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36th out of 767 books
—
1,212 voters
Paris to the Moon
by
Adam Gopnik
Paris. The name alone conjures images of chestnut-lined boulevards, sidewalk cafés, breathtaking façades around every corner--in short, an exquisite romanticism that has captured the American imagination for as long as there have been Americans.
In 1995, Adam Gopnik, his wife, and their infant son left the familiar comforts and hassles of New York City for the urbane glamo...more
In 1995, Adam Gopnik, his wife, and their infant son left the familiar comforts and hassles of New York City for the urbane glamo...more
Paperback, 368 pages
Published
September 11th 2001
by Random House Trade Paperbacks
(first published 2000)
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I have to be honest. I bought this book because I liked the title. Then I got sucked in by the back cover. Who doesn't think the idea of running away w/ your adult family to Paris wouldn't be fantastic?
Gopnik is excellent at revealing the sutle differences between life in the States and France that make up two completely seperate cultures. I felt upon finishing the book that I actually knew the secrets of French thought and behavior. Unfortunately, I now know exactly why I'd never be able to ble...more
Gopnik is excellent at revealing the sutle differences between life in the States and France that make up two completely seperate cultures. I felt upon finishing the book that I actually knew the secrets of French thought and behavior. Unfortunately, I now know exactly why I'd never be able to ble...more
I learned about this book when my niece Anna gave me a copy with the recommendation of how she loved the book and authors writing style (writes for the New Yorker). I quickly found myself savoring my time reading each of the essays that focus on different aspect of authors 5 years living as a NYC transplant in Paris from 1995 - 2000 with wife and son (daughter added to the family just before return).
Adam Gopnik captures the small details of life so deftly.....example is when he describes their...more
Adam Gopnik captures the small details of life so deftly.....example is when he describes their...more
2 likes · like · see review
Adam Gopnik's memoirs of his times spent in Paris is a Sex and the City for grown ups. Seen through a male perspective, Gopnik's Frasier-like love of France, the arts, fine food and wine and a hatred for cheesy American pop culture (AKA Barney) allows anyone who's ever dreamed of dropping everything and leaving for a more romantic lifestyle the ability to do so vicariously through his family. What's refreshing about Gopnik's writing is that he realizes he's living a ridiculously privileged life...more
4 likes · like · see review
Jun 16, 2008
Eleanor
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
American Francophiles, Aspiring Essayists
Recommended to Eleanor by:
Gael Dauvillier
Yes, I realize this is getting cliche, but I am putting this book in my category of "Americans abroad." Even though I don't connect to the "isn't raising kids just a gosh darn trip" facet of this book, I think Gopnik is a fantastic writer and his observations about living in Paris and being American ring very true. What's also interesting is that because this book concerns the years 1995 to 2000 (that is Pre-Euro as the currency, Pre-Sarkozy) it is very interesting to see how much France has cha...more
I can't say enough positive things about this book. Such intricate descriptions of such small things... you can savor it the way the French would want you to. It's a story of a beautiful life in a far away place-- but Gopnick tells it in a way that makes it so accessible (sometimes even ordinary) that he achieves an intimacy that I have not experienced in most books I've read. He also offers a social lens that is stimulating as well as enlightening.
I purposefully took forever reading this book...more
I purposefully took forever reading this book...more
"After all, spinning is its own reward. There wouldn't be carousels if it weren't so."
"And the slightly amused, removed feeling always breaks down as you realize that you don't want to be so lofty and Olympian- or rather, that being lofty and Olympian carries within it, by tradition and precedent, the habit of wishing you could be down there in the plain, taking sides. Even the gods, actually looking down from Olympus in amusement, kept hurtling down to get laid or slug somebody."
"It is just ...more
"And the slightly amused, removed feeling always breaks down as you realize that you don't want to be so lofty and Olympian- or rather, that being lofty and Olympian carries within it, by tradition and precedent, the habit of wishing you could be down there in the plain, taking sides. Even the gods, actually looking down from Olympus in amusement, kept hurtling down to get laid or slug somebody."
"It is just ...more
On a re-reading streak, and after having just finished Gopnik's other essay collection, thought I'd take myself on a vacation of the nostalgic imagination. Serendipity strikes me again: upon opening the book the other evening, I found my boarding pass to the flight that officially relocated me to Paris. If that was not enough, it just so happened that this slipped out from between the pages exactly eight years to the DAY- February 26- that I took the trip that changed my life forever.
Does this s...more
Does this s...more
My husband and I decided to be appropriately literary on our last trip to Paris -- he took Hemingway, I took this book because I love travel memoirs. The basic premise is that Gopnik, a writer for the New Yorker, flees to Paris with his family to save his young firstborn from the insidious influence of Barney the dinosaur.
It's well written, more complicated sentence structure than my usual vacation reading but engrossing. It travels an arc beginning with successfully conveying his naivete about...more
It's well written, more complicated sentence structure than my usual vacation reading but engrossing. It travels an arc beginning with successfully conveying his naivete about...more
May 23, 2007
Kelly
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
americans who have spent or are going to spend any time in Paris
This book is actually a collection of essays from the New Yorker, and they're very insightful. His arguments mostly stem from his own family's experiences and are naturally just small scenes from which he draws grand conclusions. Like most other authors.
However, his awareness of the political scene and the major infighting going on culturally speaks of a very sharp mind. His essays have enough political analysis to show his intelligence, but then will transition into a colorful story about his s...more
However, his awareness of the political scene and the major infighting going on culturally speaks of a very sharp mind. His essays have enough political analysis to show his intelligence, but then will transition into a colorful story about his s...more
I'm re-reading this love letter to Paris, a collection of essays by Adam Gopnik. He writes with such fierce intelligence, and even though some of the "current events" are ten years old, his perspective has a timelessness. Never mind that he's lived my dream- pack it all in and go live and work in Paris.
One of my favorite elements of the book is how strongly the feeling he has for his family permeates his writing. Even an essay on a quest to save a beloved neighborhood bistro is tinged with the w...more
One of my favorite elements of the book is how strongly the feeling he has for his family permeates his writing. Even an essay on a quest to save a beloved neighborhood bistro is tinged with the w...more
What a priviledged crank. His recent column in the New Yorker about eating locally makes me glad that he is aware of the effects of the world around him but he doesn't seem to appreciate so much of what he has. He was involvement in the bistro takeover and the gym were the highlights of the book, with his difference as the American, but really were these the only times he actually did anything in Paris, other than go to the carousel with son and eat out? I want the New Yorker to sponsor me to li...more
Dec 21, 2007
Jessica
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
five-star-absolute-favorites
I love, love, love adam gopnik's writing. he can write about tying his shoes and make it sound like the most fascinating subject on earth. this book is about his experience living in paris with his family, a city near and dear to my heart. paris is the perfect subject for his writerly observations. the chapter where he describes his wife's pregnancy and the interactions with the french medical system in contrast to new york (where they had their first child) is fascinating, hilarious and incredi...more
I read this when I was studying abroad in Paris and was on a kick of reading books written by American expats about living in the city. Some of Gopnik's stories interested me more than others. Particularly dramatic and fun was the story about Parisians battle with a British restaurateur who was about to take over their local brasserie in the Latin Quarter. Gopnik's is a good book to read in order to get some idea of the French cultural battles against globalization/Americanization. I have to con...more
One of my very favorite reads of all time. Adam Gopnik has a lovely way with words, specifically words that detail everyday, real life. I have found very few writers who have such power to keep me enthralled no matter what the subject matter.
I had the privilege of hearing him lecture a few years back here in Chicago, his topic "The American Dream of Paris." His eloquence astounds me. Hearing him speak only made me wish I could read the book over and over again and forget it each time, so that I...more
I had the privilege of hearing him lecture a few years back here in Chicago, his topic "The American Dream of Paris." His eloquence astounds me. Hearing him speak only made me wish I could read the book over and over again and forget it each time, so that I...more
Feb 21, 2012
Ted
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
people with interests in Paris, or in the differences between American and French society
I really liked reading this book. Gopnik is a wonderful writer, he still writes frequently for The New Yorker, and is always worth reading.
Mostly the chapters could be read at random. There is a progression in them as his son Luke ages from one year old to six (1995-2000), and thus grew from a toddler to a youngster in Paris (there were a few visits back to the States). In some chapters Gopnik's family, especially his son, play major roles (see particularly the delightful chapter The Rookie). In...more
Mostly the chapters could be read at random. There is a progression in them as his son Luke ages from one year old to six (1995-2000), and thus grew from a toddler to a youngster in Paris (there were a few visits back to the States). In some chapters Gopnik's family, especially his son, play major roles (see particularly the delightful chapter The Rookie). In...more
Absolutely loved this book. Gopnik is a talented story teller and is truly skilled at turning the micro into the macro. The book is full of beautiful written personal stories that are often used to make a broader point about cultural or political issues. I happened to be reading this while in Paris so I was particularly taken with his detailed descriptions of specific street corners, cafes and idiosyncrasies of Parisians. But much of his description about cultural assimilation is also applicable...more
Fabulous essays, combining enjoyable writing with a great American lens on Paris and all its endearing, infuriating, and comic ways. Gopnik and his wife Martha Parker move to Paris with their very young son, try valiantly and in vain to keep him from crass Americanisms like Barney (little Frenchies are sucked in as well), and actually have their second child in a Paris hospital, which is Quite An Experience. One chapter on the corruption of housing in Paris was a bit dull because bureaucracy is...more
This book was fine, but I didn't particularly enjoy it. I was certainly interested in the subject matter: living in paris, the expat life, culture clashes, etc. But the author's style is rather long-winded and unnecessarily dense; some passages reminded me of esoteric literary criticism I used to have to read in college, not particularly suited to light observational journalism. Perhaps I'm too critical as I just finished a Bill Bryson book of travel essays that were thoroughly entertaining and...more
Towards the end of Gopnik's five years in Paris, his son eats a hamburger for the first time:
"He took three bites, pushed it away, had some ice cream...but the next morning he said, 'I liked the hamburger'--decisively--'but I did not like that sauce you served with it'.
'What sauce?' I said, puzzled. I hadn't made a sauce.
'That red sauce', he said, disdainfully, with exactly the expression I have seen on the face of Jean-Pierre Quélin, the food critic of Le Monde, when he gets a corked glass of w...more
"He took three bites, pushed it away, had some ice cream...but the next morning he said, 'I liked the hamburger'--decisively--'but I did not like that sauce you served with it'.
'What sauce?' I said, puzzled. I hadn't made a sauce.
'That red sauce', he said, disdainfully, with exactly the expression I have seen on the face of Jean-Pierre Quélin, the food critic of Le Monde, when he gets a corked glass of w...more
If on your way to Paris as a student or "on a shoestring" budget, this book might make you salivate for a bigger wallet or purse. Gopnik's Paris is replete with expensive cafes, dinners out at the Ritz, gourmet cooking, and visit to the frommage shops with his son Luke (c'est tres adorable!). Still, there is much here to revel in, like his essay about the World Cup and his efforts to keep Barney away from his kid, and his weirdly successful metaphors (he somehow manages to equate Barney's succes...more
Nov 21, 2009
Harry
added it
After reading a book about Watteau and another by the French novelist Simenon, I zipped through this book as a way to continue the oo-la-la. Gopnik's prose is like beautiful stacked fruit and vegetables at the greatest market you've ever been to. It's colorful, seemingly endless, good for you but delicious. It makes you think of the moment and where the moment came from. Sometimes it seems too abundant, as Gopnik piles simile upon simile, then going into a discourse about how comparing things di...more
"Just after the move, for my birthday, Luke and Martha gave me a wonderful toy, La Machine à Dessiner le Monde, a machine to draw the world. Really, all it is is a camera lucida, but nicely done in plastic, with a viewing stand on top. You put a piece of vellum on it, and if the light's bright enough, and it has to be very bright, it projects the thing you're looking at right onto the paper. All you have to do is trace it.
All! For just tracing turns out to be the hardest thing of all. All the cl...more
All! For just tracing turns out to be the hardest thing of all. All the cl...more
I might have given Paris to the Moon a higher rating if I hadn't read this right after Edmund White's Le Flaneur, truth be told. I liked White's approach of tackling the little known fringes of Parisian life. Gopnik's book just seemed very typical by comparison - the expatriate's musings on the cultural differences between Paris and his native country, anecdotes of his efforts to adapt to a new lifestyle, etc.
There are some gems in the series of essays - compiled from Gopnik's writings for the...more
There are some gems in the series of essays - compiled from Gopnik's writings for the...more
Paris to the Moon
Note:This was originally posted to my journal on January 11, 2009. I meant to post it here, in Goodreads, also, but I was still learning how to be on this site, and my good intentions went awry.
I have just finished reading Adam Gopnik’s Paris to the Moon. It is a collection of essays about a expatriate American family living in Paris. I read it over a period of months, with time off to read some other things, work in my journal, live my ordinary life. I don’t think this (or for
...more
Nov 30, 2008
Cheryl
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Francophiles and American Expats living in France
I put this book down TWICE after the first chapter thinking that it was really boring and not so much fun. After a crisis where it was the only book around, I picked it up again and forced myself into that 2nd chapter. I think the editor did a real disservice by putting such a long forward and then the first chapter where it was- the book is a set of essays, somewhat linked and tied together, but perfectly able to be read as standalones. There are some insights in this book that I haven't read i...more
I really liked some of these essays about Gopnik's five years in Paris. I started reading the collection in Paris and finished it in NY. Some of the essays were prosaic, others were delightful and delicious, I especially enjoyed those on food. But many were just a tad too pedestrian, an entire essay on buying Christmas lights? Were where the essays on culture? Art, music, literature, the most important cultural forces of Paris were never even mentioned, instead there were essays on introducing A...more
I found this at Cattail Cove Sate Park near Lake Havasu, AZ. This is one astute journalist whose sense of humor and humanity are fully engaged, writing a comparison between living in NYC or living in Paris. That's it. I have never been to Paris, nor lived in NYC. I am not a thirty-something father of a toddler. This didn't matter. The stories within the story are political, culinary, marital, and each interesting, funny and charming.
"After a recent trip to New York one French journalist remarked...more
"After a recent trip to New York one French journalist remarked...more
In 1995 Adam, his wife Martha, and their young son Luke relocated from New York City to Paris, France. Adam had visited Paris as a youth with his family. His views at that time was as a tourist. As an adult living in Paris, he was quickly indoctrinated into a world that was shrewdly Parisian. Adam works as a writer for The New Yorker, his wife a film-maker.
Positive Points:
Book gives a good description of an American living in Paris. What differences he sees, and his tactful impressions.
Gives...more
Positive Points:
Book gives a good description of an American living in Paris. What differences he sees, and his tactful impressions.
Gives...more
I would give this a 3.5 or 4 star rating. It was really interesting to experience the author's opinion on differences between Paris and New York (or America). I had fun reading this, and though there were several times where I disagreed with his assessment of certain situations and comparisons, I thoroughly enjoyed reading about them because they definitely spurred my inner debate and brought back great memories of Paris. It was fun to try and figure out..."ok, so which does he like better?" I l...more
This book reads more like a collection of journalistic human interest pieces than like a memoir. Probably because that’s what it is. The author, a long time writer for The New Yorker, is sharing with us his personal essays about the five years that he and his young family spent in Paris. They arrived in 1995, with an infant in tow, and headed back to New York right after the turn of the new millennium.
Most of these vignettes focus not as much on the national scale differences between the US and...more
Most of these vignettes focus not as much on the national scale differences between the US and...more
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An American writer, essayist and commentator. He is best known as a staff writer for The New Yorker—to which he has contributed non-fiction, fiction, memoir and criticism—and as the author of the essay collection Paris to the Moon, an account of the half-decade that Gopnik, wife Martha, and son Luke spent in the capital of France.
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“We breathe in our first language, and swim in our second.”
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“American long for a closed society in which everything can be bought, where laborers are either hidden away or dressed up as nonhumans, so as not to be disconcerting. This place is called Disney World”
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May 25, 2011 07:09am