Utrillo's Children; A Memoir of Paris In 1969. Robert Ph.D Dick

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      R.H. Dick

      St. Louis, Missouri, 2012

      Utrillo's Children: A Memoir of Paris in l969

      I had just seen Woody Allen's film, Midnight In Paris. In fact, I saw it several times and enjoyed it. The last time I saw it, a young woman, who was taking tickets for its next showing, asked if I had liked it and I responded, “Oh Yeah! It took me back a bit to Paris in the l960s, at least seeing some of the street scenes did.” She looked somewhat surprised and said, “You were in Paris in the l960s – Wow!” I felt a pressure in me. She looked and sounded interested, but other people were arriving to have her take their tickets and our conversation ended with little satisfaction, at least on my part.

      I felt I was fairly knowledgeable about the French. I had read their great authors and knew a lot about Paris. I also had read about those Americans in Allen's film who had gone to Paris in the l920s, looking for whatever makes a creative go to this city. Josephine Baker, chasing equality; the Steins, art and understanding; and Man Ray, well who knows why he went, but through the decades, the powers of the universe had prompted artists, writers, dancers–you name it–to at least pass through the town. Ernest Hemingway felt that if you're young and go to Paris it will stay with you, and your thinking will be affected. You will live differently. You will love differently. You will even hate differently.

      Somehow, Paris creates a dictionary in your brain–a kind of reference library–and later when you're confronted with life’s problems, you think back to the “City of Light” looking for answers. There is no doubt about it, at least in my experience, Paris in the '60s could blow your doors off and leave you breathing hard. As I walked away from that mall theater on that Saturday afternoon, I wished I could have talked to that young girl, but now, as a man in his late sixties, how silly would that appear. The Paris of my generation, the generation of the l960s, wasn't like Allen's film, nor Hemingway's memories, nor a Brassai portfolio of black and white photographs. I guess in review, one shouldn't expect too much carry over from one time period to the next. Ki Ki's Paris was a Paris after World War I. Lovers, artists, writers of books packed the cafes of Montparnasse, wanting to forget the War. Black Americans were dazzling Parisians at the “Le Revue Nègre,” and overall, there was a gaiety and jocular atmosphere on the “rues” of the city. Visit the museums of Paris now and enjoy what these people left us–some say it was a high point in art and culture – Yes! A kind of Golden Age!

      College

      In l961, I was 18-years-old and beginning my freshman year at Central Missouri State College, a small mid-western school near Kansas City, Missouri. Nestled in a town of about 10,000 people, one would never think that it would attract a faculty of such outstanding scholars and teachers, but it did.

      And, СКАЧАТЬ