Bouquinistes de Paris

1 August 2023 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Paris / Île-de-France, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  9 minutes

© flickr.com - Ninara/cc-by-2.0

© flickr.com – Ninara/cc-by-2.0

The Bouquinistes of Paris, France, are booksellers of used and antiquarian books who ply their trade along large sections of the banks of the Seine: on the right bank from the Pont Marie to the Quai du Louvre/Quai François Mitterrand, and on the left bank from the Quai de la Tournelle to Quai Voltaire. The Seine is thus described as ‘the only river in the world that runs between two bookshelves’.   read more…

Portrait: Voltaire, French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher

19 August 2015 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Portrait Reading Time:  11 minutes

Voltaire by Nicolas de Largillière © Musée national du Château de Versailles

Voltaire by Nicolas de Largillière © Musée national du Château de Versailles

François-Marie Arouet (21 November 1694 – 30 May 1778), known by his nom de plume Voltaire, was a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his attacks on the established Catholic Church, and his advocacy of freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and separation of church and state. Voltaire was a versatile writer, producing works in almost every literary form, including plays, poems, novels, essays, and historical and scientific works. He wrote more than 20,000 letters and more than 2,000 books and pamphlets. He was an outspoken advocate, despite the risk this placed him in under the strict censorship laws of the time. As a satirical polemicist, he frequently made use of his works to criticize intolerance, religious dogma, and the French institutions of his day.   read more…

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