[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"doc-detail-116460-en":3,"doc-seo-116460-105":30,"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":90},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",{"doc_id":7,"user_id":8,"nickname":9,"user_avatar":10,"doc_module":4,"category_id":11,"category_name":12,"doc_title":13,"doc_description":14,"doc_content":15,"file_id":16,"file_url":17,"file_type":18,"file_size":19,"view_count":4,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":20,"is_downloadable":20,"audit_status":20,"page_count":21,"language":22,"language_code":23,"site_id":24,"html_lang":23,"table_of_contents":25,"faqs":26,"seo_title":27,"seo_description":14,"update_tm":28,"read_time":29},116460,8796095461610,"Oliver","https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_276721f389ce27ea32af1340a28f341c",2,"Literature","Paris Was Ours - Thirty-Two Writers Reflect on the City of Light","Paris Was Ours gathers thirty-two writers’ perspectives on Paris as a lived, contested, and endlessly reframed experience. Through personal essays introduced by Penelope Rowlands, the collection traces first arrivals, daily rituals, social customs, and literary obsessions, connecting foreignness with belonging. The opening “L’Arrivée” sets a tone of cinematic longing, disorientation, and language-driven humility, then shows how work, friendships, and cultural misunderstandings gradually reshape one’s relationship to the city and its myths.","PARIS WAS OURS  \n[OceanofPDF.com](OceanofPDF.com)  \nPARIS WAS OURS  \nTHIRTY-TWO WRITERS REFLECT ON THE CITY OF LIGHT  \nEDITED BY  \nPenelope Rowlands  \n[OceanofPDF.com](OceanofPDF.com)  \nPublished by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill Post Office Box 2225 Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225  \na division of Workman Publishing  \n225 Varick Street New York, New York 10014  \n© 2011 by Penelope Rowlands. All rights reserved.  \nPrinted in the United States of America. Published simultaneously in Canada by Thomas Allen & Son Limited. Design by April Leidig-Higgins.  \nFor permission to reprint some of the essays included in this book, grateful acknowledgment is made to the holders of copyright, publishers, and representatives named on pages 277–78, which constitute an extension of the copyright page.  \nLibrary of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Paris was ours : thirty-two writers reflect on the city of light / edited by Penelope Rowlands.  \n[p. cm](p. cm).  \nISBN 978-1-56512-953-5  \n1. Paris (France)—Description and travel. 2. Paris (France)—Social life and customs. 3. Visitors, Foreign—France—Paris—Biography. 4. City life—France—Paris. I. Rowlands, Penelope.  \nDC707 .P256 2011 944′.36100922—dc22 2010030560  \n10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1  \nFirst Edition  \n[OceanofPDF.com](OceanofPDF.com)  \nFor Julian, filius et lux  \n[OceanofPDF.com](OceanofPDF.com)  \nCONTENTS  \nIntroduction: L’Arrivée  \nVéronique Vienne, L’Argent Is No Object Diane Johnson, Learning French Ways Walter Wells, Becoming a Parisian Caroline Weber, Love without Reason Samuel Shimon, Keep Your Distance Joe Queenan, Friends of My Youth Valerie Steiker, Fledgling Days David Sedaris, The Tapeworm Is In  \nJeremy Mercer, My Bookstore High Mark Gaito, Chantal’s Gift Alice Kaplan, My Day with Mr. D.  \nJanine di Giovanni, Parenting, French-Style  \nPatric Kuh, Deal With It  \nC. K. Williams, Two Paris Poems Natasha Fraser-Cavassoni, Understanding Chic Julie Lacoste, It’s My Home, That’s All  \nJanet McDonald, Just Another American Judith Warner, Toward a Politics of Quality of Life Roxane Farmanfarmaian, Out of the Revolution Lily Tuck, My Literary Paris Zoé Valdés, The Tribulations ofa Cuban Girl in Paris Richard Armstrong, Montparnasse and Beyond Judith Thurman, Guillaume à Paris Karen Schur, Ma Vie Bohème Edmund White, A Mild Hell Alicia Drake, The Sky Is Metallic Stacy Schiff, In Franklin’s Footsteps Brigid Dorsey, Litost Noelle Oxenhandler, La Bourdonneuse Marcelle Clements, Paris Is Gone, All Gone David Lebovitz, Enfin  \nPenelope Rowlands, Le Départ  \nContributors  \nCredits and Permissions  \n[OceanofPDF.com](OceanofPDF.com)  \nINTRODUCTION  \nL’Arrivée  \nI’MA PARISIAN of the recurrent, revolving-door kind. I first moved to the French capital in my early twenties with my then boyfriend, sailing grandlyon the Queen Elizabeth II, which, thanks to a miraculous marketing gimmick known as Youth Fare, allowed us to take the six-day voyage to Cherbourg with all the luggage we could stash for the appealing sum of $125 each. It was late November—the last Atlantic crossing of the season—and the waves seemed as gray and menacing as sharks; the air, as we circumnavigated the upper deck each afternoon, felt embalming.  \nBut we were past feeling. Finding ourselves in the middle of the ocean only reminded us that we’d taken a step that couldn’t be undone. We were heading off to live in a city that we knew only glancingly but were sure that we would love, if only because of all the French movies that we had seen together at the hippie college we’d attended in upstate New York. We were major cinephiles, drawn, particularly, to the films of the director Jacques Rivette, whose spaced-out, chain-smoking young protagonists wore tight jeans and indulged in long nocturnal monologues. Just like us. One Rivette masterpiece, in particular, held us in its thrall: Paris nous appartient, which we translated, loosely, as Paris Is Ours. Soon, we knew, it would belong tous, too.  \nAfter we arrived at Cherbourg, we","cbCaisLDSY9errRc","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaisLDSY9errRc","pdf",1130831,1,225,"English","en",105,"# Introduction: L’Arrivée\n## Véronique Vienne, L’Argent Is No Object\n## Diane Johnson, Learning French Ways\n## Walter Wells, Becoming a Parisian\n## Caroline Weber, Love without Reason\n## Samuel Shimon, Keep Your Distance\n## Joe Queenan, Friends of My Youth\n## Valerie Steiker, Fledgling Days\n## David Sedaris, The Tapeworm Is In\n## Jeremy Mercer, My Bookstore\n## High Mark Gaito, Chantal’s Gift\n## Alice Kaplan, My Day with Mr. D.\n## Janine di Giovanni, Parenting, French-Style\n## Patric Kuh, Deal With It\n## C. K. Williams, Two Paris Poems\n## Natasha Fraser-Cavassoni, Understanding Chic\n## Julie Lacoste, It’s My Home, That’s All\n## Janet McDonald, Just Another American\n## Judith Warner, Toward a Politics of Quality of Life\n## Roxane Farmanfarmaian, Out of the Revolution\n## Lily Tuck, My Literary Paris\n## Zoé Valdés, The Tribulations of a Cuban Girl in Paris\n## Richard Armstrong, Montparnasse and Beyond\n## Judith Thurman, Guillaume à Paris\n## Karen Schur, Ma Vie Bohème\n## Edmund White, A Mild Hell\n## Alicia Drake, The Sky Is Metallic\n## Stacy Schiff, In Franklin’s Footsteps\n## Brigid Dorsey, Litost\n## Noelle Oxenhandler, La Bourdonneuse\n## Marcelle Clements, Paris Is Gone, All Gone\n## David Lebovitz, Enfin\n# Penelope Rowlands, Le Départ","[{\"question\":\"What is the focus of Paris Was Ours?\",\"answer\":\"The book presents reflections by thirty-two writers on Paris, exploring how the city is perceived through experience, culture, and personal narrative.\"},{\"question\":\"Who edited Paris Was Ours?\",\"answer\":\"Penelope Rowlands is the editor of the collection.\"},{\"question\":\"What does the introduction “L’Arrivée” describe?\",\"answer\":\"“L’Arrivée” recounts an author’s first move to Paris, emphasizing disorientation, cinematic expectations, and learning French through everyday humiliations and misunderstandings.\"}]","Paris Was Ours - 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