Travel Writers Online

on  the rue Picpus in Paris.  Glance at the front cover of the US edition of Modiano’s novel. Can you see the street running diagonally through the background map? It is the rue Picpus. In that same edition of the evening newspaper mentioned in the previous blog-post, Paris-soir , on page 2 is the heading: Signé Picpus . It is an instalment from a serialised novel by Georges Simenon with his famous detective, Maigret as the main character.  What is the significance of Picpus for these two writers of mystery? Looking forward to hearing your literary detective discoveries... In the mean time, please re-read last week's post on Patrick Modiano and literary detective work at  Read last week's blog post   A 3-Step activity for travel writers online starts in the post for 28th October 2022. Please Follow this blog below to be sure you do not miss Step 1... 

Patrick Modiano’s novel,  Dora Bruder   Immobilised indoors has given me time to indulge in Literary E-Tourism.  I started reading Patrick Modiano’s novel from April 1997, Dora Bruder this morning and immediately his opening lines provide sufficient detail to see if he is using real facts and places. He opens with a brief newspaper item from 31 st December 1941; it was the period when Marshal Pétain was Chief of State in France. The first literary tourism question then is, can a copy of that evening newspaper, Paris-soir be found? I know that Gallica, which gives on-line access to scanned documents from the French National Library, the {BnF, will probably hold the edition mentioned in the novel. Actually, it was with genuine surprise and something of that same thrill of discovery you feel when you arrive at the exact spot mentioned in a novel that I found this: There is the missing persons message for Dora Bruder on page 3 as Modiano’s novel says!  Take a look at...