Off topic, but on topic for both all the fnac talk, and another SF favourite Revolut, for those who have a Revolut I noticed just now that one of their ‘rewards’ discounts is 6% off gift cards at fnac (as with when Amazon do this I assume the idea is you buy the gift card for the discounted price then can redeem it pretty much immediately for goods, giving you what is effectively discounted goods). Not much off, but can be used in both fnac and darty, and a discount is a discount!
There are two Gibert Jeune left in the Latin Quarter, on 23 and 27 Quai St-Michel, just round the corner from the 4 Gibert Jeune bookshops on Place St-Michel that closed two months ago (after 135 years), huge loss, especially the big six-storey flagship one that I take it you’re referring to. Sadly, the writing had been on the wall for them for at least a decade, the pandemic has finished them off.
The two remaining Gibert Jeune on the Quai St-Michel are much smaller though and in a parlous state too I understand. It’s a great shame as #23 is a bit of a Paris institution, it’s an esoteric bookshop, so they specialise in esoterism, religion, spirituality and all that funky chicken. Lots of second-hand books too as per the Gibert Jeune system.
That comes on the back of the definite closure of the great Boulinier bookshop last year, another Quartier Latin institution, 200 yards further down the Boul’Mich from the main Gibert Jeune. It was a great place, also with a substantial second-hand section, lots of stonking offers (such as 2 DVDs for 1 € etc.).
Rents are far too high in central Paris for bookshops to survive, even the established ones, the pression immobilière is just too strong. If the owners don’t actually own the premises when leases come for renewal, they have no choice but to either move or pack it in. I know many bookshops and businesses in Paris who have folded because of that. It happened recently (pre-Covid I mean) to the great Les Mots à la bouche in the Marais, the first LGBT bookshop in France (opened 40 yrs ago), they’ve had to move to the 9th in (substantially subsidised) premises owned by the Paris Municipality, their rent is a fraction of what they had to fork out in the Marais.
Rents are seriously insane in the Marais. A couple of years ago, the (now defunct) small Chez Jo Goldenberg restaurant was (sadly remembered for that) on Rue des Rosiers in the heart of the Marais came up for rent (the resto shut years ago): €700,000 a year, including charges & rates I believe (I should think so!). That’s for 180 m carrés… Some fancy Leroy-Merlin concept store took over, they organise company seminars there now, do workshops for the bobos, teach them how to use power tools and make bits of furniture etc. Not sure how long it’ll survive but I bet not long…
Yes, I know but the ones that have folded were the most significant. Although fire safety did always slightly worry me!
Both were favourite places of my various daughters who were in prépa a couple of minutes away.
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Howdid he get a puncture lung?
I happened to catch a bit of a BBC news bulletin yesterday - a report of a speech or statement by the new DUP leader blaming the EU for imposing the Northern Ireland Protocol - and that was it. No mention of the fact that the NIP was in fact an agreement between the UK government, Ireland and the EU, no mention that it (or May’s ‘backstop’) were the only UK suggestions to allow the imposition of brexit on Northern Ireland (without creating a land border).
So that’s it, I thought - the BBC has accepted uncritically the Tory version of reality - as most of the media always have - and probably soon most of the people in the UK will too.
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Indeed - in fact one wonders whether the real reason for the Johnson-Orban meeting was that Johnson wanted tips on the next steps needed for a full stranglehold on the nation.
Cool, et elles crèchent toujours à/sur Paname ?
4/5 oui - 3 sont encore en plein dans leurs études!
Ah ouais qd même, t’as pas chômé dis donc, 5 filles, félicitations. J’imagine que tu connais (ou as entendu parler de) Peter Sarstedt, disparu y’a peu, j’aime bien son gros tube (de 1969) Where do you go to my lovely?, pour sa mélodie, pour Zizi Jeanmaire (également récemment disparue), mais aussi pour ça: “You live in a fancy apartment, Off the Boulevard St. Michel”.
Ça va, elles se plaisent à Paris, sont pas trop insupportables ces Parigot(e)s ? 
La celèbre librairie Shakespeare and Company au coin de la Place St-Michel ( arguably the most famous independent bookstore in the world) tire pas mal la langue aussi depuis le premier confinement y’a 14 mois mais bon, la proprio, Sylvia (Beach) Whitman (la fille du fondateur, George Whitman, décédé y’a quelques années, que j’ai connu, un type formidable, d’une grande générosité, + de 30,000 “Tumbleweeds” accueillis) et son mari possèdent les murs et ont aussi le café attenant qui tourne bien, donc ils devraient s’en sortir une fois les touristes de retour car ils marchent surtout avec les non-Français. Vers 2015 ils ont la bonne idée d’ouvrir ce café qui maintenant, bon, assure la pérennité du business.
Les bouquinistes aussi ont bien morflé les pauvres…
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J’ai utilisé ‘where do you go to my lovely’ en classe avec mes L spé (du temps où il y avait encore des L) 
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You should pop up to Edinburgh Frédéric and visit Typewronger Books - the guy that runs it (single-handedly I believe) used to work in Shakespeare & Co - and is a really interesting character. Good books too.
Thanks Geof, duly noted.
Tumbleweeding legend has it that a Scottish poet stayed 7 years as a Tumbleweed in Shakespeare and Company, maybe it’s him! 7 years is the record among the 30,000+ Tumbleweeds who stayed at least 1 night in Shakespeare and Co (record for 1 night is 30 Tumbleweeds! The place is small as you may know if you’ve visited, there were Tumbleweeds in every single nook and cranny that night, even wedged between two shelves!).
(some great photos in this Tumbleweed’s blog).
George Whitman’s daughter, Sylvia Beach Whitman, whom he had when he was 70 (she was born in France but left aged to England aged 2 when her English mother divorced Whitman in the early 1990s), took over in the mid-2000s as her father’s poor health prevented him from running the place (he died in 2011, aged 98). Anyway, she runs the bookshop now, along with her French husband, and the Tumbleweeding tradition has been somewhat scaled down, they still allow a few Tumbleweeds to stay in but not for weeks on end and you have to put in the hours I understand, you can’t just volunteer for an hour a day and stay a fortnight for instance as it was the case under George Whitman (no relation to Walt BTW), who used to live in an attic room at the top of the bookshop (a tiny room, wall to wall books of course, even the sole window had been blocked out with a bookcase). Under George, Tumbleweeds also had to write one page about their experience at the bookshop, these pages are kept in big folders upstairs; nowadays, I think Tumbleweeds just have to write a post-it message, it’s pinned on a board.
It’s more business minded now but needs must, times have changed, running a bookshop in hyper-central Paris like in the pre-internet days is doomed to fail so they’ve had to adapt, hence their opening a small café next door in 2015 (great views over Notre-Dame and the Seine), it employs 30 people and provides the bulk of the €6 million annual turnover.
What It’s Like to Live Inside the Legendary Paris Bookstore Shakespeare & Co.
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Ha Fréderic! of course those of a certain vintage remember that hit from Peter Sarstedt it went all over the world. A child could sing it and not know what it really meant.
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PS Marks & Spencer was saved for many years by the food business they opened too.
I thought Peter was still alive… but sadly not
Peter Sarstedt and his brothers were among the many Anglo-Indians that became pop stars after their families moved to the UK (or other countries) in the diaspora following Indian independence - others include Engelbert Humperdinck and Cliff Richards. I’ve often wondered why so many people with this very particular cultural background were successful in such a particular and competitive field.
Freddie Mercury too I think.
Nooo Freddie Mercury was born in Zanzibar although there were some Indian influences in the history of the Sultanate but I too thought that he was more Indian… perhaps that’s where it comes from.