 
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbary is another great summer read for artists. It tells the story of an unlikely friendship between Renee Michel, a 54 year old concierge who lives and works at a luxury Parisian apartment building, Paloma, the suicidal pre-teen intellectual who lives upstairs and their mutual fascination with the building’s new tenant, Kakuro Ozu, a Japanese film director.
It’s about the power of art to save lives, to make life bearable. I LOVED it, read it a few months ago and am still thinking about it today.
An excerpt:
My name is Renée. I am fifty-four years old. For twenty-seven years I have been the concierge at number 7, rue de Grenelle, a fine hôtel particulier with a courtyard and private gardens, divided into eight luxury apartments, all of which are inhabited, all of which are immense. I am a widow, I am short, ugly, and plump, I have bunions on my feet and, if I am to credit certain early mornings of selfinflicted disgust, the breath of a mammoth. I did not go to college, I have always been poor, discreet, and insignificant. I live alone with my cat, a big lazy tom who has no distinguishing features other than the fact that his paws smell bad when he is annoyed. Neither he nor I make any effort to take part in the social doings of our respective kindred species. Because I am rarely friendly — though always polite — I am not liked, but am
tolerated nonetheless…
|
