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Flâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London
FINALIST FOR THE PEN/DIAMONSTEIN-SPIELVOGEL AWARD FOR THE ART OF THE ESSAY
A New York Times Notable Book of 2017
The flâneur is the quintessentially masculine figure of privilege and leisure who strides the capitals of the world with abandon. But it is the flâneuse who captures the imagination of the cultural critic Lauren Elkin. In her wonderfully gender-bending new book, the flâneuse is a "determined, resourceful individual keenly attuned to the creative potential of the city and the liberating possibilities of a good walk." Virginia Woolf called it "street haunting"; Holly Golightly epitomized it in Breakfast at Tiffany's; and Patti Smith did it in her own inimitable style in 1970s New York.
Part cultural meander, part memoir, Flâneuse takes us on a distinctly cosmopolitan jaunt that begins in New York, where Elkin grew up, and transports us to Paris via Venice, Tokyo, and London, all cities in which she's lived. We are shown the paths beaten by such flâneuses as the cross-dressing nineteenth-century novelist George Sand, the Parisian artist Sophie Calle, the wartime correspondent Martha Gellhorn, and the writer Jean Rhys. With tenacity and insight, Elkin creates a mosaic of what urban settings have meant to women, charting through literature, art, history, and film the sometimes exhilarating, sometimes fraught relationship that women have with the metropolis.
Called "deliciously spiky and seditious" by The Guardian, Flâneuse will inspire you to light out for the great cities yourself.
A New York Times Notable Book of 2017
The flâneur is the quintessentially masculine figure of privilege and leisure who strides the capitals of the world with abandon. But it is the flâneuse who captures the imagination of the cultural critic Lauren Elkin. In her wonderfully gender-bending new book, the flâneuse is a "determined, resourceful individual keenly attuned to the creative potential of the city and the liberating possibilities of a good walk." Virginia Woolf called it "street haunting"; Holly Golightly epitomized it in Breakfast at Tiffany's; and Patti Smith did it in her own inimitable style in 1970s New York.
Part cultural meander, part memoir, Flâneuse takes us on a distinctly cosmopolitan jaunt that begins in New York, where Elkin grew up, and transports us to Paris via Venice, Tokyo, and London, all cities in which she's lived. We are shown the paths beaten by such flâneuses as the cross-dressing nineteenth-century novelist George Sand, the Parisian artist Sophie Calle, the wartime correspondent Martha Gellhorn, and the writer Jean Rhys. With tenacity and insight, Elkin creates a mosaic of what urban settings have meant to women, charting through literature, art, history, and film the sometimes exhilarating, sometimes fraught relationship that women have with the metropolis.
Called "deliciously spiky and seditious" by The Guardian, Flâneuse will inspire you to light out for the great cities yourself.
317 pages, Paperback
First published February 28, 2017
About the author
Lauren Elkin
22 books289 followersLauren Elkin is a widely acclaimed Franco-American writer, critic, and translator. Her books include Flâneuse: Women Walk the City, which was a Radio 4 Book of the Week, a New York Times Notable Book of 2017, and a finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel award for the art of the essay. Her essays on art, literature, and culture have appeared in the London Review of Books, the New York Times, Granta, Harper's, Le Monde, Les Inrockuptibles, and Frieze, among others. She is also an award-winning translator, most recently of Simone de Beauvoir's previously unpublished novel The Inseparables, and forthcoming fiction and non-fiction by Constance Debré, Lola Lafon, and Colombe Schneck. After twenty years in Paris, she now lives in London.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 551 reviews
December 29, 2018
Ugh, Flâneuse was such a disappointment. It doesn't really deliver what it promises; it just reads like a bunch of research papers Lauren Elkin has written and strung together with a flimsy scaffold of personal reflections. The writing is not nearly as lively as I'd hoped and neither is Elkin; at one point she describes herself as "no rebel," and she's right, she isn't. I'm giving this 3 stars because there were a few interesting sections and some insights worth underlining, but I don't recommend it. Might I suggest Paris Was a Woman, The Dead Ladies Project, Spinster, or the Virginia Woolf chapter of Men Explain Things to Me instead?
October 17, 2020
How much of our identities are actually rooted firmly in the places we live in? And supposing it is a large, unignorable component, is it also inescapable? Or, as Gertrude Stein put it, "But what good are roots if you can't take them with you?" Lauren Elkin makes a case for discovering ourselves and the spaces we occupy through flâneusing, or wandering aimlessly - a leisure that historically women have been deprived of.
Flâneuse [flanne-euhze], noun, from the French. Feminine form of flâneur [flanne-euhr], an idler, a dawdling observer, usually found in cities.
As Elkin introspects philosophically into the subject, she attempts to trace the steps of a few famous women through various cities - Jean Rhys, Geroge Sand, Agnes Varda in Paris, Virginia Woolf in London and Sophie Calle in Venice. These women shared intimate relationships with the spaces they inhabited and conveyed it through their art.
I might even have given this book five stars if not for the Tokyo chapter. What bothered me is that Elkin didn't have anything pleasant to say about Tokyo - the only non-Western city included in the book. She does not examine the life of any woman who lived in Tokyo, she does not even walk around Tokyo much and she criticizes Barthes who praised Tokyo in his writings. She only has one thing to offer in the Tokyo chapter - the utter despair she experienced while living there. I don't even see the point of including Tokyo in the book - it clearly isn't written about like the rest of the cities and the chapter seems like a long, sad, hard-to-read diary entry. (She even included excerpts from her diary in this chapter and all of them can be reduced to "I am miserable here, Tokyo sucks.")
However, the writing overall is quite poignant.
A few days ago, a women's group in my hometown organized a march to protest the rising number of rape cases in India and the lack of efficiency in handling them. But, just as we convened at the scheduled time, permission was retracted by the city authorities - because it was after 7 pm. Though furious, we were also determined. They might have stopped us once, but they cannot stop us forever. We will march with purpose, but we will also flâneuse. With the indignation and the nonchalance that each of them require.
Claim the streets sisters, we shall prevail!
Space is not neutral. Space is a feminist issue. The space we occupy – here in the city, we city dwellers – is constantly remade and unmade, constructed and wondered at. ‘Space is a doubt,’ wrote Georges Perec; ‘I have constantly to mark it, to designate it. It’s never mine, never given to me, I have to conquer it.’
From Tehran to New York, from Melbourne to Mumbai, a woman still can’t walk in the city the way a man can.
Flâneuse [flanne-euhze], noun, from the French. Feminine form of flâneur [flanne-euhr], an idler, a dawdling observer, usually found in cities.
As Elkin introspects philosophically into the subject, she attempts to trace the steps of a few famous women through various cities - Jean Rhys, Geroge Sand, Agnes Varda in Paris, Virginia Woolf in London and Sophie Calle in Venice. These women shared intimate relationships with the spaces they inhabited and conveyed it through their art.
I might even have given this book five stars if not for the Tokyo chapter. What bothered me is that Elkin didn't have anything pleasant to say about Tokyo - the only non-Western city included in the book. She does not examine the life of any woman who lived in Tokyo, she does not even walk around Tokyo much and she criticizes Barthes who praised Tokyo in his writings. She only has one thing to offer in the Tokyo chapter - the utter despair she experienced while living there. I don't even see the point of including Tokyo in the book - it clearly isn't written about like the rest of the cities and the chapter seems like a long, sad, hard-to-read diary entry. (She even included excerpts from her diary in this chapter and all of them can be reduced to "I am miserable here, Tokyo sucks.")
However, the writing overall is quite poignant.
A few days ago, a women's group in my hometown organized a march to protest the rising number of rape cases in India and the lack of efficiency in handling them. But, just as we convened at the scheduled time, permission was retracted by the city authorities - because it was after 7 pm. Though furious, we were also determined. They might have stopped us once, but they cannot stop us forever. We will march with purpose, but we will also flâneuse. With the indignation and the nonchalance that each of them require.
Claim the streets sisters, we shall prevail!
Space is not neutral. Space is a feminist issue. The space we occupy – here in the city, we city dwellers – is constantly remade and unmade, constructed and wondered at. ‘Space is a doubt,’ wrote Georges Perec; ‘I have constantly to mark it, to designate it. It’s never mine, never given to me, I have to conquer it.’
From Tehran to New York, from Melbourne to Mumbai, a woman still can’t walk in the city the way a man can.
August 25, 2017
I've always thought of myself as a flaneur- the passionate street wanderer who learns the city by foot- ever since the first day I moved to a city (Montreal) six years ago for undergrad. I've since transplanted to Boston, but the feeling is the same: this city is mine, it knows my feet, we trust one another, we know each other's forms, we are familiar with the sensation of physical contact with each other. There is no better way to befriend a city than to walk it.
It has taken me a year, a year during which I hated Boston violently, but after thousands of hours spent wandering her streets, I have come to love and respect her. She is not home, she will never be my beloved Montreal, but she has her hidey-holes and precious haunts and sacred spaces, just as Montreal did. And I would not have come to this feeling had I not wandered her on foot.
That is why I was so excited when I discovered this book's existence. It takes the image of a "flaneur"- a male word- and examines the possibility of the "flaneuse", the feminine version of the word. This book examines the implicit issues of that- the female cannot walk through a city in the same way a male does, it will be different, altered. People will raise eyebrows to see a woman walking alone at night. Men will watch her form as it goes past. Some may follow her. The city is not friendly to the female form.
But the flaneuse subverts these possibilities and walks anyway, becoming an androgynous set of eyes taking in the city. Lauren Elkin discusses her own experiences as a flaneuse in the cities she has lived in. She examines the experiences of wandering cities of various female writers, photographers, artists, and filmmakers.
There's one chapter where a scene in a movie is examined in extreme depth that I found pretty boring. I haven't seen the movie, and tbh the deep analysis of the scene didn't seem to contribute much to the book.
Beyond that though, I have no complaints. Very readable, insanely quotable (if you're someone who likes to think of themselves as a flaneur, as I do), wonderfully lyrical.
"An attempt to claim an undengered place in the city by walking through it. Whether or not we want to be androgynous eyes taking in the city, or bodies inviting desire, or any of the myriad ways of being in between, we can integrate ourselves into the world of the city by becoming attentive to the shifts in the afective landscape. It is only in becoming aware of the invisible boundaries of the city that we can challenge them. A female flanerie- a flaneuserie- not only changes the way we move through space, but intervenes in the organisation of space itself. We claim our right to disturb the peace, to observe (or not observe), to occupy (or not occupy), and to organise (or disorganise) space on our own terms."
It has taken me a year, a year during which I hated Boston violently, but after thousands of hours spent wandering her streets, I have come to love and respect her. She is not home, she will never be my beloved Montreal, but she has her hidey-holes and precious haunts and sacred spaces, just as Montreal did. And I would not have come to this feeling had I not wandered her on foot.
That is why I was so excited when I discovered this book's existence. It takes the image of a "flaneur"- a male word- and examines the possibility of the "flaneuse", the feminine version of the word. This book examines the implicit issues of that- the female cannot walk through a city in the same way a male does, it will be different, altered. People will raise eyebrows to see a woman walking alone at night. Men will watch her form as it goes past. Some may follow her. The city is not friendly to the female form.
But the flaneuse subverts these possibilities and walks anyway, becoming an androgynous set of eyes taking in the city. Lauren Elkin discusses her own experiences as a flaneuse in the cities she has lived in. She examines the experiences of wandering cities of various female writers, photographers, artists, and filmmakers.
There's one chapter where a scene in a movie is examined in extreme depth that I found pretty boring. I haven't seen the movie, and tbh the deep analysis of the scene didn't seem to contribute much to the book.
Beyond that though, I have no complaints. Very readable, insanely quotable (if you're someone who likes to think of themselves as a flaneur, as I do), wonderfully lyrical.
"An attempt to claim an undengered place in the city by walking through it. Whether or not we want to be androgynous eyes taking in the city, or bodies inviting desire, or any of the myriad ways of being in between, we can integrate ourselves into the world of the city by becoming attentive to the shifts in the afective landscape. It is only in becoming aware of the invisible boundaries of the city that we can challenge them. A female flanerie- a flaneuserie- not only changes the way we move through space, but intervenes in the organisation of space itself. We claim our right to disturb the peace, to observe (or not observe), to occupy (or not occupy), and to organise (or disorganise) space on our own terms."
December 24, 2019
I’ll be honest; I skimmed a majority of this book. I assumed this book would recount the author’s life in various cities and how they differ in terms of cityscapes, how women hold themselves, and the author’s experiences wandering through these cities. But instead it examined various feminists throughout history and their experience in certain cities, and I just could not rouse any interest in the book.
I also didn’t appreciate how critical and negative the author was of Tokyo and Japanese culture in general. It left a terrible taste in my mouth.
I also didn’t appreciate how critical and negative the author was of Tokyo and Japanese culture in general. It left a terrible taste in my mouth.
May 24, 2022
Flanöz bu yıl okuduğum ne güzel kitaplardan birisiydi. Yürümek ile edebiyatı bu kadar güzel birleştirmesini, bunu yaparken de kişisel hikayesini de okura anlatmasını çok sevdim. Kitabın her bir bölümü Lauren Elkin gibi yürüyen yazarlara, karakterlere ve şehrin tarihine, protestonun gücüne adanmış gibi.
Londra’da Virginia Woolf ve Bloomsbury ekibine, New York’ta Joan Didion'a, Venedik’te Calle ile Paris’te Jean Rhys, George Sand ve Agnes Varda’nın adımlarına, sohbetlerine ve mücadelelerine Lauren Elkin’in adımlarıyla eşlik ediyorsunuz. Şehirlerin tarihleri ile, ilişkiler ve kadın hikayeleri birbirini tamamlıyor. Zaman zaman şehri daha kişiselleştiriyor, Venedik'te kaldığı sürece ve burada yarattığı karakterine dair yazıyor. Yeri geliyor bir sevgilinin peşinden gidilen, karmaşası ve engelleriyle sokaklarında yürüyemediği, uyum sağlayamayıp kaybolduğu Tokyo’da sıkışmışlığını anlatıyor. Kitap yürümek, edebiyat, isyanlar, protestolar, tarih ve siyaset gibi geçmişle günümüz arasında pek çok temanın arasında dolanıyor. Fransız kaldırım taşları ve isyanlarından bir anda "occupy" hereketine geçiyorsunuz ancak bu geçişler sizi okumaktan koparmıyor. Ben bu kitapla birlikte kitaplıktan çokça kitap indirip, yollarım açıldığında gidilecek çokça rota planı yaptım. Geçmişte yürüdüğüm yollarda ya da yaşadığım şehirlerde yürüyüşün karşıma çıkardıklarını hatırladım. Hem konu olarak çok özgün hem de içerik olarak çok zengin ve okuması çok keyifli. Size düşünecek, izleyecek ve okuyacak çok şey veriyor. Kamusal alanda - hem kadınlar hem de toplumsal olarak- özgürlüğün savaşını, edebiyatı ve kadınları bir araya getirmesi açısından çok önemli bir kitap. Yollarda, hiç bilmediğiniz ara sokaklarda kaybolmayı seviyorsanız mutlaka okuyun.
Londra’da Virginia Woolf ve Bloomsbury ekibine, New York’ta Joan Didion'a, Venedik’te Calle ile Paris’te Jean Rhys, George Sand ve Agnes Varda’nın adımlarına, sohbetlerine ve mücadelelerine Lauren Elkin’in adımlarıyla eşlik ediyorsunuz. Şehirlerin tarihleri ile, ilişkiler ve kadın hikayeleri birbirini tamamlıyor. Zaman zaman şehri daha kişiselleştiriyor, Venedik'te kaldığı sürece ve burada yarattığı karakterine dair yazıyor. Yeri geliyor bir sevgilinin peşinden gidilen, karmaşası ve engelleriyle sokaklarında yürüyemediği, uyum sağlayamayıp kaybolduğu Tokyo’da sıkışmışlığını anlatıyor. Kitap yürümek, edebiyat, isyanlar, protestolar, tarih ve siyaset gibi geçmişle günümüz arasında pek çok temanın arasında dolanıyor. Fransız kaldırım taşları ve isyanlarından bir anda "occupy" hereketine geçiyorsunuz ancak bu geçişler sizi okumaktan koparmıyor. Ben bu kitapla birlikte kitaplıktan çokça kitap indirip, yollarım açıldığında gidilecek çokça rota planı yaptım. Geçmişte yürüdüğüm yollarda ya da yaşadığım şehirlerde yürüyüşün karşıma çıkardıklarını hatırladım. Hem konu olarak çok özgün hem de içerik olarak çok zengin ve okuması çok keyifli. Size düşünecek, izleyecek ve okuyacak çok şey veriyor. Kamusal alanda - hem kadınlar hem de toplumsal olarak- özgürlüğün savaşını, edebiyatı ve kadınları bir araya getirmesi açısından çok önemli bir kitap. Yollarda, hiç bilmediğiniz ara sokaklarda kaybolmayı seviyorsanız mutlaka okuyun.
February 12, 2017
20% of this book is about what you think it would be about, and what is has largely been sold as: an account of the way notable women artists/writers have experienced urban space. The other 80% is some very narcissistic, self-mythologising, and uninteresting accounts by Elkin of her own privileged and uninteresting life. I was very disappointed by this book.
April 12, 2017
The first problem with this book is that I've read better versions of it multiple times. Maeve Brennan's The Long-Winded Lady, Vivian Gornick's The Odd Woman and the City, Kate Bolick's Spinster -- even Edmund White's The Flaneur does a better job discussing marginalized groups walking the streets of Paris. My favorite flânerie, I think, is about looking outward: observing others, watching the buildings and the streets. Elkin's book seems to be primarily about how much she loves France, how much she hates Tokyo, a really bad boyfriend that she had...in short, about Elkin. This could still be interesting if she made herself a rich, complex subject, but -- she doesn't.
And good god, that Tokyo chapter. TOKYO IS UGLY COMPARED TO PARIS AND THEY EAT GROSS FOOD YOU GUYS. It's 35 pages of the worst white girl whining. How is this still considered acceptable (publishable) travel writing/cultural commentary/anything? Elkin claims you can't walk in Tokyo -- which, since I tragically have not been (making me especially fond of the passages where Elkin bemoaned her boyfriend's company paying for her to fly and live there), I can't actually dispute, but having read a ton of wonderful, wandering Murakami novels -- and even the white guy travelogues of, say, Will Ferguson -- I view with extreme skepticism. Also, "the men slurp their noodles." Elkin doesn't put the adjective Japanese in there, but it is more than just implied; it's a given. Ew.
Two stars because the chapter on Agnès Varda was a small oasis of excellence -- the only section of the book that seemed truly in the spirit of flânerie: probably more a credit to Varda than to the author.
And good god, that Tokyo chapter. TOKYO IS UGLY COMPARED TO PARIS AND THEY EAT GROSS FOOD YOU GUYS. It's 35 pages of the worst white girl whining. How is this still considered acceptable (publishable) travel writing/cultural commentary/anything? Elkin claims you can't walk in Tokyo -- which, since I tragically have not been (making me especially fond of the passages where Elkin bemoaned her boyfriend's company paying for her to fly and live there), I can't actually dispute, but having read a ton of wonderful, wandering Murakami novels -- and even the white guy travelogues of, say, Will Ferguson -- I view with extreme skepticism. Also, "the men slurp their noodles." Elkin doesn't put the adjective Japanese in there, but it is more than just implied; it's a given. Ew.
Two stars because the chapter on Agnès Varda was a small oasis of excellence -- the only section of the book that seemed truly in the spirit of flânerie: probably more a credit to Varda than to the author.
February 28, 2018
Historical retrospective of cities and the literary women who haunted their avenues with overlays of Elkin's experiences.
This is more biographical than geographical. Elkin explores feminism through the lens of authors' lives and their writings. Specifically, women's use of city space or exclusion from it. It has strong associations to arguments of female confinement and the interiority of their lives, but Elkin emphasizes the subversion of it by artists and writers from historical periods.
New York
Twenty pages and only two that actually discuss walking the city, the rest covers nearly everything else but flaneusing.
Don't think I don't see the irony in complaining about the lack of focus in a book titled Flaneuse. But, I took it literally, as an armchair adventurer not as a disjointed treatise on everything from Post World War II architecture, to postmodernism, to feminism, to the epiphany that, "I've lived in a cage and never realized it!" experiential sharing.
Paris
Twenty five pages and maybe one that discusses walking the streets contemporaneously, from a firsthand account. The rest is a dissection of Jean Rhys' literature oeuvre with a provocative counterpoint of Hemingway and a dash of Ford. I haven't read Rhys and I can tell from the analysis provided I'll despise her books--women in penumbral spaces who continually make the worst choice possible-- dear god, yes, why wouldn't I love that?
London
Virginia Woolf and the Bloomsbury Group. Again, more literary than actual discussion of London. That said, I was very familiar with the area discussed so I enjoyed moments of flashbacks. Plus, I like London.
Paris Deuxieme
This revisit features George Sand and her radical flight to Paris in the early nineteenth century, leaving behind her children to pursue her writing and political ideals only to return to the countryside in Berry after the unrelenting bloodshed of Paris power struggles. Sand refocusing on themes of matrimony and education as the liberator of women. Again, there are brief, one line ties in to contemporary Paris but that is it.
Venice
Diary entry about Elkin's PhD avoidance by writing a novel set in Venice instead of a thesis. Clearly, firsthand experience required. Sophie Calle turns out to be a source for character development and the reader gets to run down this rabbit hole. Turns out Sophie liked to follow interesting looking strangers around the city, see where they went--which to be honest, I've done while wandering various cities myself so I can't knock it. The idea is that someone that interesting looking must be going somewhere interesting. Where? Alas, not always true, but I found strange nooks and crannies with unique shops, festivals, and even dreary financial districts utilizing this method.
Tokyo
I feel like Elkin and I are on opposite ends of the spectrum; I would take Tokyo in a heartbeat over Paris--any day. This section is primarily a diatribe about how much Elkin hated Japan and everything about it with a backdrop of her destructing relationship. The part that really drove me nuts was that for a person who travelled the complaint that the real Japan couldn't be found dumbfounded me. Like everywhere else in densely populated cities, jump on the Metro, Tube, subway and go!
Paris Troisième
God, I don't like Paris, and certainly not enough to start the third chapter of its history and effusing over its "charm". I'm tapping out of this book, page 150. My library loan is about to end and I just don't have the desire to continue on.
This is probably a fantastic read for people looking for an author biography and feminist discussions of restricted space. Just know that it tends towards tossing out philosophical concepts like confetti as it meanders. Either you find it pretentious or a clever tie-in. I clearly had incorrect expectations and while I found it interesting, Paris killed it for me.
Overall, strangely intimate editorializing, but then since complete strangers often share oddly intimate details of their lives unprompted on street corners waiting for lights or deli counters and parking lots this wasn't as weird as it could have been.
This is more biographical than geographical. Elkin explores feminism through the lens of authors' lives and their writings. Specifically, women's use of city space or exclusion from it. It has strong associations to arguments of female confinement and the interiority of their lives, but Elkin emphasizes the subversion of it by artists and writers from historical periods.
New York
Twenty pages and only two that actually discuss walking the city, the rest covers nearly everything else but flaneusing.
Don't think I don't see the irony in complaining about the lack of focus in a book titled Flaneuse. But, I took it literally, as an armchair adventurer not as a disjointed treatise on everything from Post World War II architecture, to postmodernism, to feminism, to the epiphany that, "I've lived in a cage and never realized it!" experiential sharing.
Paris
Twenty five pages and maybe one that discusses walking the streets contemporaneously, from a firsthand account. The rest is a dissection of Jean Rhys' literature oeuvre with a provocative counterpoint of Hemingway and a dash of Ford. I haven't read Rhys and I can tell from the analysis provided I'll despise her books--women in penumbral spaces who continually make the worst choice possible-- dear god, yes, why wouldn't I love that?
London
Virginia Woolf and the Bloomsbury Group. Again, more literary than actual discussion of London. That said, I was very familiar with the area discussed so I enjoyed moments of flashbacks. Plus, I like London.
Paris Deuxieme
This revisit features George Sand and her radical flight to Paris in the early nineteenth century, leaving behind her children to pursue her writing and political ideals only to return to the countryside in Berry after the unrelenting bloodshed of Paris power struggles. Sand refocusing on themes of matrimony and education as the liberator of women. Again, there are brief, one line ties in to contemporary Paris but that is it.
Venice
Diary entry about Elkin's PhD avoidance by writing a novel set in Venice instead of a thesis. Clearly, firsthand experience required. Sophie Calle turns out to be a source for character development and the reader gets to run down this rabbit hole. Turns out Sophie liked to follow interesting looking strangers around the city, see where they went--which to be honest, I've done while wandering various cities myself so I can't knock it. The idea is that someone that interesting looking must be going somewhere interesting. Where? Alas, not always true, but I found strange nooks and crannies with unique shops, festivals, and even dreary financial districts utilizing this method.
Tokyo
I feel like Elkin and I are on opposite ends of the spectrum; I would take Tokyo in a heartbeat over Paris--any day. This section is primarily a diatribe about how much Elkin hated Japan and everything about it with a backdrop of her destructing relationship. The part that really drove me nuts was that for a person who travelled the complaint that the real Japan couldn't be found dumbfounded me. Like everywhere else in densely populated cities, jump on the Metro, Tube, subway and go!
Paris Troisième
God, I don't like Paris, and certainly not enough to start the third chapter of its history and effusing over its "charm". I'm tapping out of this book, page 150. My library loan is about to end and I just don't have the desire to continue on.
This is probably a fantastic read for people looking for an author biography and feminist discussions of restricted space. Just know that it tends towards tossing out philosophical concepts like confetti as it meanders. Either you find it pretentious or a clever tie-in. I clearly had incorrect expectations and while I found it interesting, Paris killed it for me.
Overall, strangely intimate editorializing, but then since complete strangers often share oddly intimate details of their lives unprompted on street corners waiting for lights or deli counters and parking lots this wasn't as weird as it could have been.
July 12, 2017
Raised in New York and now a Paris resident, Lauren Elkin has always felt at home in cities. Here she traces how women writers and artists have made the world’s great cities their own, blending memoir, social history and literary criticism. In a neat example of form flowing from content, the book meanders from city to city and figure to figure. My interest waned during later chapters on protesting (‘taking to the streets’) and the films of Agnès Varda. However, especially when she’s musing on Martha Gellhorn’s rootlessness, Elkin captures the angst of being a woman caught between places and purposes in a way that expatriates like myself will appreciate. It’s in making the history of the flâneuse personal that Elkin opens her book up to a wider swathe of readers than just the feminist social historians and literary critics who might seem like her natural audience. I would particularly recommend this to readers of Rebecca Solnit and Olivia Laing.
See my full review at The Bookbag.
See my full review at The Bookbag.
August 12, 2016
In her new book, abridged for radio by Penny Leicester, the author Lauren Elkin strolls great cities, thinking about distinguished women who did the same..
1/5: She loves the word FLANEUR and then the female version - FLANEUSE. But historically who were these types, and is there a flaneuse today? She also recalls her youthful struggles to walk the New York suburbs.
2/5: She describes her own walks through London's Bloomsbury, which takes her back to when Virginia Woolf covered the same route, in her life and in her novels.
3/5: She describes Paris, which is THE great walking city. Beneath today's concrete lies cobblestones, which gets her thinking about an earlier age and the remarkable George Sand, who in the 1800's promenaded around in gentleman's clothes.
4/5: She spent time in Venice, researching a novel. And here she recalls the artist Sophie Calle, who came to the city to 'follow' a man called 'Henri B'. All in the name of creativity of course..
5/5: There's an intriguing photograph of 'Jinx Allen', taken in Florence by Ruth Orkin, and it's mysteries are now revealed. Then some reveries after wandering the sidewalks of New York..
Reader Julianna Jennings
Producer Duncan Minshull.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07mwqf9
1/5: She loves the word FLANEUR and then the female version - FLANEUSE. But historically who were these types, and is there a flaneuse today? She also recalls her youthful struggles to walk the New York suburbs.
2/5: She describes her own walks through London's Bloomsbury, which takes her back to when Virginia Woolf covered the same route, in her life and in her novels.
3/5: She describes Paris, which is THE great walking city. Beneath today's concrete lies cobblestones, which gets her thinking about an earlier age and the remarkable George Sand, who in the 1800's promenaded around in gentleman's clothes.
4/5: She spent time in Venice, researching a novel. And here she recalls the artist Sophie Calle, who came to the city to 'follow' a man called 'Henri B'. All in the name of creativity of course..
5/5: There's an intriguing photograph of 'Jinx Allen', taken in Florence by Ruth Orkin, and it's mysteries are now revealed. Then some reveries after wandering the sidewalks of New York..
Reader Julianna Jennings
Producer Duncan Minshull.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07mwqf9
August 14, 2016
BOTW
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07mwqf9Description: 'Flâneuse [flanne-euhze], noun, from the French. Feminine form of flâneur [flanne-euhr], an idler, a dawdling observer, usually found in cities. That is an imaginary definition.'
If the word flâneur conjures up visions of Baudelaire, boulevards and bohemia – then what exactly is a flâneuse?
In this gloriously provocative and celebratory book, Lauren Elkin defines her as ‘a determined resourceful woman keenly attuned to the creative potential of the city, and the liberating possibilities of a good walk’. Part cultural meander, part memoir, Flâneuse traces the relationship between the city and creativity through a journey that begins in New York and moves us to Paris, via Venice, Tokyo and London, exploring along the way the paths taken by the flâneuses who have lived and walked in those cities.
From nineteenth-century novelist George Sand to artist Sophie Calle, from war correspondent Martha Gellhorn to film-maker Agnes Varda, Flâneuse considers what is at stake when a certain kind of light-footed woman encounters the city and changes her life, one step at a time.
Youthful struggles to walk the New York suburbs.
July 22, 2017
This was a disappointment, more so because it started off so well. It’s about the love of the art of walking and gazing in a large city – from the perspective of women. The author presents much on the history of women walking in Paris and London (not much on New York). One woman, George Sand (she changed her name), during the mid-1800’s dressed as a man so as to be less conspicuous in the street.
So the first five chapters were delicious! There were many wonderful observations and witticisms on the joys of city-walking from a woman’s perspective. Most of it is on Paris, a city where I myself have walked. Paris is the city, I should add, which is marvelous for random walks – every street is an experience and an exploration; and it is so easy to get lost which is part of the fun. So bring a map or GPS locator. The author takes us with her in the current and in the past, for urban walks where so much diversity and energy can be experienced.
After, beginning with the chapter on Venice, the book veers completely off-topic, and this is almost two-thirds of it.
1) The author discusses her love-life.
2) Several writers and film-makers are brought up which had little to do with walking and was, to put it simply, boring.
The only chapter I did not speed read was on Martha Gellhorn – and again this had nothing to do with strolling city-streets.
So the first five chapters were delicious! There were many wonderful observations and witticisms on the joys of city-walking from a woman’s perspective. Most of it is on Paris, a city where I myself have walked. Paris is the city, I should add, which is marvelous for random walks – every street is an experience and an exploration; and it is so easy to get lost which is part of the fun. So bring a map or GPS locator. The author takes us with her in the current and in the past, for urban walks where so much diversity and energy can be experienced.
After, beginning with the chapter on Venice, the book veers completely off-topic, and this is almost two-thirds of it.
1) The author discusses her love-life.
2) Several writers and film-makers are brought up which had little to do with walking and was, to put it simply, boring.
The only chapter I did not speed read was on Martha Gellhorn – and again this had nothing to do with strolling city-streets.
November 27, 2020
Who. In. The. Fuck. Does. This. Woman. Think. She. Is.
I mean, I could give her a few hints. She's a whiny, self-obsessed, super privileged, childish bitch with a massive chip on her shoulder on a permanent ego trip.
Tell us how you really feel, Alison!
Oy. Okay, so. First, this book is not what it is sold as, although the phrase "part cultural meander, part memoir" in the synopsis should have been read as a flashing neon sign, I guess. This is supposed to be about the history and experiences of women in major cities, specifically women who take on the typically male persona of the flâneur, a sort of man-about-town who has all the time in the world to amble about his city, observing and being observed. But with the added layers of nuance and complexity for women trying to do the same, both historically and in the present. And there is a little bit about that, and those little bits were basically the only good parts of the book, maybe like 20% at most. The rest is just this chick babbling about herself and her life and her boyfriends and her PhD and on and on. It lacks any real cohesion, skipping around from a historical figure to the author's café jaunts to Scarlett Johansson movies, and seems to be mainly a vehicle for Elkin to either navel-gaze and brag or whine and complain about everything.
Speaking of whining and complaining...the Tokyo chapter. O. M. F. G. The Tokyo chapter. This bitch, I tell you. I am not Japanese, I've never been to Tokyo, but I was so disgusted and offended on behalf of Tokyo, Japan as a whole, the Japanese people. This was some of the most immature and snide garbage I've ever read. Elkin had been living in Paris with her boyfriend (who she calls 'X' throughout, copying what some other long-ago author did, and which feels so damn pretentious), when the bank he worked for transferred him to their Tokyo branch, and they had to move there within a few months. Okay, sure, that would be jarring and upsetting if you didn't want to leave the place you were in. I could forgive her for not being thrilled about it at first. But also, imagine the privilege involved in someone who has the financial and physical capability to live in New York, Paris, London, Venice, and now Tokyo, to flit back and forth among those places constantly, and to do nothing but complain in the most repulsive ways. Okay, you love Paris. I get it. I've never been there and I love it, too. But Elkin seemed to be personally offended by the fact that Tokyo is--SHOCKER--not Paris. And that Japanese people are not Parisians. And boy howdy, is she not shy about it.
There is so much more of that kind of disgusting shit, but I'm making myself angry again by typing it all out. And while her boyfriend is working there, she's flying off back to Paris all the time, but then complains that she doesn't want to be there now because he's not there. So not only is she selfish and childish and rude and an asshole, she's also a pathetic little girl who can't enjoy the city she claims to adore because WAAHHHHHHH MY BOYYYYYYFRIEND ISN'T HEEEEERRREE.
And it just kept on being that bad. At one point, she's back in New York after...I don't fucking know how long because it's impossible to follow her circuitous timelines, maybe a few years? And she's like, when did all these bankers and children and people who look like they'd be on the show Girls get here?? Like, what? You're surprised by bankers....in Manhattan? And children in Brooklyn? And other narcissistic clueless white people like yourself all over the place? Girl. Please.
The few small parts about women in history and their writings about being a flâneuse (though none of them used the term, I don't think) were the only bright spots in this book, and not even all of those were worth reading because the author couldn't form a coherent thesis if her life depended on it. I initially thought to give this 2 stars, but...no. For me, a 2-star rating means there are a few positives I can say about the book, but that overall there were more negatives. But I have like 0.5 positives about this one, and the negatives are not just things I didn't like but shit I found utterly offensive and crass. So fuck it. One star, do not recommend.
(Also, the author is apparently an editor at something called "The White Review" which.............sounds about right!)
I mean, I could give her a few hints. She's a whiny, self-obsessed, super privileged, childish bitch with a massive chip on her shoulder on a permanent ego trip.
Tell us how you really feel, Alison!
Oy. Okay, so. First, this book is not what it is sold as, although the phrase "part cultural meander, part memoir" in the synopsis should have been read as a flashing neon sign, I guess. This is supposed to be about the history and experiences of women in major cities, specifically women who take on the typically male persona of the flâneur, a sort of man-about-town who has all the time in the world to amble about his city, observing and being observed. But with the added layers of nuance and complexity for women trying to do the same, both historically and in the present. And there is a little bit about that, and those little bits were basically the only good parts of the book, maybe like 20% at most. The rest is just this chick babbling about herself and her life and her boyfriends and her PhD and on and on. It lacks any real cohesion, skipping around from a historical figure to the author's café jaunts to Scarlett Johansson movies, and seems to be mainly a vehicle for Elkin to either navel-gaze and brag or whine and complain about everything.
Speaking of whining and complaining...the Tokyo chapter. O. M. F. G. The Tokyo chapter. This bitch, I tell you. I am not Japanese, I've never been to Tokyo, but I was so disgusted and offended on behalf of Tokyo, Japan as a whole, the Japanese people. This was some of the most immature and snide garbage I've ever read. Elkin had been living in Paris with her boyfriend (who she calls 'X' throughout, copying what some other long-ago author did, and which feels so damn pretentious), when the bank he worked for transferred him to their Tokyo branch, and they had to move there within a few months. Okay, sure, that would be jarring and upsetting if you didn't want to leave the place you were in. I could forgive her for not being thrilled about it at first. But also, imagine the privilege involved in someone who has the financial and physical capability to live in New York, Paris, London, Venice, and now Tokyo, to flit back and forth among those places constantly, and to do nothing but complain in the most repulsive ways. Okay, you love Paris. I get it. I've never been there and I love it, too. But Elkin seemed to be personally offended by the fact that Tokyo is--SHOCKER--not Paris. And that Japanese people are not Parisians. And boy howdy, is she not shy about it.
Rumour has it there's a mental ward in the Hôpital Sainte-Anne in Paris for Japanese tourists who are catatonically disappointed to find the actual Paris is dirty and loud and rude, when they were expecting it to be all croissants and macarons and smelling of Chanel No. 5 ... But there is no mental ward in Tokyo for Parisians lightheaded at the hideousness of Tokyo. For the first week, I was convinced we were living in the shit part of town. They put us up in Roppongi, the gaijin (foreigner) ghetto of flyovers and tunnels and steel bridges you had to climb to cross the four-lane highway of a main street. The buildings were almost uniformly covered in bathroom tiles which looked as if they haven't been cleaned since they were thrown up in haste after the Second World War. It hurt. It really hurt.
--------------------
[Writing in her journal] Today was a pretty good day. X took me to Yodobashi Camera and then out for katsu-don (pork cutlets and rice topped with a fried egg) and beer. Like a little kid he's saddled with and has to please, except with alcohol ... Men on stools hunch over Formica tables and slurp up their noodles loudly and with great smacking of their lips.
--------------------
Food was a problem. I haven't been a picky eater since the third grade, when my mother asked me to keep an open mind about a white substance that turned out to be mozzarella and on the whole keeping an open mind has generally rewarded me with something delicious. But in Japan I realized my mind can only open so far. The highest form of Japanese cuisine, kaiseki, I found inedible. Everything had a strange smell, like the ground-up contents of a rabbit cage was made into a broth, and then the rest of the meal was simmered in it. The tea tasted like the air in a room that has been closed up for a very long time. There was one root vegetable, some kind of radish, which tasted like the underarms of an old man's tweed jacket.
There is so much more of that kind of disgusting shit, but I'm making myself angry again by typing it all out. And while her boyfriend is working there, she's flying off back to Paris all the time, but then complains that she doesn't want to be there now because he's not there. So not only is she selfish and childish and rude and an asshole, she's also a pathetic little girl who can't enjoy the city she claims to adore because WAAHHHHHHH MY BOYYYYYYFRIEND ISN'T HEEEEERRREE.
And it just kept on being that bad. At one point, she's back in New York after...I don't fucking know how long because it's impossible to follow her circuitous timelines, maybe a few years? And she's like, when did all these bankers and children and people who look like they'd be on the show Girls get here?? Like, what? You're surprised by bankers....in Manhattan? And children in Brooklyn? And other narcissistic clueless white people like yourself all over the place? Girl. Please.
The few small parts about women in history and their writings about being a flâneuse (though none of them used the term, I don't think) were the only bright spots in this book, and not even all of those were worth reading because the author couldn't form a coherent thesis if her life depended on it. I initially thought to give this 2 stars, but...no. For me, a 2-star rating means there are a few positives I can say about the book, but that overall there were more negatives. But I have like 0.5 positives about this one, and the negatives are not just things I didn't like but shit I found utterly offensive and crass. So fuck it. One star, do not recommend.
(Also, the author is apparently an editor at something called "The White Review" which.............sounds about right!)
September 13, 2019
Göründüğünden daha çok edebiyatla ilgili bir kitap. Elkin’in anlattığı her şehir beraberinde bir yazar ve hikayesini de getiriyor. Bu dönem zorunlu dersimle çakışmasaydı ‘Edebiyat ve Şehir’ dersini seçmeli olarak alıp konuya daha çok yaklaşabilirdim ama şimdilik burada duruyorum.
June 8, 2017
Truth be told I didn't read all the way to the end, but I read enough to convince me there would be more of the same had I stuck with it. Disappointing. The premise holds so much promise and in those few moments when the author sticks to it the book is quite good. Unfortunately the majority of the book is a narcissistic excercise to impress us with her worldly travels and privileged youth while demonstrating her retention of everything she researched to get her PhD. Lacks cohesion to the premise and her life just isn't that interesting. One big fail.
March 20, 2017
I've been looking forward to this book for so long, with such joy at the prospect of finding myself and my experiences in the text, that I've struggled with trying to parse my objective disappointment from my subjective. My two main problems are 1) structural: I don't think Elkin goes deep enough into either history or memoir, and the insistence on the conflation of the two narrows and shallows her exploration of either; and 2) historical/political: Elkin completely elides the danger women face in walking the street, and it is such an obvious danger that her elision must be deliberate (why? because it's unpleasant to confront? because she rarely experiences it? because it would complicate a shallow narrative?), and she also completely elides (literally does not acknowledge) disability, and how the ability to freely meander is a physical freedom as well as a gendered one. From the text, it's unclear if this second elision ever occurred to her.
Honestly, I loved the first part of this book, the historical examination of flaneur vs. flaneuse and the twinning of memoir (the urban neophyte falling in love with city sidewalks) with history, but the book was over time revealed as more shallow and conservative than expected. There’s a glancing description of laws censuring women’s appearance in public, but the book fails in its stated feminist purpose because there is no intersectional framework of examination of violence, and in fact no examination of violence at all, as an impediment to walking. Second - admittedly perhaps a fault that I’d have felt less strongly about at a different time - there are a few disparaging comments about anarchist rabble-rousers at protests, dismissive and uncomprehending in the extreme. Particularly in a year when antifa have done such brave and necessary work, this is pretty galling - and again, points (to my eye) toward a lack of historical appreciation on Elkin’s part.
She praises Martha Gellhorn for being an empathetic eye on broken war-torn streets, but cannot extend that same eye when in a familiar context; there's nothing but disdain for the students of '68, an ironic detachment that sits poorly alongside the celebration of life that is flanerie. This deep ambivalence to the fact of marching/collective action isn't relegated to familiarly iconic Paris, either; Elkin admits she didn’t feel the invasion of Iraq to be of personal import until she was kettled alongside protesters in New York when she was walking home minding her own small-minded business. What's perhaps most telling is her dismissal of 1968's chroniclers as starry-eyed about their use of streets (she namedrops Quattrocchi basically to accuse him of hagiography), but she hardly acknowledges their mirroring in her own paeans to George Sand.
Sidenote (!), as Elkin is bound to writing about cities she’s walked in, this is a predominately super white book, and the chapter on Tokyo is allllll about othering.
There have been utter gems in this book in the early chapters, passages I've underlined for their poetic expression of things I've felt, and historical examinations I've appreciated (on Woolf and Bloomsbury particularly), but I'm generally left dissatisfied and let down.
Honestly, I loved the first part of this book, the historical examination of flaneur vs. flaneuse and the twinning of memoir (the urban neophyte falling in love with city sidewalks) with history, but the book was over time revealed as more shallow and conservative than expected. There’s a glancing description of laws censuring women’s appearance in public, but the book fails in its stated feminist purpose because there is no intersectional framework of examination of violence, and in fact no examination of violence at all, as an impediment to walking. Second - admittedly perhaps a fault that I’d have felt less strongly about at a different time - there are a few disparaging comments about anarchist rabble-rousers at protests, dismissive and uncomprehending in the extreme. Particularly in a year when antifa have done such brave and necessary work, this is pretty galling - and again, points (to my eye) toward a lack of historical appreciation on Elkin’s part.
She praises Martha Gellhorn for being an empathetic eye on broken war-torn streets, but cannot extend that same eye when in a familiar context; there's nothing but disdain for the students of '68, an ironic detachment that sits poorly alongside the celebration of life that is flanerie. This deep ambivalence to the fact of marching/collective action isn't relegated to familiarly iconic Paris, either; Elkin admits she didn’t feel the invasion of Iraq to be of personal import until she was kettled alongside protesters in New York when she was walking home minding her own small-minded business. What's perhaps most telling is her dismissal of 1968's chroniclers as starry-eyed about their use of streets (she namedrops Quattrocchi basically to accuse him of hagiography), but she hardly acknowledges their mirroring in her own paeans to George Sand.
Sidenote (!), as Elkin is bound to writing about cities she’s walked in, this is a predominately super white book, and the chapter on Tokyo is allllll about othering.
There have been utter gems in this book in the early chapters, passages I've underlined for their poetic expression of things I've felt, and historical examinations I've appreciated (on Woolf and Bloomsbury particularly), but I'm generally left dissatisfied and let down.
August 27, 2018
‘Flâneuse’ wasn’t quite what I expected. I thought it would more systematically consider the history of women walking in cities, while it turned out to be mostly personal memoir with regular digressions concerning specific female figures. This is purely personal taste, but the digressions were much more interesting to me than the memoir parts. Perhaps because the author’s romantic life depressed me; I didn’t like the theme of women following dysfunctional men around. Nonetheless, Elkin is an involving and erudite writer. I liked the chapters about Paris best, especially the one concerned with George Sand’s role in the 1848 revolution. The Venice chapter, centred on Sophie Calle, was unsettling yet atmospheric and intriguing. By contrast, I didn’t get very much from the chapter on being unhappy in Tokyo. This book really reads like an essay collection, and I believe several chapters were originally published as stand alone essays. It isn’t a history of the flâneuse as such, which was what I wanted, so I couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed. I definitely agree with Elkin’s philosophy of wandering the streets to familiarise yourself with a city, although I prefer to do this in smaller cities that don’t overwhelm my ability to construct mental maps. London is entirely too big; Cambridge and Edinburgh are much more manageable.
February 18, 2017
Here's my review for the Chicago Tribune:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifesty...
Flaneur is one of those fancy-sounding French words that tend to freak Americans out, but its meaning is unintimidating and should be a lot more widespread. Although, as with any word, there are debates about its nuances, simply put, it means: one who wanders aimlessly through a city as an inveterate pedestrian. In fact, plenty of people drift on foot through urban landscapes taking great pleasure in the activity of directionless strolling without even knowing that there's a term for what they're doing.
As is typical of French nouns, flaneur is gendered — in this case masculine. It would follow that there should be a feminine counterpart, flaneuse. Sadly, as Lauren Elkin points out in her eclectic and absorbing memoir and cultural history "Flaneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London," "most French dictionaries don't even include the word."
Experts both male and female attribute this conspicuous omission to the oppressed state of women in cities until relatively recently. Elkin allows that the flaneur has generally been "a figure of masculine privilege and leisure, with time and money and no immediate responsibilities to claim his attention." So, too, does she concede that the invisibility — seeing while not necessarily being seen — that's considered a key part of flanerie is often unavailable to women due to societal surveillance and street harassment.
So, too, does she cite Janet Wolff's landmark essay on the subject, "The Invisible Flaneuse," in which Wolff claims, "such a character was rendered impossible by the sexual divisions of the nineteenth century." Other self-avowed flaneurs and historians including Will Self, Luc Sante and Griselda Pollock echo such sentiments. Luckily for readers, walkers and city lovers everywhere, Elkin aims, in this book, to argue for a reassessment and a correction of this misguided notion.
Throughout the pages of this erudite yet conversational book, Elkin sets about successfully persuading her audience that the joy of walking in the city belongs now — and has for ages belonged — to both men and women: "We can talk about social mores and restrictions but we cannot rule out the fact that women were there." If anything, she suggests, "Perhaps the answer is not to attempt to make a woman fit the masculine concept, but to redefine the concept itself. If we tunnel back, we find there always was a flaneuse passing Baudelaire in the street."
As befits such an ambitious mission statement, tunneling back is exactly what Elkin proceeds to do. The book strikes a rewarding balance between present and past, as it establishes and illustrates the much-needed definition of the flaneuse as "a determined, resourceful individual keenly attuned to the creative potential of the city, and the liberating possibilities of a good walk."
A native New Yorker, Elkin has been based in Paris since 2004. She deftly intersperses her own opinions and experiences of flanerie with portraits and explorations of such notable flaneuses as Jean Rhys, Virginia Woolf, Sophie Calle, Martha Gelhorn and more.
Writing of George Sand (the male pen name of Amantine-Lucille-Aurore Dupin), Elkin points out that the author, upon moving to Paris, took to cross-dressing to assist her mobility and invisibility. In trousers and boots, Sand "could 'fly' from one end of the city to the other in spite of the weather, the hour and the setting, blending with the crowd like a true flaneur."
Though the book derives its chapter titles primarily from geographic locations, as a whole it feels drifty and meandering, almost like a walk itself. Elkin's sections give the reader the sensation one often has with neighborhoods when one is strolling — the locations feel distinct, but the borders are vague.
Suburbanites might not like this book, for Elkin rightly criticizes the suburbs as places built upon fragmentation and exclusion by "people breaking away from the collective in all its variety to dwell among similar people." But they — and all readers — would do well to keep an open mind to its praise of cities and its execution of its admirable goal of claiming the flaneuse's right "to organize (or disorganize) space on our own terms."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifesty...
Flaneur is one of those fancy-sounding French words that tend to freak Americans out, but its meaning is unintimidating and should be a lot more widespread. Although, as with any word, there are debates about its nuances, simply put, it means: one who wanders aimlessly through a city as an inveterate pedestrian. In fact, plenty of people drift on foot through urban landscapes taking great pleasure in the activity of directionless strolling without even knowing that there's a term for what they're doing.
As is typical of French nouns, flaneur is gendered — in this case masculine. It would follow that there should be a feminine counterpart, flaneuse. Sadly, as Lauren Elkin points out in her eclectic and absorbing memoir and cultural history "Flaneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London," "most French dictionaries don't even include the word."
Experts both male and female attribute this conspicuous omission to the oppressed state of women in cities until relatively recently. Elkin allows that the flaneur has generally been "a figure of masculine privilege and leisure, with time and money and no immediate responsibilities to claim his attention." So, too, does she concede that the invisibility — seeing while not necessarily being seen — that's considered a key part of flanerie is often unavailable to women due to societal surveillance and street harassment.
So, too, does she cite Janet Wolff's landmark essay on the subject, "The Invisible Flaneuse," in which Wolff claims, "such a character was rendered impossible by the sexual divisions of the nineteenth century." Other self-avowed flaneurs and historians including Will Self, Luc Sante and Griselda Pollock echo such sentiments. Luckily for readers, walkers and city lovers everywhere, Elkin aims, in this book, to argue for a reassessment and a correction of this misguided notion.
Throughout the pages of this erudite yet conversational book, Elkin sets about successfully persuading her audience that the joy of walking in the city belongs now — and has for ages belonged — to both men and women: "We can talk about social mores and restrictions but we cannot rule out the fact that women were there." If anything, she suggests, "Perhaps the answer is not to attempt to make a woman fit the masculine concept, but to redefine the concept itself. If we tunnel back, we find there always was a flaneuse passing Baudelaire in the street."
As befits such an ambitious mission statement, tunneling back is exactly what Elkin proceeds to do. The book strikes a rewarding balance between present and past, as it establishes and illustrates the much-needed definition of the flaneuse as "a determined, resourceful individual keenly attuned to the creative potential of the city, and the liberating possibilities of a good walk."
A native New Yorker, Elkin has been based in Paris since 2004. She deftly intersperses her own opinions and experiences of flanerie with portraits and explorations of such notable flaneuses as Jean Rhys, Virginia Woolf, Sophie Calle, Martha Gelhorn and more.
Writing of George Sand (the male pen name of Amantine-Lucille-Aurore Dupin), Elkin points out that the author, upon moving to Paris, took to cross-dressing to assist her mobility and invisibility. In trousers and boots, Sand "could 'fly' from one end of the city to the other in spite of the weather, the hour and the setting, blending with the crowd like a true flaneur."
Though the book derives its chapter titles primarily from geographic locations, as a whole it feels drifty and meandering, almost like a walk itself. Elkin's sections give the reader the sensation one often has with neighborhoods when one is strolling — the locations feel distinct, but the borders are vague.
Suburbanites might not like this book, for Elkin rightly criticizes the suburbs as places built upon fragmentation and exclusion by "people breaking away from the collective in all its variety to dwell among similar people." But they — and all readers — would do well to keep an open mind to its praise of cities and its execution of its admirable goal of claiming the flaneuse's right "to organize (or disorganize) space on our own terms."
Read
June 16, 2016I’ve seen it argued from various angles that the flâneur is a purely male figure, and not just because of how French works. Some writers seem implicitly to accept psychogeography as the sort of spoddy pursuit which, allegedly, only boys are sad enough to love; others focus on how much easier it is for men to walk the streets unobjectified and without threat. But, without entirely dismissing the latter argument, Elkin is having none of it. Here she tells her own story, beginning (like so many of us) as am ungrateful child of suburbia obliged to look in books for way-markers to a more exciting life in the big city. And in those books she found the first of the monstrous regiment whose stories she marshals here alongside her own, the women who even in more restricted times found ways to set out, reclaim space, and walk themselves into an understanding of their cities. Elkin’s brilliant at what seem like small observations, but are really quite major ones – such as the way the suburbanite’s fear of the chaotic, populous city is mirrored by the urbanite’s fear of empty suburban streets. Some of the figures on whom she lights are ones I know (it’s always seemed ludicrous to me that urban rambles might be considered an exclusively male pursuit when Woolf’s ‘Street Haunting’ is surely one of the psychogeographical hr-texts), others not at all (New Wave film-maker Agnès Varda, conceptual artist Sophie Calle), but all are worthy inclusions. It’s one of the big questions of the moment, of course – attending to tiny, marginalised strands of the culture which themselves can be prone to close ranks and render themselves too internally homogeneous in other respects. But while too often the whole business has been collapsing into vicious, depressing (sub)culture wars, this serves more as a politely debonair reminder that the story can be more interesting still when you tell it all. Like the flâneu(r/se) themselves, it's a reminder of a much more civilised way of doing things. Which is not to say it’s not angry in places; the section on Parisian marches might be considered to stretch the definition (ditto Martha Gellhorn’s explorations of war-torn Madrid, or the idea of the cabbie as wheeled flâneuse). But then on some level the flâneur has always been a protester, albeit usually quite an oblique one. There would have been undoubted interest in a book which was simply a rejoinder to the psychogeographical sausage party; there's even more in this, which knows that tension and plurality have far more interest than a simple rebalancing, just like a confusing metropolitan interchange will always be far more intriguing than a suburban strip-mall.
(Review copy)
(Review copy)
March 31, 2017
This is one of the most disappointing and most misleading books I have read in a very long time. Actually, I don't think I have ever been so mislead by a book before. The full title is
Flâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London but very little of the book is actually about the art of walking. Really, this book is a history of several women writer's lives of the past with a mishmash of topics thrown in between them, including but not limited to: immigration, feminism, writing, protests, marching, travel, and romantic relationships. There was even a section that had page after page of a detailed retelling of a movie. WHY???
There is a ton of quoting the featured women's books or book about them and most of it is regarding the rights and freedoms (or lack thereof) of women in the particular decade that they came from.
What I wanted going into this book - a first-person view of "flâneusing" - we actually got very little of. There are a few paragraphs of the author's time spent in Paris or Venice that I quite enjoyed but 90% of the book was page after page of history and information about these women and none of it has anything to do with FLANEUR. Not only was it not about the flâneur, what it is comprised of is such a mishmash it's hard to make sense of anything.
2/5 Stars (I have given it 2 stars because I did enjoy what few words there were on the title topic)
I was given a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Flâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London but very little of the book is actually about the art of walking. Really, this book is a history of several women writer's lives of the past with a mishmash of topics thrown in between them, including but not limited to: immigration, feminism, writing, protests, marching, travel, and romantic relationships. There was even a section that had page after page of a detailed retelling of a movie. WHY???
There is a ton of quoting the featured women's books or book about them and most of it is regarding the rights and freedoms (or lack thereof) of women in the particular decade that they came from.
What I wanted going into this book - a first-person view of "flâneusing" - we actually got very little of. There are a few paragraphs of the author's time spent in Paris or Venice that I quite enjoyed but 90% of the book was page after page of history and information about these women and none of it has anything to do with FLANEUR. Not only was it not about the flâneur, what it is comprised of is such a mishmash it's hard to make sense of anything.
2/5 Stars (I have given it 2 stars because I did enjoy what few words there were on the title topic)
I was given a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
September 21, 2023
Çok beğendim, çok etkilendim. Dün bitirdim, kafamın içinde dönüp duruyor Lauren Elkin’in dünyası. Emin de olamadım biraz bu geçince mi paylaşmalıyım hislerimi yoksa beklemeli miyim, diye ama bu heyecanla yazmaya karar verdim.
Lauren Elkin İtalya’dan göçen Yahudi bir ailenin ABD’de doğup büyüyen ikinci nesli, sonrasında okumak için Paris’e gidiyor ve buraya yerleşiyor. Gerek kişisel gerek akademik nedenlerle yaptığı seyahatlerin kişisel bir kaydı aslında kısaca Flanöz. Akademik bir metin asla değil, benim gibi soğuk ve mesafeli denemeler olduğunu düşünüp uzak duruyorsanız yapmayın. Çok kişisel, çok samimi. Kendime de çok yakın hissettim, hatta benim fikrimi ve dünyamı derleyip toparlamış, edebiyat eğitiminin verdiği birikimle de muhteşem bir düzleme oturtmuş hissine kapıldım hep okurken. Bu açıdan aslında yazmak gibi bir uğraşım olmasa da böyle bir kitap yazmış olmayı ya da yazabilmeyi isterdim, diye geçirdim içimden.
Kadınların tek başına sokakta yürümelerinin, ayıp ya da yasak bariyerlerine takılmadan sokakları adımlayabilmelerinin tarihsel süreciyle ‘flanöz kelimesininkini anlatarak başlıyor Elkin. On dokuzuncu yüzyılda Sanayi Devrimi sonrası, seri üretimle beraber açılan büyük mağazaların hedef kitlesi oldukları için kadınların dışarıda tek başlarına dolaşabilmelerinin ‘normal’ karşılanmaya başlamasını tokat gibi çarparak başlıyor. Bu noktada aklıma Emile Zola’nın Paris Yıldızı (Au Bonheur des Dames)’ı geliyor ve pat, hemen anıyor onu Elkin. Resimdeki kadını tasviri aklıma Godard’ı getiriyor ve bir bakıyorum Elkin ondan bahsediyor. Aklımı okuyor, hislerimi kelimelere döküyor hissiyle okudum tüm kitabı bu şekilde. Sonrasında Paris, Londra (benim en sevdiğim bölümler), Tokyo, Venedik ve kendi şehri New York’u, buradaki günlerini, gezintilerini anlatıyor bize. Jean Rhys’in hayatının arka planda akıp gittiği, sokak sokak Paris’i gezip, kafelerinde oturup kahve içtiğimiz, bir yandan da Lauren Elkin’in zihnine ve ucundan hayatına konuk olduğumuz bir Paris gezisi bu. Londra’da da Virginia Woolf’un dünyasına gidip, onun gözleriyle adımlıyoruz şehri. Tüm bu anlatıma bayılmamın sebebi, edebiyat birikimiyle harmanlanmış olmasının yanında, Elkin’in zihnini kendime çok yakın hissetmiş olmam. Gezdiğim yerlerin duygusal haritasını yürüyerek, adımlayarak çizen biriyim ben de; yeni keşfettiğim bir şehirde sabahtan akşama yürümeyi severim, adımlarken bir yandan gördüklerimi diğer yandan gördüklerimin bana hissettirdiklerini zihnime kazımaya çalışırım. “Onların dünyasının bizimkinin içinde erimesini sağlayacak, bir şeylerin aynı hizaya gelmesine, o bağın kurulmasına dair bir arzu benim hissettiğim” diyor Elkin, ben de adımladığım caddelerden daha önce yürüyüp gidenleri, yaşanmış olayları canlandırmaya, onları hissetmeye çalışırım (s. 144). Hatta her metrekaresini bildiğim şehri de adımlamak isterim özlediysem. Tüm bunları öyle güzel anlatmış ki, okurken benim baktığım gözlerle dünyaya bakan biriyle sohbet ediyormuş gibi hissettim. Woolf’un ‘her hikaye köşedeki yaşlı kadınla ba��lar’ minvalindeki sözleri gibi başka dünyalara, kurgulamaya meraklılar için de Londra kısmı aynı şekilde oldukça doyurucu.
En sonda da, bu kitaba yakışır biçimde, kişisel hesaplaşmasından bahsediyor kısaca. Duygusal bağlarla bağlı olduğu New York’u ardında bırakıp Paris’e taşınma kararına dair içini döküyor. Burada da, kalbi üç şehir ve iki ülke arasında bölünmüş, hangisini seçse diğerine keşke diyeceğini bilen biri olarak sarsılıyorum. Keşke Elkin Köken gibi, sadece bu temalarda gezindiği bir kitap da yazsa, diye de geçirdim içimden.
Öyle bir anlatıyor ki Elkin bahsettiği şehirleri daha önce gezdiyseniz özlem gideriyor, anılarınızı tazeliyorsunuz, gezmediyseniz de karış karış gezmişçesine keyif alıyorsunuz. Keyifle gezdiğim şehirleri bana hatırlatması, yenilerini keşfetme arzusu uyandırmasının yanında başka yeni dünyaların kapılarını da aralıyor kitap: Elkin pek çok yazardan, kitaptan ve filmden bahsediyor. Kitabı bitirince sadece gezmek konusunda değil okumak için de iştahınız kabarıyor. Çok ama çok sevdim. Lütfen okuyun.
Lauren Elkin İtalya’dan göçen Yahudi bir ailenin ABD’de doğup büyüyen ikinci nesli, sonrasında okumak için Paris’e gidiyor ve buraya yerleşiyor. Gerek kişisel gerek akademik nedenlerle yaptığı seyahatlerin kişisel bir kaydı aslında kısaca Flanöz. Akademik bir metin asla değil, benim gibi soğuk ve mesafeli denemeler olduğunu düşünüp uzak duruyorsanız yapmayın. Çok kişisel, çok samimi. Kendime de çok yakın hissettim, hatta benim fikrimi ve dünyamı derleyip toparlamış, edebiyat eğitiminin verdiği birikimle de muhteşem bir düzleme oturtmuş hissine kapıldım hep okurken. Bu açıdan aslında yazmak gibi bir uğraşım olmasa da böyle bir kitap yazmış olmayı ya da yazabilmeyi isterdim, diye geçirdim içimden.
Kadınların tek başına sokakta yürümelerinin, ayıp ya da yasak bariyerlerine takılmadan sokakları adımlayabilmelerinin tarihsel süreciyle ‘flanöz kelimesininkini anlatarak başlıyor Elkin. On dokuzuncu yüzyılda Sanayi Devrimi sonrası, seri üretimle beraber açılan büyük mağazaların hedef kitlesi oldukları için kadınların dışarıda tek başlarına dolaşabilmelerinin ‘normal’ karşılanmaya başlamasını tokat gibi çarparak başlıyor. Bu noktada aklıma Emile Zola’nın Paris Yıldızı (Au Bonheur des Dames)’ı geliyor ve pat, hemen anıyor onu Elkin. Resimdeki kadını tasviri aklıma Godard’ı getiriyor ve bir bakıyorum Elkin ondan bahsediyor. Aklımı okuyor, hislerimi kelimelere döküyor hissiyle okudum tüm kitabı bu şekilde. Sonrasında Paris, Londra (benim en sevdiğim bölümler), Tokyo, Venedik ve kendi şehri New York’u, buradaki günlerini, gezintilerini anlatıyor bize. Jean Rhys’in hayatının arka planda akıp gittiği, sokak sokak Paris’i gezip, kafelerinde oturup kahve içtiğimiz, bir yandan da Lauren Elkin’in zihnine ve ucundan hayatına konuk olduğumuz bir Paris gezisi bu. Londra’da da Virginia Woolf’un dünyasına gidip, onun gözleriyle adımlıyoruz şehri. Tüm bu anlatıma bayılmamın sebebi, edebiyat birikimiyle harmanlanmış olmasının yanında, Elkin’in zihnini kendime çok yakın hissetmiş olmam. Gezdiğim yerlerin duygusal haritasını yürüyerek, adımlayarak çizen biriyim ben de; yeni keşfettiğim bir şehirde sabahtan akşama yürümeyi severim, adımlarken bir yandan gördüklerimi diğer yandan gördüklerimin bana hissettirdiklerini zihnime kazımaya çalışırım. “Onların dünyasının bizimkinin içinde erimesini sağlayacak, bir şeylerin aynı hizaya gelmesine, o bağın kurulmasına dair bir arzu benim hissettiğim” diyor Elkin, ben de adımladığım caddelerden daha önce yürüyüp gidenleri, yaşanmış olayları canlandırmaya, onları hissetmeye çalışırım (s. 144). Hatta her metrekaresini bildiğim şehri de adımlamak isterim özlediysem. Tüm bunları öyle güzel anlatmış ki, okurken benim baktığım gözlerle dünyaya bakan biriyle sohbet ediyormuş gibi hissettim. Woolf’un ‘her hikaye köşedeki yaşlı kadınla ba��lar’ minvalindeki sözleri gibi başka dünyalara, kurgulamaya meraklılar için de Londra kısmı aynı şekilde oldukça doyurucu.
En sonda da, bu kitaba yakışır biçimde, kişisel hesaplaşmasından bahsediyor kısaca. Duygusal bağlarla bağlı olduğu New York’u ardında bırakıp Paris’e taşınma kararına dair içini döküyor. Burada da, kalbi üç şehir ve iki ülke arasında bölünmüş, hangisini seçse diğerine keşke diyeceğini bilen biri olarak sarsılıyorum. Keşke Elkin Köken gibi, sadece bu temalarda gezindiği bir kitap da yazsa, diye de geçirdim içimden.
Öyle bir anlatıyor ki Elkin bahsettiği şehirleri daha önce gezdiyseniz özlem gideriyor, anılarınızı tazeliyorsunuz, gezmediyseniz de karış karış gezmişçesine keyif alıyorsunuz. Keyifle gezdiğim şehirleri bana hatırlatması, yenilerini keşfetme arzusu uyandırmasının yanında başka yeni dünyaların kapılarını da aralıyor kitap: Elkin pek çok yazardan, kitaptan ve filmden bahsediyor. Kitabı bitirince sadece gezmek konusunda değil okumak için de iştahınız kabarıyor. Çok ama çok sevdim. Lütfen okuyun.
Read
May 21, 2022I was afraid, a bit, that this would be some awful girl-boss pseudo-feminism, but thankfully, it was nothing of the sort. Rather, it was a poetic amble across places and times, not particularly groundbreaking, but pretty damn entertaining.
Now, it's time for a caveat, and a pretty damn big one.
The Tokyo chapter... she bizarrely claims Tokyo isn't even remotely walkable – which I take issue with as someone who has wandered extensively around Tokyo, and who has taken absolute delight in doing so. But it is clear to me that she hates it because, well, it's not Paris. To paraphrase Bill Burr, it's dumb to hate LA because they don't have pond hockey. And this whole chapter reads like the diary of every wretched Westerner I know who despises Asia for being Asia, and she really comes off as a fragile, small-minded Yank... so yeah, fuck that shit.
But if you like travel and memoir stuff, chances are you'll like the rest.
Now, it's time for a caveat, and a pretty damn big one.
The Tokyo chapter... she bizarrely claims Tokyo isn't even remotely walkable – which I take issue with as someone who has wandered extensively around Tokyo, and who has taken absolute delight in doing so. But it is clear to me that she hates it because, well, it's not Paris. To paraphrase Bill Burr, it's dumb to hate LA because they don't have pond hockey. And this whole chapter reads like the diary of every wretched Westerner I know who despises Asia for being Asia, and she really comes off as a fragile, small-minded Yank... so yeah, fuck that shit.
But if you like travel and memoir stuff, chances are you'll like the rest.
October 30, 2016
"Space is not neutral. Space is a feminist issue," Lauren Elkin writes towards the end of this incredibly rich and detailed book about women who walked out of their homes and claimed space in cities such as Paris, London, New York and more. With its mix of memoir and literary/artistic biography, Elkin's book shows how just being a woman alone on the street is a revolutionary act, tracing the stories of icons like Virginia Woolf, who battled Victorian social mores to walk freely alone in London, the French filmmaker Agnes Varda, in whose movies the streets of Paris often become an essential character, and the fearless Martha Gellhorn, who traversed the globe to report from war zones, long considered the wrong place for a woman.
Each chapter is dedicated to a different city and Elkin skillfully blends the past with the present, weaving in the narrative of her own explorations on foot around the world. The small details she spots in Paris, Tokyo and Venice, and her nuanced analysis of her experiences, are all set against the context of the long history of women pushing back against exclusion. The result is a beautiful, and essential, mediation on women and urban life.
Each chapter is dedicated to a different city and Elkin skillfully blends the past with the present, weaving in the narrative of her own explorations on foot around the world. The small details she spots in Paris, Tokyo and Venice, and her nuanced analysis of her experiences, are all set against the context of the long history of women pushing back against exclusion. The result is a beautiful, and essential, mediation on women and urban life.
June 25, 2022
(4.5 Stars)
When we hear the word ‘flâneur’, we probably think of some well-to-do chap nonchalantly wandering the streets of 19th-century Paris, idling away his time in cafés and bars, casually watching the inhabitants of the city at work and play. Irrespective of the specific figure we have in mind, the flâneur is almost certainly a man – a well-dressed dandy, possibly like the central pen-and-ink sketch on the cover of this Vintage edition of Flâneuse. The flâneur is a consummate observer, looking without participating, preferring to remain somewhat distanced from the action in his leisurely pursuits.
In this fascinating book, the critically-acclaimed writer and translator Lauren Elkin shows us another side of flâneusing, highlighting the existence of the female equivalent, the eponymous flâneuse. While the male flâneur has been well documented over time, much less has been written about his female counterpart, possibly due to the social restrictions placed on women’s movements around the cities in the 19th and early 20th centuries. However, as Elkin eloquently argues, women walkers have often been present in cities; they just haven’t been identified or mythologised as flâneuses.
To suggest that they couldn’t be a female version of the flâneur is to limit the ways women have interacted with the city to the ways men have interacted with the city. We can talk about social mores and restrictions but we cannot rule out the fact that women were there; we must try to understand what walking in the city meant to them. Perhaps the answer is not to attempt to make a woman fit a masculine concept, but to redefine the concept itself.
If we tunnel back, we find there always was a flâneuse passing Baudelaire in the street. (p. 11)
Through a captivating combination of memoir, social history and cultural studies/criticism, Elkin walks us through several examples of notable flâneuses down the years, demonstrating that the joy of traversing the city has been shared by men and women alike.
Each chapter highlights a different female walker in touch with her city. So, we have Virginia Woolf walking through London’s Bloomsbury, an experience vividly portrayed in the writer’s evocative essay Street Haunting; George Sand, who has to dress like a man to roam freely in 19th-century Paris; and Martha Gellhorn, the journalist and travel writer who captures the Civil War through a series of remarkable reports, straight from the front line in late ‘30s Madrid.
Elkin also explores leading cultural figures that fit the bill, most notably the acclaimed writer Jean Rhys and the legendary filmmaker Agnes Varda – two of my favourite artists in their respective creative fields.
To read the rest of my review, please visit:
https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2022...
When we hear the word ‘flâneur’, we probably think of some well-to-do chap nonchalantly wandering the streets of 19th-century Paris, idling away his time in cafés and bars, casually watching the inhabitants of the city at work and play. Irrespective of the specific figure we have in mind, the flâneur is almost certainly a man – a well-dressed dandy, possibly like the central pen-and-ink sketch on the cover of this Vintage edition of Flâneuse. The flâneur is a consummate observer, looking without participating, preferring to remain somewhat distanced from the action in his leisurely pursuits.
In this fascinating book, the critically-acclaimed writer and translator Lauren Elkin shows us another side of flâneusing, highlighting the existence of the female equivalent, the eponymous flâneuse. While the male flâneur has been well documented over time, much less has been written about his female counterpart, possibly due to the social restrictions placed on women’s movements around the cities in the 19th and early 20th centuries. However, as Elkin eloquently argues, women walkers have often been present in cities; they just haven’t been identified or mythologised as flâneuses.
To suggest that they couldn’t be a female version of the flâneur is to limit the ways women have interacted with the city to the ways men have interacted with the city. We can talk about social mores and restrictions but we cannot rule out the fact that women were there; we must try to understand what walking in the city meant to them. Perhaps the answer is not to attempt to make a woman fit a masculine concept, but to redefine the concept itself.
If we tunnel back, we find there always was a flâneuse passing Baudelaire in the street. (p. 11)
Through a captivating combination of memoir, social history and cultural studies/criticism, Elkin walks us through several examples of notable flâneuses down the years, demonstrating that the joy of traversing the city has been shared by men and women alike.
Each chapter highlights a different female walker in touch with her city. So, we have Virginia Woolf walking through London’s Bloomsbury, an experience vividly portrayed in the writer’s evocative essay Street Haunting; George Sand, who has to dress like a man to roam freely in 19th-century Paris; and Martha Gellhorn, the journalist and travel writer who captures the Civil War through a series of remarkable reports, straight from the front line in late ‘30s Madrid.
Elkin also explores leading cultural figures that fit the bill, most notably the acclaimed writer Jean Rhys and the legendary filmmaker Agnes Varda – two of my favourite artists in their respective creative fields.
To read the rest of my review, please visit:
https://jacquiwine.wordpress.com/2022...
November 10, 2018
I wish there were more books like this: immensely informative, erudite without being obscure, elegant and articulate without burdening the reader with ornateness. I came away feeling enlightened and motivated to learn more. Dr. Lauren Elkin provides an episodic look at women walking the city/cities, including Paris, London, Tokyo, Venice and New York, combining biography, autobiography, history, psychology, and literature. There isn't a great deal of theory differentiating women's walking from men's walking, but that's okay, and there's no real attempt at psychogeography, which is even better given how tedious the subject can be, but there is plenty to ruminate on, and, somewhat embarrassingly, I learned a huge amount about the women Elkin focuses on as case studies (Jean Rhys, George Sand, Sophie Calle, Martha Gellhorn, Joan Didion), sadly highlighting my own prior ignorance. Much as I love Rebecca Solnit's politics, I find her works hard going sometimes: she spares no prisoners. Lauren Elkin is kinder to her reader, and her book and her readers are the better for it.
July 3, 2019
Flanörün flanöze, kadının bakılandan bakana dönüştüğü farklı örneklerden oluşmuş keyifli ve bilgilendirici bir kitap; tabii ki bazı bölümleri diğerlerine göre daha çok sevdim: Virginia Woolf, Jean Rhys, Agnés Varda, Martha Gellhorn ve George Sand'lı kısımlar daha çok keyif verdi. Fakat kitabın bence olumsuz yönü anlattığı yazar/yönetmen vb'nin eserlerinin sonunu da söylemesi, henüz izlememiş, okumamışsanız hiç hoş olmuyor açıkçası :/ Buradaki kadınlar tam bir ilham kaynağı, insana cesaret veren bir yönleri var.
October 2, 2022
Bir yandan topluma, sanatçılara, feminizme, şehirlere dair bir şeyler söylerken, bir yandan da kendi yaşamından anekdotlar veren yazarların kitaplarını çok seviyorum. Rebecca Solnit ve Patti Smith’le benzer noktalarda konumlandırdım Lauren Elkin’in yazdıklarını. En çok Agnes Varda, Martha Gellhorn, Jean Rhys, George Sand ve elbette Virginia Woolf’a dair yazdıklarını sevdim. Venedik bölümünü diğer bölümlere göre daha zayıf buldum ama o atmosferi derinden hissettim. Yazarın Japonya’da yaşadığı zorluklar Amelie Nothomb’un romanlarını getirdi aklıma. New York’a karşı iki arada bir derede hissettiklerini kendi yaşadıklarımla özdeşleştirdim. Okurların ilgi alanlarına göre yakınlık veya mesafe hissedecekleri bölümlere sahip bir kitap. Sokaklar, şehir hafızası, protestolar, yürüyen kadınlar, flanözler ve özgürlük manifestosu. Çevirinin son derece akıcı ve güzel olması da kitabı sevdiren etkenlerden.
Shelved as 'didntfinish-yet'
July 11, 2018Oh agh jeez I don't know... I liked this, I did, I do, I just got restless. She is very smart! And I don't know what I was expecting! But instead of some kind of broad survey of how women have walked through the world, this was that certain kind of smart-but-accessible academic-ish book that delves quite deeply into the oeuvres of several people the author has clearly studied deeply, and I hadn't heard of most of them, and I just... I just put it down one evening several months ago and never quite picked it up again.
Maybe someday...
Maybe someday...
January 14, 2018
Man šo gribas saukt par rūpīgi izstrādātu pētījumu sieviešu emancipācijā, ko sniedz iespēja pilsētā pārvietoties ar kājām, caur literātēm, fotogrāfēm, režisorēm, māksliniecēm un grāmatas autores pašas pieredzi. Grāmatā savijas pastaigu un vērošanas prieks ar feminismu, vēsturi un kultūru. Dažas nodaļas šķita par daudz aizejam kultūrā prom no staigāšanas, bet kopumā labi. Esmu liela pastaigu cienītāja, tāpēc man šī grāmata patika un interesēja.
November 6, 2023
La flâneuse esiste ogniqualvolta deviamo dalla strada che è stata tracciata per noi, partendo alla ricerca di un territorio nostro
È un’abitudine difficile da perdere. Perché cammino? Perché mi piace. Mi piace il ritmo, la mia ombra che mi precede sul marciapiede. Mi piace potermi fermare quando voglio, appoggiarmi a un edificio e scrivere un appunto nel mio diario, oppure leggere una mail o mandare un messaggio, e che il mondo si fermi insieme a me. Camminare, paradossalmente, permette di stare immobili. Camminare è disegnare una piantina con i piedi. Ti aiuta ad assemblare i pezzi di una città, mettendo in relazione quartieri che altrimenti resterebbero entità separate, pianeti che, pur destinati l’uno all’altro, rimangono distanti. Mi piace vedere come in realtà si fondono, mi piace vederne i confini. Camminare mi aiuta a sentirmi a casa. Provo un certo piacere nel vedere che ormai conosco molto bene la città grazie al camminare, all’attraversare quartieri che in alcuni casi già conoscevo bene e altri che forse non vedevo da un po’; è come ritrovare qualcuno incontrato a una festa tanto tempo fa. A volte cammino perché ho molte cose per la testa, e camminare mi aiuta a riordinarle. Solvitur ambulando, dicevano i latini. Cammino perché camminare conferisce – o ripristina – una sensazione di appartenenza, di radicamento in un luogo. Il geografo Yi-Fu Tuan sostiene che uno spazio diventa un luogo quando gli attribuiamo significato con il movimento, quando lo vediamo come qualcosa da percepire, da comprendere, da sentire. Cammino perché, in un certo senso, camminare è come leggere. Vieni messo a parte di vite e conversazioni che non hanno niente a che vedere con le tue, e che puoi ascoltare di nascosto. A volte c’è troppa folla; a volte le voci sono troppo alte. Ma sei sempre in compagnia. Non sei solo. Attraversi la città fianco a fianco con i vivi e i morti.
È un’abitudine difficile da perdere. Perché cammino? Perché mi piace. Mi piace il ritmo, la mia ombra che mi precede sul marciapiede. Mi piace potermi fermare quando voglio, appoggiarmi a un edificio e scrivere un appunto nel mio diario, oppure leggere una mail o mandare un messaggio, e che il mondo si fermi insieme a me. Camminare, paradossalmente, permette di stare immobili. Camminare è disegnare una piantina con i piedi. Ti aiuta ad assemblare i pezzi di una città, mettendo in relazione quartieri che altrimenti resterebbero entità separate, pianeti che, pur destinati l’uno all’altro, rimangono distanti. Mi piace vedere come in realtà si fondono, mi piace vederne i confini. Camminare mi aiuta a sentirmi a casa. Provo un certo piacere nel vedere che ormai conosco molto bene la città grazie al camminare, all’attraversare quartieri che in alcuni casi già conoscevo bene e altri che forse non vedevo da un po’; è come ritrovare qualcuno incontrato a una festa tanto tempo fa. A volte cammino perché ho molte cose per la testa, e camminare mi aiuta a riordinarle. Solvitur ambulando, dicevano i latini. Cammino perché camminare conferisce – o ripristina – una sensazione di appartenenza, di radicamento in un luogo. Il geografo Yi-Fu Tuan sostiene che uno spazio diventa un luogo quando gli attribuiamo significato con il movimento, quando lo vediamo come qualcosa da percepire, da comprendere, da sentire. Cammino perché, in un certo senso, camminare è come leggere. Vieni messo a parte di vite e conversazioni che non hanno niente a che vedere con le tue, e che puoi ascoltare di nascosto. A volte c’è troppa folla; a volte le voci sono troppo alte. Ma sei sempre in compagnia. Non sei solo. Attraversi la città fianco a fianco con i vivi e i morti.
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