PARIS TO THE MOON - Adam Gopnik - Essays

In telling me about this book, my boyfriend admitted that I should have read it before he and I went to Paris. It does explain a lot of the particulars of French eating, driving, and recreational habits--what is the difference between a cafe, a brasserie, and a restaurant, anyway?--but it's just as enjoyable to read after coming back from Paris, relaxing into American life, and then being reminded of the French in small, subtle ways. For someone who came back to Berkeley, the book is particularly interesting, as it spends a few essays discussing American implementations of French food, including the work of chef Alice Waters, whose Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse is a cultural landmark here and abroad. Adam Gopnik spends some time wandering an open-air produce market with her, cooks dinner for her, and ties yet another aspect of French culture, the distinction between experimental, high-class cuisine, and terroir or earthy, regional dishes. Gopnik is able to condense all of his observations of Paris into the distinction between a French sense of abstraction fitting into what seem to us to be small, individual problems or peccadilloes, and the three tiers of French explanations for problems: first, it is the responsibility of a single man; second, it is the responsibility of the system, of the government or a broader set of rules; and third, that is the way it has to be, and there' s no sense arguing with it, a sort of cosmic throwing of hands and relinquishing of responsibility.

Gopnik's own move to Paris can be explained in these three tiers; first, it was the responsibility of his family, he and his wife, both wanting to rekindle their first romance, and raise their firstborn son in such a magical and romantic setting. Second, it was the fault of American culture: the Gopniks didn't want to raise their son with Barney, or many of the other low-key television babysitters. They wanted him to grow up bilingual, with an appreciation for beauty and a sense of mature, and even slightly archaic entertainment. Finally, it was impossible for it to happen any other way: Adam Gopnik found himself in France, and being there, had to continue his stint at the New Yorker by writing essays about his experiences. From experiencing his wife's second pregnancy and the birth of their daughter, to swimming at the Paris Ritz with his son, to trying to join a health club and trying to set up an American christmas tree, Gopnik had adventures big and small, and was involved in politics from the local (strongly protesting the change in ownership of a beloved local restaurant) to the national (attending the war-crimes trial of Papon, a functionary who signed papers sending French Jewish children to the camps that held their parents, and to their deaths.) Gopnik's style is generally humorous, but it was this last essay, touching as it did on post-WW2 politics and the lingering image of the Vichy era in the French collective unconscious, that really displayed his understanding and quiet questioning of the French system as a whole. Gopnik manages to both point out small, funny idiosyncrasies in the French system of being, and simultaneously sketch out their raison d'etre. Plus or minus a few lariats of christmas lights.

Read this book if you're going to France, or if you're in France, and then read it again, once you've come back, to remember the little streets that only permit U-turns of taxis, the bridges everywhere, the desertion of Paris in August, and the triumph of Parisian bakeries. And then, read Gopnik's sequel, fittingly enough about New York City.