Paris: The Secret History

If Adam Gopnik's Paris to the Moon described daily life in contemporary Paris, this book describes daily life in Paris throughout its history: a history of the city from the point of view of the Parisians themselves. Paris captures everyone's imaginations: It's a backdrop for Proust's fictional pederast, Robert Doisneau's photographic kiss, and Edith Piaf's serenaded soldier-lovers; a home as much to romance and love poems as to prostitution and opium dens. The many pieces of the city coexist, each one as real as the next. What's more, the conflicted identity of the city is visible everywhere — between cobblestones, in bars, on the métro.

In this lively and lucid volume, Andrew Hussey brings to life the urchins and artists who've left their marks on the city, filling in the gaps of a history that affected the disenfranchised as much as the nobility. Paris: The Secret History ranges across centuries, movements, and cultural and political beliefs, from Napoleon's overcrowded cemeteries to Balzac's nocturnal flight from his debts. For Hussey, Paris is a city whose long and conflicted history continues to thrive and change. The book's is a picaresque journey through royal palaces, brothels, and sidewalk cafés, uncovering the rich, exotic, and often lurid history of the world's most beloved city.

"The 16th-century French wars of religion were less about Christian theology than about who ruled France; centuries later the French authorities, aided by, a significant number of ordinary citizens 'willingly and enthusiastically' sent tens of thousands of Parisian Jews to their deaths during WWII. In his sprawling, eclectic, self-indulgent and entertaining unofficial antihistory of Paris, Hussey (The Game of War: The Life and Death of Guy Debord), head of French and comparative literature at the University of London in Paris, tells the story of Paris from the perspective of the city's marginal and subversive elements insurrectionists, criminals, immigrants and sexual outsiders. Highlights include descriptions of the Pont-Neuf during the reigns of Henri IV and Louis XIII as a cultural epicenter, a hangout for con artists and prostitutes, and a cauldron of antigovernment, antiroyal and antireligious activity. Hussey also tells of the 'sacred geometry' of Notre-Dame as vivified by Victor Hugo. Also noteworthy in this overstuffed, unrestrained effort are Hussey's critique of former French president Mitterrand as 'a master of double-dealing and double-talk whose only real loyalty was to himself and his position in power,' and Hussey's take on the 2005 riots instigated by violent black and Arab suburban youths." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"The 16th-century French wars of religion were less about Christian theology than about who ruled France; centuries later the French authorities, aided by , a significant number of ordinary citizens 'willingly and enthusiastically' sent tens of thousands of Parisian Jews to their deaths during WWII. In his sprawling, eclectic, self-indulgent and entertaining unofficial antihistory of Paris, Hussey (The Game of War: The Life and Death of Guy Debord), head of French and comparative literature at the University of London in Paris, tells the story of Paris from the perspective of the city's marginal and subversive elements — insurrectionists, criminals, immigrants and sexual outsiders. Highlights include descriptions of the Pont-Neuf during the reigns of Henri IV and Louis XIII as a cultural epicenter, a hangout for con artists and prostitutes, and a cauldron of antigovernment, antiroyal and antireligious activity. Hussey also tells of the 'sacred geometry' of Notre-Dame as vivified by Victor Hugo. Also noteworthy in this overstuffed, unrestrained effort are Hussey's critique of former French president Mitterrand as 'a master of double-dealing and double-talk whose only real loyalty was to himself and his position in power,' and Hussey's take on the 2005 riots instigated by violent black and Arab suburban youths. B&w illus." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"For anyone with notions of Paris as the most romantic city on Earth, try digesting this image of ordinary residents' lives during the Prussian attack of 1870: 'As the siege hardened, the most desperate among them took to digging up corpses in various cemeteries around the city, mincing the bones to make a thin sort of gruel which offered little nutritional value, but at least kept them warm.'

... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) Or consider this description: 'In 1776, the common grave, into which the poor of Paris had been flung like so much garbage over the centuries, began to subside; dead bodies began to appear in rotten lumps, breaking through the cellar walls of nearby houses alongside flesh-eating rats.'

Have the stomach for more? Consider the fate of Francois Ravaillac, the fanatic who assassinated King Henri IV in 1607: 'He was scalded, ripped into pieces and part of his torso was roasted and eaten by the mob before the rest of him was reduced to ashes.'

Andrew Hussey, a British-born historian who has made a career of writing accounts of offbeat movements in French history, has titled his latest, meticulously researched book 'Paris: The Secret History.' He might have more accurately named it 'Paris: The Sordid History' for its breathless race across more than 2,000 years of massacres, revolutions, insurrections, riots, wars, beheadings, plagues and poverty.

This is the rat's-eye view of Paris, captured in stomach-churning snapshots of its most visceral moments. Hussey undresses the city, its residents and its rulers. Though he reveals few real secrets that have not been unearthed by previous authors or journalists, he chronicles a side of Parisian history not found in tourist guides or, for that matter, in most French school textbooks. (Imagine picking up a guidebook with this scene from the Cathedral of Notre Dame, one of the world's most visited churches: 'The `Fete des Fous', an orgiastic four-day saturnalia that took place in the cathedral, often ending in murder and group sex, was tolerated long into the sixteenth century.') But within the broad sweep of endless mayhem, debauchery and vermin nibbling on corpses, Hussey provides valuable historical context for the Islamophobia, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, social unrest and national malaise of today's France.

The author describes the 'virulent Islamophobia at work in Christian Paris' in the 1300s, 'the conquest of Algeria in 1830' and the 'wave of Islamist-inspired bombings which terrified the city in the 1980s and 1990s.' He juxtaposes those historical currents with the arsons and police clashes that convulsed impoverished suburban neighborhoods of immigrants and their French-born offspring — many of them Muslim — throughout the country in the fall of 2005.

Paris also has often been the setting for clashes between the elites and the mass population. In particular, Hussey recounts Paris' student demonstrations, dating to the first on record, a 1229 protest against an increase in wine prices at a tavern in the Faubourg Saint-Marcel, and he explains why the 1968 uprisings were so pivotal in French politics: 'For the first time this was not the revolt of an impoverished and half-starved underclass ... but a rebellion by middle-class students.' Over the centuries, Hussey, shows, French leaders have been beheaded, dethroned and overthrown because of their failure to understand or relate to the masses — which provides a partial explanation of why today's government remains so terrified of public sentiment that last spring's student demonstrations paralyzed reform efforts and sank the presidential aspirations of Prime Minister Dominque de Villepin. After reading Hussey's book, one realizes Villepin was fortunate; at least he kept his head.

Hussey also explores the schisms in society that Parisians have been unable to bridge since the city's founding as a muddy enclave on the Ile de la Cite. The social and political elite remain largely oblivious to the city's underclasses. For centuries, they have watched wars and protests from their balconies or their horse-drawn carriages, returning to their dinner tables when they became bored by the spectacle. Last spring, while French police pummeled student demonstrators with high-pressure water hoses and tear gas, upper-crust clients sat deep inside pricey restaurants sipping wine not half a block away. During the suburban violence of the previous fall, residents of Paris were all but oblivious to the destruction and unrest at the far ends of the Metro lines.

You may feel as though you need a long, hot shower after 433 relentless pages of carnage, misery and rat infestations, but you'll come away with a deeper understanding of a people, a culture and a city that the rest of the world has simultaneously envied and maligned.

Molly Moore is Paris bureau chief of The Washington Post.

" Reviewed by Molly Moore, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group)
(hide most of this review)

"For anyone with notions of Paris as the most romantic city on Earth, try digesting this image of ordinary residents' lives during the Prussian attack of 1870: 'As the siege hardened, the most desperate among them took to digging up corpses in various cemeteries around the city, mincing the bones to make a thin sort of gruel which offered little nutritional value, but at least kept them warm.'

... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) Or consider this description: 'In 1776, the common grave, into which the poor of Paris had been flung like so much garbage over the centuries, began to subside; dead bodies began to appear in rotten lumps, breaking through the cellar walls of nearby houses alongside flesh-eating rats.'

Have the stomach for more? Consider the fate of Francois Ravaillac, the fanatic who assassinated King Henri IV in 1607: 'He was scalded, ripped into pieces and part of his torso was roasted and eaten by the mob before the rest of him was reduced to ashes.'

Andrew Hussey, a British-born historian who has made a career of writing accounts of offbeat movements in French history, has titled his latest, meticulously researched book 'Paris: The Secret History.' He might have more accurately named it 'Paris: The Sordid History' for its breathless race across more than 2,000 years of massacres, revolutions, insurrections, riots, wars, beheadings, plagues and poverty.

This is the rat's-eye view of Paris, captured in stomach-churning snapshots of its most visceral moments. Hussey undresses the city, its residents and its rulers. Though he reveals few real secrets that have not been unearthed by previous authors or journalists, he chronicles a side of Parisian history not found in tourist guides or, for that matter, in most French school textbooks. (Imagine picking up a guidebook with this scene from the Cathedral of Notre Dame, one of the world's most visited churches: 'The `Fete des Fous', an orgiastic four-day saturnalia that took place in the cathedral, often ending in murder and group sex, was tolerated long into the sixteenth century.') But within the broad sweep of endless mayhem, debauchery and vermin nibbling on corpses, Hussey provides valuable historical context for the Islamophobia, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, social unrest and national malaise of today's France.

The author describes the 'virulent Islamophobia at work in Christian Paris' in the 1300s, 'the conquest of Algeria in 1830' and the 'wave of Islamist-inspired bombings which terrified the city in the 1980s and 1990s.' He juxtaposes those historical currents with the arsons and police clashes that convulsed impoverished suburban neighborhoods of immigrants and their French-born offspring — many of them Muslim — throughout the country in the fall of 2005.

Paris also has often been the setting for clashes between the elites and the mass population. In particular, Hussey recounts Paris' student demonstrations, dating to the first on record, a 1229 protest against an increase in wine prices at a tavern in the Faubourg Saint-Marcel, and he explains why the 1968 uprisings were so pivotal in French politics: 'For the first time this was not the revolt of an impoverished and half-starved underclass ... but a rebellion by middle-class students.' Over the centuries, Hussey, shows, French leaders have been beheaded, dethroned and overthrown because of their failure to understand or relate to the masses — which provides a partial explanation of why today's government remains so terrified of public sentiment that last spring's student demonstrations paralyzed reform efforts and sank the presidential aspirations of Prime Minister Dominque de Villepin. After reading Hussey's book, one realizes Villepin was fortunate; at least he kept his head.

Hussey also explores the schisms in society that Parisians have been unable to bridge since the city's founding as a muddy enclave on the Ile de la Cite. The social and political elite remain largely oblivious to the city's underclasses. For centuries, they have watched wars and protests from their balconies or their horse-drawn carriages, returning to their dinner tables when they became bored by the spectacle. Last spring, while French police pummeled student demonstrators with high-pressure water hoses and tear gas, upper-crust clients sat deep inside pricey restaurants sipping wine not half a block away. During the suburban violence of the previous fall, residents of Paris were all but oblivious to the destruction and unrest at the far ends of the Metro lines.

You may feel as though you need a long, hot shower after 433 relentless pages of carnage, misery and rat infestations, but you'll come away with a deeper understanding of a people, a culture and a city that the rest of the world has simultaneously envied and maligned.

Molly Moore is Paris bureau chief of The Washington Post.

" Reviewed by Reza AslanMartin van CreveldFlora FraserRon CharlesMolly Moore, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group)
(hide most of this review)

"In the closing pages...Andrew Hussey notes, 'As violence and terror dominated the streets, sex and love somehow still remained central to the ethos and mythology of Paris.' As it happens, he is referring to the mid-1990's, but the description could apply to almost any period in the last 500 years. Paris, Mr. Hussey amply demonstrates, has always been a city of darkness as well as light." New York Times

"This is a timely book, for Hussey observes that Paris is still being shaped by new arrivals who are playing a role in remaking the city yet again." Library Journal

"An immensely readable, richly detailed and sometimes disturbing chronicle that explores much of the darkness in the City of Lights." Kirkus Reviews

If Adam Gopnik's "Paris to the Moon" described daily life in contemporary Paris, this book describes daily life in the city throughout its history. Two 8-page inserts.

Andrew Hussey is a cultural historian and biographer. His previous book, a critically acclaimed biography of Guy Debord, was published in 2001. He is Lecturer in French studies at the University of Aberystwyth and divides his time between Ireland, Wales and Paris.