The RER line quickly comes to my attention since it is situated on the other side of the car park. The vehicles are neatly aligned beneath a corrugated iron hangar. Little thought for environmental aesthetics, however, had gone into its construction. It quickly rids me of the naive notion that somehow everything in the City of Light is going to be of dazzling wonder.
If I’d managed to convince anyone to think of me as a non-tourist, my pointless act of deception abruptly ends at the ticket office. I ferret in a panicked mind for vaguely appropriate words to explain an undignified search for some change. Putting on my best apologetic face, I pull out a 100 franc note.
Misreading the metro map results in an ungainly stagger down the Champs Elysée. I regret my decision to stock up on some weighty classics of English literature in addition to the French books. Sweat burns at the edges of my eyes and I have an hour’s wait before the tourist office opens. I sit down on the cold pavement and watch others gather outside the same building before we are all herded like cattle (the analogy embarrassingly apposite) into the building. Accommodation is everyone’s natural priority. We queue to be told by blasé looking staff where a bed is to be found. A service is offered whereby hotels are telephoned to assess the likelihood of their having vacancies. The staff do not appreciate independent suggestions gleaned from Fodor’s ‘cost conscious’ guide to Europe. The cheapest nightly rate that they come up with is 180 francs, which I agree to pay. The deal is fixed up and a map thrust into my hand with the hotel’s location nonchalantly ringed in red ink. The hotel is close to the Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Montmartre. I want to declare: ‘Hey I’m no tourist, this is a business trip.’ I say nothing but leave with a spring in my step, seeing romance and adventure on the horizon.
Reality soon asserts itself. A soggy shower curtain is draped over the rim of a small bath. On the green linoleum floor there is a pool of water containing all the germs of the last occupant, whom I imagine suffers from unspeakably horrible diseases. The bathroom is windowless and the smell of dampness permeates into the bedroom. This consists of a creaky bed, a wardrobe and a chest of drawers. My belongings, transported in a navy blue rucksack, could fit into a single drawer but I leave them in the rucksack. I leave the suitcase unopened. The room looks out onto more insalubriousness. Clothes dangle from washing lines that criss-cross the gap between buildings. Brown rusted sheeting slopes down, from various levels, to meet in the square’s middle. There are three soot-blackened stairways, clinging to the buildings’ exterior, that seem to lead to nowhere.
The street into which I emerge smells bad. The stench of dog shit lingers. I look down at my shoes and see why. For 48 hours I haven’t spoken to anyone in a non-official capacity. I need a beer, so enter a small bar to order one. The barman looks puzzled when I take my drink onto the terrace. The clouds have cleared and it’s warm enough to sit outside. I sip at my drink while looking furtively at a skinny lady in chic garb on the adjoining table. Passers-by openly eye her up. Absorbed in a magazine, she doesn’t seem to notice them. I get up and walk off with affected casualness. I walk for hours with no real aim in mind; picking up the smell of the Seine before glimpsing its waters.
The banks of the Seine are lined with green metal bouquiniste stalls. The bookselling tradition dates back to the seventeenth century when the Renaissance ushered in an era of ‘vagabond’ booksellers. They were to eventually set up fixed places of business alongside the river. I try to make conversation with one of them who isn’t engrossed in a newspaper or book. Thwarted by my French, we both agree, with consoling smiles, to end our attempts at communication.
I wander into the city’s Latin Quarter and then come across Gibert Jeune bookshop, a seven-storeyed bookshop on Boulevard Saint-Denis. What a p(a)lace. It is said to hold the biggest stock of books in France; providing literature for university students from all fields of study.
To help broach the subject of my French books, I buy the recently published French language edition of A Prayer for Owen Meany in the misguided belief that, knowing the story in English, it will help improve my language skills. An employee, a tiny man with large glasses and good English, expresses a modicum of interest in my business proposal. I arrange to bring the books in tomorrow. The rest of the day passes in a whirlwind of ideas and distractions. A rough calculation of my budgetary needs causes me to check into a hostel in the Marais district. It is cheaper than the previous hotel and has a friendlier receptionist.
Jacques is from a pied noir family, French nationals who were born in Algeria. Keen to practise his English, he listens as I tell him about my day and my bookselling intentions. It turns out that he spent some of his childhood in Oran and had relations who lived just outside Algiers. He asks me to bring down the book I have about the city. (Tout l’inconnu de la Casbah by Lucienne Favre. Published in 1933, Baconnier frères Algier, 1933.)
‘You see the Casbah. It’s so different. Not European,’ he explains.
‘In the Casbah no signs of colonisation. Narrow streets, so different. Beautiful.’
He continues to leaf interestedly though it. ‘Look here.’ Jacques mentions prostitutes; Favre comparing the indigenous women in a favourable light to their European counterparts whom he finds crude.
‘I’ave heard of Brouty, you know. He took Le Corbusier for walk around the Casbah. You know Le Corbusier?’ I nod, not wishing to appear ignorant. And before I properly realise it, Jacques is negotiating a price. I ought to take the book first to Gibert Jeune but Jacques is insistent. ‘I give 500 francs and three days ’ere for free,’ he says.
‘Three days?’
‘And nights too, biensûr.’
‘Four nights.’
We shake hands on the deal. Jacques is clearly delighted with his new purchase. Have I undersold? I console myself by thinking that his enthusiasm might have skewed his valuation of the book in the way that football fans might bet, regardless of the odds, on their team.
At Gibert Jeune the next day I end up showing my wares to a lady whose seniority, I gather, trumps the bespectacled small man when it comes to the buying of stock. After producing an assortment of paperbacks, I pull out the Rimbaud from my bag with a flourish. It doesn’t create the impact I’d been hoping. Surprise is expressed at it having been translated at all. I point out the original black cloth with red plate and gold lettering on its spine. It has a colour frontispiece and six colour plates by Keith Vaughan who has designed the dust jacket with distinctive free flowing lettering. Both the book and its dust jacket are in very good condition so I can’t understand her muted response.
She doesn’t even deign to make an offer, gesturing instead towards a glass bookcase used to display Gibert Jeune’s ‘livres a collectioner.’ I spot the familiar olive-green of Olympia’s Traveller’s Companion. It’s William Burrough’s The Naked Lunch which she takes out to show me the author’s signature. I don’t understand. Is it that they don’t want translations of French works of literature. I accept an offer of 350 francs for the paperbacks and leave the shop with the Rimbaud.