Literary Tourism: Rome & Paris

We've written before at abcreads about literary tourism, but now we've finally done some!  This spring (we're a little behind in our report), your intrepid abcreads reporter journeyed to Europe.  Amongst the myriad of things to do in Paris & Rome, we found time for a bt of literary sightseeing.

Rome:


The Keats - Shelley House is right beside the Spanish Steps! The English Romantic poets were very smitten with Rome, & this site, 26 Piazza di Spagna, "is most famous for being the final resting place of John Keats, who died here in 1821, aged just 25, and to this day Keats’s bedroom is preserved as a shrine to his tragic story".  This is a small museum, but chock full of books & memorabilia.

Not strictly literary, but cool:



These posters were dotted throughout Rome, indicating that a movie had been filmed in the area & telling you a bit about the film.  Roman Holiday fans might guess that this sign was around the corner from La Bocca della Verità.

Paris:

It may seem morbid to some, but I can't imagine visiting Paris without stopping at their famous cemeteries, a stop at both Montparnasse & Père Lachaise were in order.








The tomb of Oscar Wilde has had to be surrounded by plastic to protect it.






Our "Latin Quarter Literary Loop" walking tour, recommended by Lonely Planet, included sites such as  Sartre & de Beauvoir's hang-outs (Les Deux Magots & Café de Flore),  #56 Rue Jacob - in 1783 treaty recognizing  American independence was signed;  the original Shakespeare & Company bookstore owned by Sylvia Beach; the home of Gertrude Stein & Alice B. Toklas (27 rue de Fleurus); & the literary cafés of Montparnasse (Le Dôme, Select', La Rotonde).












Have you done any literary sightseeing, or do you have any in mind?  Other books we consulted for our trip included Walks in Hemingway's Paris: A Guide to Paris for the Literary Traveler by Noel Riley Fitch and Forever Paris: 25 Walks in the Footsteps of the City's Most Illustrious Figures by Christina Henry de Tessan.  If you know any other good reads for the literary tourist, let us know!

Also see: "A Google Maps Tour of Famous Authors' Homes".  We walked by the site of Hemingway's apartment, too!