Echoes Along The Seine

Chapter 29, Part I of IV from
"Hemingway's Paris and Pamplona, Then and Now"
By Robert Forrest Burgess
Paris Kiosque - Dec 2001 / Jan 2002 - Vol. 8, N. 12
Copyright (c) 2001 Robert Forrest Burgess
Used with permission - Excerpted from
"Hemingway's Paris and Pamplona, Then and Now";
Chapter 29 - Part I of IV.

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Whenever Hemingway wrote about Paris, the Seine River was always part of it, whether he mentioned it or not. Anyone who has ever lived in Paris is aware of the important role the river plays. It has been said that Paris makes love to the Seine. This is true. Parisians embrace their river with intense affection. Artists and lovers have always found this broad, meandering river with its wide stone quais, arched stone bridges, shade trees and many marble benches for lovers and admirers one of the reasons Paris is such a romantic, unforgettable feast for all the senses. Paris is the Seine is Paris even though Miss Stein may never have said it. Yet, nothing is truer.

Over time, some things about this river have changed, but not much. Its waters may still be polluted, but its pale greenness makes it look clean. The steady stream of noisy automobiles, motor scooters and high-rise buses that whiz over the bridges or get stalled on them, besmirches some of the pleasant scenery. But in the past it was the slower, more prolonged noise of galloping hooves, smelly, horse-drawn carriages and freight wagons with thundering wheels. Today's clouds of gagging exhaust fumes are health-threatening, and the people pollution is worse than ever. But that's about all that has changed. Thankfully, not too much else disturbs the Seine's peaceful natural beauty. With luck she may make it into the 21 st Century relatively intact.

To see the river and its trappings in its natural guise you have to get up early in the morning and go look at it. Even if it's just from your hotel balcony. Best view however is at street level, perhaps from a bridge such as le Pont du Carrousel looking toward the sunrise and L'Île de la Cité. If you are early enough, most vehicles will still be doing what they do so well in the depths of someone's underground garage, or they will simply be curbed and quiet. Then if you are really lucky, you may see what makes this Grande Dame of a city so special.

Seen in early morning mists on a bright morning in May, this is the scene that artists have painted and poets have rhapsodized over from time immemorial. It is the exact same scene, with slight variations of course, that young Ernest Hemingway saw on many mornings he walked along the Seine wondering if he would ever learn to write well enough to make a good living.

Nothing really has changed today. Writers and artists still walk the Seine pondering these questions. The sun still rises over the River Seine and the event is as spectacular as ever. As dawn turns the eastern sky a glowing pale rosé, the morning mists rise up like slowly lifting gossamer curtains, curling and caressing the black barges and rainbow-hued houseboats moored with armthick rough hemp hawsers to the centuries old manhole-sized mooring rings embedded in the stone walled quai. Curling ever upward past bridge abutments, up over gracefully arched stone bridges with their black Parisian lamp posts, up over the black bronze mailed knight and rearing steed, up past the flying buttresses, and glaring gargoyles to play with the upthrust towers and spire of Notre Dame Cathedral. Then, the first strong clear sharp light appears, setting fire to spire and tower edges, a halo of gold and rosé grows glowing and brilliant momentarily silhouetting the entire scene, a masterpiece in all its brief glory for any artist, poet or author quick enough to capture it.

Possibly no other people in the world take more sensual pleasure in their river than Parisians. You see it everywhere. You see it in just the number of occupied marble benches that are placed discretely where river lovers can see the prettiest river sights. And speaking of lovers, they still unabashedly embrace each other on these same benches as they did in Hemingway's day and long before that, the same way they will long after this. They are all in tune with and acutely aware of the nearness of their romantic River Seine, but as you might expect they have eyes only for each other.

Even in adverse weather the river has charms. A windy, brisk gray day in May the sky lays like a sodden wool blanket over the Pont du Carrousel where cobblestones gleam from recent rain. A cold wind rips down the river. No bateau mouches today. The backpack feels heavy and good, the straps tight against my shoulders. It's good to be in Paris again. Put out all your antennae, I tell myself. Remember everything. It may be your last time. And later after the sun comes out and the day warms, I notice that no matter how hot it gets, the marble slabs atop the Seine's benches always stay cool. And someone always has time to take a moment out of his or her busy day to stop and gaze out upon the river.

That afternoon I hike far along the Seine, marveling at the variety of things people can think of to add to the deck of their live-aboard houseboats to make them look more homey, more like one's backyard. I see an amazing assortment of cats, dogs, furniture, awnings, hammocks, exercise equipment, kayaks, bicycles, children's Jungle Gyms or playpens, barbecue grills, artificial lawns, building supplies, Tiki torches, rows of flower boxes usually containing bright red geraniums, small vegetable gardens, various potted plants, and shrubs, including a few palm trees. All the accouterments of most people's backyards compressed neatly into the rectangular confines of an elegantly kept, brightly painted highly livable river barge on the river Seine parked in front of the romantic city of Paris. Each family's "Island in the Seine." Or as some Frenchmen might say with passion: "Voila! Mon Ark!" And I would have to add just as passionately, "Ah, oui, c'est la vie!"

Whenever the sun comes out, the river walkers are not far behind. Everyone seems to wear a backpack, young and old alike. They are as common in Paris as businessmen's briefcases in New York. Unless, of course, you happen to be a musician. They seldom wear a backpack. They carry an instrument. You see them here and there along the Seine. Solitary soloists playing their cornet, their French horn, their flute to no one in particular. Just playing while everyone else stops momentarily in the shade of the plane trees to listen.

An artist and his easel here, a cello player there, maybe some of it is inspired by the nearby Pont des Arts, the no frills people-only bridge where a popular thing to do is to carry bongo drums with friends down to the riverside quai, sit on grass in the late afternoon sun and beat out a rhythm. On the bridge overhead, street artists paint painting after painting of the Île de la Cité and Notre Dame Cathedral to sell to tourists. They can paint this scene in their sleep. No one tires of it.

End of Part I of IV; Chapter 29 of "Hemingway's Paris and Pamplona, Then and Now".

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Robert F. Burgess who met Ernest Hemingway during his last Pamplona fiesta, describes those events. He tells of Ernest's early Paris and Pamplona years, then returns to Europe to revisit Hemingway's haunts today. He buses and back-packs into the Spanish Pyrenees to retrace the route described by Hemingway in The Sun Also Rises. Finding everything exactly as he described it, including where Jake and Bill cooled their wine bottles while trout fishing, he realizes that Hemingway often wrote more fact than fiction into his novels. From new interviews and perspectives of those who knew him we see a clearer view of the man behind the legend, a man who just before the end knew what he valued most and when he had been the happiest. Burgess shows us where and how Hemingway's legacy still lives on in Paris and Pamplona today. 392 pages, includes never before published pictures of Hemingway, and many others. Paperback: 6 x 9-inches. © Jan. 2000 Published by iUniverse.com. See more about the book at http://www.robertf.burgess.to

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