The Arcades Project - Operi

trated the spirit of the times as a mirror concentrates the rays of the sun, a book
which towered up up in in majestic majestic glory to to the the heavens heavens like a a primeval forest, a a hook hook in
which which ... . .. a hook hook for for which which ... . .. finally, finally, a hook which which ... . .. hy which which and through
which [the most most long-winded specifications follow] ... a book book ... a book book . ... .. this
book was the Divine Comedy.' Loud applause. H Karl Karl Gutzkow, Briefe au.s Paris
(Leipzig, 1842), 1842), vol. 2, pp. 151-152. 151-152. [El,3J
Strategic Strategic basis for the perspectival perspectival articulation articulation of the city. A contemporary contemporary seeking
to justify the construction of large thoroughfares under Napoleon III speaks
of them as "unfavorable 'to the habitual tactic of local insurrection.'" Marcel
Poete, The vie vie de cite (Paris, 1925), p. 469. "Open up this area of continual
disturbances." Baron Haussmann, in a memorandum calling for the extension of
the Boulevard de Strasbourg to Chatelet. Emile de Labedolliere, Le Nouveau
Paris, Paris, p. 52. But even earlier than this this: : "They are paving Paris with wood in
order to deprive the Revolution of building materials. Out of wooden blocks
there will be no more barricades barricades constructed:' constructed:' Gutzkow, Brif!fi aus aus Pans, vol. vol. 1, 1,
pp. 60-61. What this means can be gathered from the fact that in 1830 there
were 6,000 6,000 barricades. [El,4]
"In Paris ... they are fleeing the arcades, so long in fashion, as one flees stale air.
The The arcades arcades are are dying. From From time to to time, one one of of them them is is closed, closed, like like the the sad sad
Passage Delorme, where, in the wilderness of the gallery, female figures of a tawdrydry
antiquity antiquity used used to to dance dance along the the shopfronts, shopfronts, as as in in the the scenes scenes from Pompeii Pompeii
interpreted hy Guerinon Hersent. The arcade that for the Parisian was was a sort of
salon-walk, where where you you strolled strolled and smoked and and chatted, is now nothing more more than
a a species species of of refuge refuge which which you you think think of when it it rains. rains. Some Some of of the the arcades maintain maintain
a a eertain eertain attraction on on account of of this this or or that famed establishment establishment still still to to be be found
there. But it is the tenant's renown that that prolongs the excitement, or rather rather the
death death agony, agony, of of the the place. place. The The arcades have one one great defect defect for modern Parisians: Parisians:
you could say that, just just like certain paintings done from stifled perspectives,
they're in need of air." Jules Claretie, La Vie it Paris, 1895 (Paris, 1896), pp. 47ff.
[El,5J
The radical transformation of Paris was carried out under Napoleon III mainly
along along the axis running through the Place Place de la la Concorde Concorde and the Hotel de Ville.
It may be that the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 was a blessing for the architectural
image of Paris, seeing that Napoleon III had intended to alter whole districts
of the city. Stahr thus writes, in 1857, that one had to make haste now to see
the old Paris, for "the new ruler, it seems, has a mind to leave but little of it
standing."