Shakespeare and Company is an amazing bookstore in Paris.
I found the above video, via Bookshelf Porn, here.
While in Paris I bought a couple beautiful editions of books there.
I just love being in that bookstore, it feels like home.
Antiquarian books at Shakespeare & Co., a Paris literary institution.
Everything here encourages creativity. A tiny enclosed bureau, lined with rugs and a blue painted chair, bears the sign: “Feel free to use the typewriter for your lovely writing/creative ventures.” Notes from customers are scrawled in all languages. “A friend told me if I ever felt lonely to come to Shakespeare & Company,” one says. Visitors are so effusive that a few years ago George installed what he calls a “mirror of love”, where hundreds more scribblings are pinned, from the surreal to the touching: “Dear Granny, I would like you to come to Paris with me”, reads one. “Books insulate this nest of wandering dreams”, reads another, “there should always be a place where stories reign over commercial enterprise.”
Walking into Shakespeare & Co.
Opened in 1951 by George Whitman, it was originally named “Le Mistral” but renamed to “Shakespeare and Company” in 1964 in tribute to Sylvia Beach’s bookstore [the original Shakespeare and Co.].[3] Today, it serves both as a regular bookstore and as a reading library, specializing in English-language literature. The shop was featured in the Richard Linklater filmBefore Sunset and in the Woody Allen film Midnight in Paris.[4]
…
Its premises, the site of a 16th-century monastery,[10] are at 37 rue de la Bûcherie, near Place Saint-Michel, just steps from the Seine, Notre Dame and the Île de la Cité.[10]
– Wikipedia
On the third floor of the bookstore Shakespeare & Co. in Paris
If you’re ever in Paris and get the chance, swing by this Parisian institution. Shakespeare and Co. is home to beautiful books that cover it from floor to ceiling. A true gift to the ex-pat community in Paris.
