Meet the People Behind Paris Muse

Lisa Pasold is a poet, journalist and architectural historian who has been leading walks for Paris Muse since 2003. Her first book of poetry Weave was published last year by Frontenac Press. She is also a staff writer for Fodor’s and author of Paris Notes Building Guide.

Lisa recently took a break from correcting proofs for her next collection, A Bad Year for Journalists, to talk to us about her new tour. Passy: Neighborhood of Invention explores spectacular modern buildings tucked away in the chic 16th arrondissement of Paris.

Q: You’re not exactly a 16th arrondissement type of gal, Lisa, although I could definitely see you getting some serious writing done at Le Corbusier’s Villa La Roche. His buildings have always struck me as ideal homes for very productive people! What other sites in Passy are your favorites?

A: I agree about the modernist villas. I love rue Mallet-Stevens for that reason. In Passy, I like market days on rue de l’Annonciation: it feels like the main street of a smaller town, with really wonderful food shops where everyone knows each other. Somehow Passy managed to become “high Parisian” without losing its village charm. In fact, when I moved to Paris ten years ago, one of the first places I lived was a little chambre de bonne (a former maid’s room) in the 16th, right around the corner from some of the most fabulous Art Nouveau buildings in Paris that I take people to see on the tour.

Q: Your Marais tour has always been very popular. Why the lesser-known neighborhood of Passy?

The Marais is a kind of microcosm of central Paris: from the medieval wall built by Philip Augustus to its superb Baroque mansions, through the Revolution and up to the Pompidou—it’s the heart of what we think of as “Paris”.

A: Passy started out as a village, it wasn’t part of Paris at all. Passy was an abbey with Roman vineyards, a mineral spring where celebrities came to take the waters. Traces of this very un-Parisian past are still visible. And because of the open spaces here, the aristocratic gardens and so on, it had available space for new Parisian houses. The architecture had a chance to evolve in a way that was difficult in the center of the city. What’s more, the relative wealth of the neighborhood means the buildings are in fantastic shape, perfect for us to walk around and admire (not like the Marais, which went through a terrible period of decay before turning around in the last 20 years.)

Q: If someone were to choose between your two walking tours, which would you recommend?

A: Well, the two neighborhoods have very different personalities. If Marais is the life-of-the-party fashion designer who’s living in a former Baroque ballroom, Passy is like an elegant older aunt with surprisingly hip contemporary taste.

Q: Speaking of good taste, congratulations on all the great reviews Weave has been receiving. How much of your life in Paris do you think ended up in that collection?

A: Thank you. The poems are inspired by my grandmother’s life—she traveled a great deal, in Europe and elsewhere, and I think the cosmopolitan flavor of Paris, along with its “old world” mentality, helped me write the poems.

Q: I think most people would think of writing and leading tours as very different kinds of activities. Do you think they are at all related?

A: The two complement each other—I can’t do one without the other. The conversations I have with people when I’m leading a tour are so interesting. I honestly don’t know how other writers spend their whole day inside: I’m actually very restless: I find it hard to sit still for hours on end. So walking tours are perfect for me!

The Parisian composer Eric Satie said all his compositions came from walking through Paris; he said the essential rhythm of his music was his footstep on the pavement. I like that idea.

Q: Do you think of yourself as a Parisian poet or a poet who happens to live in Paris?

A: Definitely as a poet who happens to live in Paris. I think if I started to think of myself as Parisian, I might start taking the place for granted. I’ve lived here nearly a decade and I’m still constantly delighted by the city. Every morning I walk from my house up to Sacre-Coeur in Montmartre, just to look at the view and appreciate that I actually live here. It’s a marvelous city to be a writer—especially for me, because I love to walk, and Paris is the ultimate walking city. You can head off in any direction here and you’ll end up in a fascinating street.

Q: So where are some of your favorite places in Paris to write?

A: I have a number of favorite cafes in the Marais, depending on the time of day: Les Philosophes in the morning, the Café Beaubourg in the early afternoon, and the Café Panisse in the evening, because it overlooks Notre Dame and it’s right near Shakespeare & Company, the bookstore. But if I could choose any historic literary house in all of Paris, I would move into Balzac’s house in Passy! That garden…how could you not write every day with a garden like that?

Q: Any good books you’d recommend on the history of Paris or either of your two neighborhoods?

A: Mme de Sevigné lived in the Marais, and her selected letters (there’s a nice little Penguin translation) give you a great picture of life there during the time of Louis XIV. For Passy, Paris Secret et Insolite by Rodolphe Trouilleux has some wonderful tidbits on the neighborhood. For a more general history of the city, there’s Seven Ages of Paris by Alistair Horne. And for reading in cafés, you should take along The Flaneur by Edmund White and my personal all-time favorite, Ernest Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast.

Read another interview with Paris Muse guide Pamela Warner.

 E-mail this page
 Printer-friendly page