Paris Cafés: Les Deux Magots
The literary café hosting the glitterati of literati.
Photo by me on a very rainy day.What makes a good literary café?
Very picky artists.
Les Deux Magots has been the go-to spot for a slew of artists for a very long time.
It was the first literary café to create its own prize in 1933, the Prix des Deux Magots. Awarded every year since then, it has become a reference. It has inspired other literary cafés in the capital to create their own awards. (Source)
These days there are a few writers and a lot of posers… people who want to seep in the remnant exhalations of author who once sat in those very chairs and looked out at the same things.
By the way, the online writing course A Writing Year will increase in price next week. If you want to improve your writing skills, join before January 15 to save $30 USD.
Then go to Paris and write at Les Deux Magots like the fancy pants you are. Extrême!
What makes a good literary café? Decent coffee, good street scene to gaze through, plenty of arm space indoors when it’s cold, and good food. The hot chocolate at Les Deux Magots is as good as Angelina Café. Seriously.
So Les Deux Magots ticks a lot of boxes.
Famous authors who loitered about Les Deux Magots: Simone de Beauvoir, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, James Joyce, Jean-Paul Sartre, Guillaume Apollinaire, Bertolt Brecht, Julia Child.
Also, just about every Paris memoirist in the modern day (including me) has sat there and scribbled out a few chapters.
I like Les Deux Magots because there is a magazine stand and bookstore next door. Nothing like picking up a new magazine and sitting down at Les Deux Magots with a coffee. I mean, heaven.
Except that time I picked up the September issue of Vogue, which is very heavy and it was a long walk home.
Nice signage is a plus.
In my pursuit to paint 100 Paris storefronts, I present #27… and #28 because I did it twice:
Les deux Deux Magots, if you will. Now in the shop.
I made a fun video of me painting them both. Very fast. I love me some fast-forwards. It’s my favourite video editing trick because it makes me look so accomplished and talented. The truth is I am a slow painter. Not impressive to watch. Speaking of slow…
That is a photo of me taken a long time ago in Paris for Psychologies Magazine. They did an article about slow living and featured me and my paintings (they even did my hair and makeup!), so I am famously slow. I thought it was funny to use this photo for my fast-forward painting process.
Self is always coming up with ways to quietly amuse self here at the household.
If you’d like to paint along, you can buy a printable of the sketch and paint one for yourself. Fun!
I liked painting Les Deux Magots for the umbrellas and flowers jutting out of balconies. It’s one of those Paris cafés that look best in the rain.
PS Remember, the online writing course A Writing Year will increase in price next week. If you want to have a gentle, fun, and delightful writing practice, consider joining before January 15 to save $30 USD. Then take that cash and buy journals and pens. Fun!
