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| Montparnasse at its 1920s zenith, cafés like Le Dôme and La Closerie and others such as des Lilas, La Coupole — all of which are still in business— were a lifeline to the starving artists that populated Montparnasse. French poet Jean Cocteau [1889-1963] once said “...poverty was a luxury in Montparnasse....” |
MONTPARNASSE
From Ten Poems and Three
Stories & Ten Poems, 1923.
From the public domain by Ernest Hemingway [1899—1961]
There are never any suicides
in the quarter among people one knows
No
successful suicides.
A
Chinese boy kills himself and is dead.
(they
continue to place his mail in the letter rack at the Dome)
A
Norwegian boy kills himself and is dead.
(no
one knows where the other Norwegian boy has gone)
They
find a model dead
alone
in bed and very dead.
(it
made almost unbearable trouble for the concierge)
Sweet
oil, the white of eggs, mustard and water, soap suds
and
stomach pumps rescue the people one knows.
Every
afternoon the people one knows can be found at the café.
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