The existentialists, the philosophers, the chansonniers, the jazz musicians, the actors, the film makers, the literary giants and Nobel Prize winners: all of them are here in this spellbinding historiography and intimate biography of a small district in Paris in the decade after World War II. The famed artists and writers living and working in Saint Germain des Pres conjoined in creative and intellectual activity which has influenced generations worldwide.
Originally published to wide critical acclaim in France, "Saint Germain des Pres: The Heart of Paris 1945-1955" is the long-awaited translation of Gerard Bonal s documentation of this unique, almost mythical period in French intellectual and creative life. All the legendary names of that period are assembled in the book - Juliette Greco, Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, Bernard Buffet, Jean Cocteau, Simone de Beauvoir, Margueritte Duras, and more. With his skills as both biographer and novelist, Bonal has filled the book with the romance, adventure, energy, and the intensity of life and times of the Saint Germain district and her famous residents.
Much like the end of the Franco-Prussian war in Montmartre, and the end of World War I in Montparnasse, the decade following the end of World War II coincided with a creative outburst and intellectual scene. From literature to music, from philosophy to dance, from theatre to painting, Bonal details the players in vivid language and unforgettable stories. Essential reading for arts and literary history buffs, and for any lovers of all things Paris, this is the definitive history of how, once more, one of the world s great cities led the way in creative and intellectual life and lifestyle."