excerpt
Paris calls no one but lets it be thought that she does; she has ever allowed herself to be sung she is a grande dame who cannot live without the song and the troubadour dame and fountain, she is an illusion without which the West would not exist, and it is surely for this reason that, Hitler’s orders notwithstanding, it was not blown up by the Germans
synopsis
Paris não acaba nunca affords a journey that no tourist guide offers. The great protagonist of the book is Paris herself, the Paris of Hemingway, Joyce, Fitzgerald and Victor Hugo. With them, the reader walks through the streets and along the banks of the Seine, sees the blooming of spring and the yellow-ochre of fall, sits in bars to have a Bordeaux or a Beaujolais. The reader discovers that Paris is a literary city as Rio de Janeiro is musical, but above all he rediscovers that he can be surprised at each step and that leisure is fundamental. And because Paris is not Paris without the art of its shop windows and its gourmet food stores, we are led to consider the importance of beauty and the pleasure of tasting.
Through her manner of description, Betty Milan involves us, and with her we make our way through streets as hospitable as the squares and gardens. On this wandering there are passages that are like film sets, which transport to other places and make us look inward in self-discovery.
history
Launched in 1996, Paris não acaba nunca comprises crônicas published in the São Paulo daily newspaper Jornal da Tarde during 1995. The book had several editions in Brazil. Hailed by Jacques Chirac, then mayor of Paris, it was distributed to passengers with the compliments of Air France. It was translated into English and French and published online by 00h00.com. In 2005, it was translated into Mandarin and published in China by Editora Educativa in Liaoning.
opinion
“Betty Milan’s graceful and involving language makes Paris não acaba nunca a delightful book. In it appear the smells, the colors, and the tastes of Paris, which the author celebrates like one in love with the city that makes the world dream.”
Neide Archanjo, Brazilian Book Magazine, August 1996
areas of interest
Literature, Tourism.