Laurel Zuckerman's Paris Weblog

David Raether on What It's Like to Fail

David Raether’s autobiographical essay  “What It’s Like to Fail” was selected by both The Atlantic and Longform as excellent journalism and one of the best essays of 2013 and has been viewed by nearly 200,000  readers online. Formerly a smash hit TV writer in Hollywood, David Raethner lost his home and his marriage and ended up homeless, a journey he recounts in his darkly comic memoir, Tell Me Something, She Said.

Fascinated by his essay, I contacted David, who kindly agreed to answer our questions about the exceptional ups and downs of his writing life.

A beautiful essay on why we love books by Leopold Stern

Booklovers fighting the onslaught of dematerialized ebooks find lots of reasons to defend the old-fashioned book - the feel of the paper, the smell of the pages, the beauty of the binding - but it was not until I read the essay "Mon Livre" written by Léopold Stern as a refugee in Rio de Janeiro in 1942 that felt I had stumbled upon the truth.

Paris book lovers: mark your calendar for Festival America Sep 11 to 14, 2014

PARIS BOOK NEWS : September 11- 14 FESTIVAL AMERICA IN VINCENNES

Every two years Vincennes hosts one of the best literary events in Europe: Festival America

It is a unique chance to listen to - and occasionally discuss with - some of the finest English language writers in the World.

The 2014 edition features, as always, absolutely wonderful writers: 

Ryad Assani-Razaki
Jami Attenberg
Margaret Atwood
Paolo Bacigalupi

De Selby Press to publish stunning new illustrated edition of Dubliners - with help from Ulule!

De Selby Press is publishing a stunning new illustrated edition of James Joyce's classic Dubliners. A crowdfunding campaign with ULULE is currently underway to help pay for the printing of this inaugural edition. 

From book buying to founding an indie press - an interview with de Selby's Linda Fallon

HEC: France's elite business school turns fifty!

In 1964, the Général de Gaulle inaugurated France's great business school. HEC would be reserved exclusively for men until 1973. Famous alumni include France's current president, François Hollande (H75)  and former IMF chief Dominique Strauss Kahn (H71).

Other illustrious folk include Pascal Lamy (H69), Jean-Louis Borloo (H76), Valérie Pécresse (H88), Eric Woerth (H81), as well as CEOs  Henri de Castries (H76), Baudouin Prot (H72), Louis Gallois (H66), Henri Proglio (H71), Stéphane Richard (H83), Pierre Feraud (H61), François-Henri Pinault, ,Bruno Lafont (H77), Jean-Paul Agon (H78), Sidney Taurel (H69), and many, many more. Check out HEC's Wikipedia.

Paris Literary Events this Summer

In Paris this July and August, news from writers Meghan O'Rourke, Olivia Baes, Jarrah Burns, Heather Hartley, Jeffrey Greene, Geoffrey Gilbert, Lethu Msimang, Felix Purat, Emma Ramadan, and Venessa Weller, Darcey Steinke, Shakespeare & Co., Shannon Cain,  Alan Riding, Lola Peploe, Charlotte Corman, Stanley Wells, Ian Monk, Nick Calderbank,  Nicole Peyrafitte, Pierre Joris and terrific literary events from Paris Lit Up, AUP Summer Creative Writing Institute, Shakespeare and Company's Bard on Seine Festival and more! Update ongoing!

France's Mysterious Wiretap Practices

FRANCE: After nearly a year of intensive surveillance - including wiretaps, search, seizure and interogation - a suspect who is also the greatest potential rival to the sitting President is charged with crimes unrelated to the original justification for surveillance. Here are a few questions from a curious observer:

 

Heather Stimmler-Halls on Kickstarting Naughty Paris

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 Secrets of Paris author Heather Stimmler Hall launched a major crowdfunding effort today in order to finance the printing costs of the beautiful four-color second edition of the insider Paris guidebook: Naughty Paris: A Lady's Guide to the Sexy City which will be released to the public in December.

Intrigued by her use of crowdfunding - and a longtime fan - I asked Heather to tell us about Naughty Paris' Kickstarter adventure, and how we might help her to succeed!

Anne-Marie O'Connor on the extraordinary tale of Klimt's The Lady in Gold

When Maria Altmann died in 2011 at the age of 94, she left behind a legacy that reached far beyond herself. Her struggle to reclaim Klimt masterpieces that Nazis had stolen from her family in Vienna paved the way, not just for a precedent-setting Supreme Court decision and one of most important restitutions of Nazi looted art in history, but for a long overdue telling of a story that had been too long concealed. 

If I am so excited about Anne-Marie O'Connor's book The Lady in Gold: The Extraordinary Tale of Gustav Klimt's Masterpiece, Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer  it is because she tells that story brilliantly. Framed by a dramatic, high-stakes battle for justice, The Lady in Gold is a cracking good read.  Colorful, engaging and wonderfully detailed, The Lady in Gold resurrects fascinating people in a vanished - and brilliantly complex - world. It is, perhaps, no accident that O'Connor is a seasoned war correspondent, as well as a culture writer. I can only agree with Library Journal when it writes: “The dazzling, nearly surreal ‘Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I’ is about a lot more than just art. O'Connor captures the whole story.” 

Publishing Panel in Paris June 25 at the American University

Meet the panelists!

25 June: 4-6pm The Paris Writers Workshop is opening its doors to the public for the:

Experts’ Panel, “Getting Published – A Writer’s Options”