regarding the
history of the catacombs OR the history of Notre Dame and its fate during WWII, analyze the propriety of
the setting of either Nerval’s The Green Monster or Green’s In Notre-Dame.