What’s the story behind the story? What inspired you to write Artsy Rambler: Mindful Journeys to Paris and Beyond?
I have a blog, Artsy Rambler, resurrected out of, and continued from, my earliest presence on the internet: a website (Journey on a Limb) I initiated in 2008, where I posted about my musings on art, travel, food, and some social issues. One day, it just vanished. Luckily, I had backups. This book, my first nonfiction, culls material—revised and reedited—out of those blogs that I organized within what I hope is a cohesive framework.
What’s your favorite genre to read? Is it the same as your favorite genre to write?
I have eclectic tastes in books, from literary to romance, and from serious to fun nonfiction. Maybe that’s why the fiction I’ve written also tends to cross genres.
What books are on your TBR pile right now?
I’m ready to listen to The Swerve by Stephen Greenblatt about a period in Renaissance history. I’m lightening it up with a fun read, Scent of a Truffle by French author Cecile Ganne.
What scene in your book was your favorite to write?
I can think of more than one scene, but the first that comes to mind is an open market on rue Mouffetard, where a group entertained the crowd with French songs and dances. I wrote: “The mood that morning was certainly ‘fun.’ But we also sensed spontaneity and unabashed joy—an atmosphere one would expect from a country fête, not a jaded Parisian venue. Or was flesh-and-blood reality challenging our stereotypical idea of a Parisian?”
Do you have any quirky writing habits? (lucky mugs, cats on laps, etc.)
Not really, unless you count obsessive-compulsive tendencies as quirky.
Do you have a motto, quote, or philosophy you live by?
Every book I’ve written has an epigraph of quotes I believe in. My favorites are in the book The Shade Under the Mango Tree: “Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other,” from Rainer Maria Rilke, and “Talent develops in quiet places, character in the full current of human life,” from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
If you could choose one thing for readers to remember after reading your book, what would it be?
The wonderful things art can do for us. Art, like language, is wired into our genes. We had art (i.e., Chauvet cave paintings) as a form of expression long before we had a writing system (possibly 3100 BC).
Evy Journey is the author of the new book Artsy Rambler: Mindful Journeys to Paris and Beyond
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