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William S Burroughs in the cafe of the Beat Hotel in Paris Early 1960's
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Allen Ginsberg in Room 25 of the Beat Hotel 9 rue Git le Coeur Paris France
Christmas 1956
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William Burroughs in the cafe of the Beat Hotel, Paris circa. 1958/61
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Gregory Corso
Paris 1957
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Gregory Corso
Paris 1957
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William Burroughs in the Beat Hotel, Paris, France. 1958. Photo by Harold Chapman.
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William S Burroughs - Beat Hotel, Paris, 1960s
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Brion Gysin, American poet, writer and painter. He met William Burroughs in Tangier, and through him, Ian Sommerville.
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0023619
Allen Ginsberg, American poet in Room 25 of the Beat Hotel, Rue Git-le-Coeur, Paris, France. December 1956 |
0063995
Diane Barker and Mirtaud. The only room with a view of St.
Chapelle was 41,which was much sought after by artists and
writers for its quietness and good light.
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0063994
American Poets
Allen Ginsberg & Peter Orlovsky
December 1956
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0063993
Between each landing, on the spiral staircase, was a Turkish
lavatory. Telephone directories served as toilet paper.
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0063992
Leo in Room 38 of the Beat Hotel
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0063991
Room 32. Mirja, photographic model from Finland. 1963
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0063990
Beat Hotel Room 32. Mirja, from Finland; the favourite
model of many Left Bank photographers. 1963
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0063989
Room 34. Notice for casual work, painting and plastering at a Polyclinic in Paris.
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0063988
Room 32. (Harold's) I found my alarm clock in perfect working order on the top of a dustbin. All the books were
gifts from departing residents.
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0063987
"Kaja" poet,writer and painter from New Orleans. One evening she came to Room 29 and asked:"Do you want to photograph the face of suffering?"
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0063986
Barbara Shumsky in her room. She was a street-seller of the
"International Herald Tribune".
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0063985
Eyla with Mirtaud. Madame Rachou provided white wine for the occasion.
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0063984
Not everybody was sociable; Room 6 was occupied by a Canadian recluse, who, like others in the hotel, would lock herself in her room.
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0063983
Light Control Panel for each of the rooms in the Beat Hotel.
The bulb glowed dimly or brightly according to the amount of electricity beiing used.
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0063982
Barbara Shumsky
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0063981
Winter 1956. (Lto R) Alex Campbell; William Guthrie, the painter.Dixie Nimmo writes of artists in the hotel; " They rent for a few francs a day bare rooms smelliing of dust and Gauloises."
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0063980
William Guthrie. Winter 1956
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0063979
A mural with a World War 1 army-slang expression. People
could paint on the walls,decorate their rooms and have their own furniture.
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0063977
Verta Kali Smart in a dress which she made, playing an African piano of flattened bicycle spokes, called an "N'goma". Behind her is one of Bob's paintings.Jan 1958
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0063976
Madame Rachou, the "patronne" of 9, Rue Git-le-Coeur,described by William Burroughs as the "perfect
landlady" with "inflexible authority".
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0063975
Thelma Shumsky, who later became my wife.
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0063974
Keith in Rue Git-le-Coeur
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0063972
Almost but not quite! These 2 sharp-eyed nuns spotted us before we could carry out our plan. Gregory Corso turned away,embarassed, but I still took the picture, even though it was unsuitable for his conceptual book, "Church", for which he was collecting pictures of himself,behind nuns & monks, in the streets of Paris. Boulevard St-Michel spring 1957.
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0063971
Marlene, from West Berlin, in the Tabac St-Michel
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0063970
Bill Cheney from the USA; one of several photographers living in the Beat Hotel who did reportages. His lens ia a 300mm Novaflex Telephoto.
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0063969
Two Beat Hotel residents outside the Post Office in Rue Danton. (l to r);Pip Rau, an English painter and Stella Tohl, an American,who was the editor's assistant of the magazine
"Birth" . 1960
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0063968
Monsieur Dupres, the hotel cleaner, at the festival of Santa Lucia. He was often followed round the hotel by Mirtaud the cat, and an entourage of small children.
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0063967
William Burroughs, "Sherlock Holmes poker-faced impassive"...(Allen Ginsberg, in a letter to Peter Orlovsky). Young people would seek him out as their mentor and spend hours with him in the cafe.
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0063966
William Seward Burroughs, born in St.Louis 1914.Encouraged by Jack Kerouac whom he met in 1943, Burroughs was able todevelop a childhood interest in writing to become a novelist.
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0063965
The Dutch Painter, Guy Harloff, who had his studio in the hotel.
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0063964
William Burroughs,outside the Beat Hotel. 1958
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0063962
Early morning at Le Royal: local people drinking coffee at the circular "zinc" before going to work.
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0063961
Gregory Corso in Room 41, the garret. Behind him, on the walls which he painted a sombre brown, are reproductions of old masters.Here, he wrote the poem "Bomb", which was printed in the form of a mushroom cloud.
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0063960
The Left Bank, December 1956.The restaurant L'Alsace a
Paris at 2.00am in the Place St Andre-des-Arts.
.
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0063959
Brion Gysin,American poet, writer and painter. He met William Burroughs in Tangier, and through him, Ian Sommerville.
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0063958
Brion Gysin with his Dream-Machine, in Room 25 where he lived from 1959 to 1964..
.
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0063957
William Burroughs in the Beat Hotel in Paris, 1960.
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0063956
Whilst in the hotel, Burroughs worked on several novels including "Naked Lunch" in Room 15, and "Soft Machine".
In his literary autobiography, he writes: "In 1956 I went to London and took the apomorphine cure with Dr John Dent.
"Naked Lunch" would never have been written without Dr Dent's treatments.
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0063954
Piero Heliczer, poet of the "Dead Language Press, visiting the hotel for a free haircut.
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0063953
The "terrasse" of theTabac St-Michel was one of the favourite meeting places of people from the Beat Hotel. L to r:Cyclops Lester, Thomas Neurath, Thelma Shumsky.
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0063952
Thomas Neurath, son of Walter Neurath of Thames & Hudson, book publishers.In 1960, aged 19, he was living in the Beat Hotel and working for a publisher in Paris,before leaving to study at Cambridge University.
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0063951
Alex Campbell relaxing in the Monaco Bar, which was popular with the Beats..."My advice to the young men of Britain is, give up your job, come to Paris with old Campbell and live a life of Guts, Sex, Sin,Literature, Arts".
Before devaluation of the franc,the prices of drinks werepainted underneath saucers, and with each drink one oredered, another saucer was added to the pile.
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0063950
Cafe le Royal in the heart of St.Germain-des-Pres was the nightly meeting place of artists and homosexuals..."Blade-sharp hustlers. Gray old fag swindle...
Sweeping coiffures, every dyed hair counted, every advantage price-tagged"... Harold Norse wrote of Le Royal in "Residu", spring 1965.
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0063949
Diane Barker and American poet Angus Maclise
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0063948
At Diane Barker's party, Belgian born Olivia de Haulleville, a poetess whose pseudonym was "Om".
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0063947
William Burroughs,"Sherlock-Holmes poker faced impassive"...(Allen Ginsberg, in a letter to Peter Orlovsky.)
Youg people would seek him out as their mentor and spend hours with him in the cafe.
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0063945
Chez Jean, in Boulevard St-Germain; one of the few restaurants in Paris that still had a thick layer of sawdust on the floor. The meal was cheap - 250 old francs (approx. 25p)
and itinerant musicians would entertain at night.
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0063944
The cafe price list,after the devaluation of the franc. A black
coffee was 40 centimes. a large white coffee,55 centimes;
a small glass of red wine, 30 centimes; a Pernod, 1 franc.
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0063943
Sharon Walsh and Guy Harloff outside the hotel cafe.
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0063940
Art dealers came to the hotel offering to buy any walls with murals, but they had all been covered over with flowered wallpaper.
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0063939
Room 29. Jean-Marie Villanova and Ellen Silverman. two visitors having to share the only available chair. On the wall is a collage which I made after thenCuban Missile Crisis..
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0063938
Brion Gysin, American poet, writer and painter. He met William Burroughs in Tangier, and through him, Ian Sommerville.
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0063937
William Burroughs' hands, described by Anne Sharpley in 1963 as "narrow red" hands, which are "his only touch of colour".
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0063936
Dominique's room.
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0063935
Angry with journalists who called the hotel a "flea-bag shrine", Harold Norse used their expression to prophesy;
"The flea-bag shrine will be documented by art historians".
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0063934
Thomas Neurath.
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0063933
Gregory Corso behind a priest on the Ile da la Cite. Spring 1957
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0063932
Gregory Corso, like myself, was a great nun-collector. In Place de Furstenberg, St. Germain-des-Pres, he stepped nimbly behind this Sister of the Sacred Heart. Sprinig 1957
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0063931
The American poet, Allen Ginsberg, in front of a portrait of Arthur Rimbaud. Rimbaud, with Baudelaire, Lautreamont and later Artaud and Michaux, greatly influenced the Beats.
Christmas 1956
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0063930
William Guthrie and painting. Winter 1956
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0063929
Monsieur et Madame Laigle bought the hotel. Drawings like this were scraped off and painted over.
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0063928
Madame Rachou with Harold Norse.He asked me to take these pictures in January 1963, when,after 32 years, Mme Rachou "the bluehaired old mother of us all", retired and moved to a flat nearby. The hotel had been sold, the handle of the cafe door had been removed, and a notice in the window read : "Closed fro alteration". The Beat Hotel had ceased to exist.
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0063927
Madame Rachou with Harold Norse.He asked me to take these pictures in January 1963, when,after 32 years, Mme Rachou "the bluehaired old mother of us all", retired and moved to a flat nearby. The hotel had been sold, the handle of the cafe door had been removed, and a notice in the window read : "Closed fro alteration". The Beat Hotel had ceased to exist.
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0063926
View from Room 41.
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0063925
Madame Rachou, the "patronne" of The Beat Hotel.
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0063924
Room 41. Myself and "Cyclops" Lester, taken by delayed action release, with prints of Stella Benjamin and Gregory Corso.For a short time, I had an improvised dark room in an alcove no larger than a small wardrobe, blacked out with two blankets which I nailed up to the walls at night. I priinted with an enlarger bought in a flea market, which stood on a couple of orange crates nailed together.I washed my prints in the sink and hung them up to dry on a clothes-line in the room. My films were scraps given to me by a cine cameraman.
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0063923
Room 41.Shumsky and her Swedish friend Gun, who both
helped to sell my Polaroid pictures in the cafes. The bed served as a sofa during the day.
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0063922
Harold Chapman, photographer and author of The Beat
Hotel. Paris 1960s.
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0063921
Front of The Beat Hotel
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0063920
The street of The Beat Hotel.
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0063919
Kaja stored some of her paintings on the top landing, which was blocked by a folded mattress.
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0063918
Kaja, in an interview with Dixie Nimmo, said; "I came here to find artistic friendship and found only loneliness".
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0063917
View from the gabled window of Room 41. Washing could be hung out of windows at the back of the hotel.
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0063916
Corso, in Jack Kerouac's book, "Desolation Angels", was called "Raphael Urso". Kerouac spent a night in Room 41 and wrote of the experience;..."as I lay there on the floor he makes love to Nanette all night, as she whimpers"....
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0063915
In an interview in the hotel with Alain Jouffroy, Gregory Corso said..."we state openly in our work that we smoke marijuana.
But for us, marijuana is only of secondary importance. Poetry is the one essential thing".
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0063914
The door of Room 41, marked by drawing-pins..
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0063913
During my long stay in the hotel, I photographed several people who stayed in Room 40, the smallest room. With no table, one had to make do with knees at meal times.
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0063912
Room 40. Tom the Texan's typewriter.
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0063911
Eyla, a pin-up model for the French photographer Serge Jacques, poses for me at the top of the stairs, which was a favourite spot with photogrqphers for dramatic posed pictures.
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0063910
Dixie Nimmo and Kay Johnson - nom de plume - Kaja - outside the two top rooms, 40 and 41. Behind them is one of Kaja's paintings.
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0063909
Mirja.
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0063908
John Hammer avoids banging his head in the groove on the ceiling, formed by many less fortunate than him.
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0063907
Room 38. Liza Ames, Dixie's American wife.
l
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0063906
Room 38. Dixie Nimmo and Liza Ames' "kitchen" had two alcohol cookers and a camping gaz stove, which were the most practical means of cooking in the hotel.
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0063905
Room 38. Dixie Nimmo, West Indian poet and novelist. On the walls is part of his large art collection.
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0063904
Room 38. "Tea-time" in the Beat hotel. The large painting on the wall is by Mike Blake. Dixie Nimmo and Liza Ames kept
"open house" for young artisis and writers.
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0063903
Room 32. Uta, a German model, resting during a photographic session.
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0063902
Many of the walls were covered in graffiti of a philosophical
nature.
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0063901
Room 29, one of the rooms in which I stayed. The folders on the table are the beginnings of my documentation of "Les
Halles" and "Everyday Life" in France.Above are two of a series of poster pictures which I later exhibited at the Exeter College of Art.
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0063900
The studio of Dutch painter, Guy Harloff. Spring 1959
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0063899
The studio of Dutch painter, Guy Harloff. Spring 1959
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0063898
Patrick Shelley, the English sensualist painter, and Allen
Ginsberg, Room 25. Christmas 1956. Shelley introduced me to the Beat Hotel in the winter of that year.
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0063897
Ian Sommerville in his room.
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0063896
Mike Blake, English painter and stage director. Behind him is Ian Sommerville's new chromium-plated bicycle wheel.
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0063895
Bryon Gysin's Dream-Machine. Harold Norse, in "City Lights Journal", writes: "dreamachine spins around and round opening up hash visions and colors as it crashes the sight barrier and changes cells of the brain".
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0063894
William Burroughs' grey trilby.
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0063893
View from Room 29.
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0063892
View from Room 27
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0063891
The pictures of Dominique's room were commissioned by her parents after she had died in a car accident. She had been working in Paris as a film editor.
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0063890
Mural by "Goofy" Godfrey.
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0063889
Mural by "Goofy" Godfrey, in Barbara Shumsky's room.
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0063888
Ken Tindall, American writer and poet, who was working in the hotel on his novel,"The Arboretum". In "Left Bank this Month" he writes of Paris life: "I need no bottled pyre; I don't need a fix, I make my own clouds here".
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0063887
Tove, Ken's Danish wife.
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0063886
Harold Norse, a poet, writer and painter from the USA. He moved in to Bob and Ver's room long after they had left. In the "City Lights Journal" he wrote, in February 1963; "Last September I got Room 9 at 9, Rue Git-le Coeur on the 9th day of the 9th month.... In the cabbala, 9 is the number referring to initiates and prophets"....
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0063885
At Stella Tohl's party.
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0063884
A drawing in a "cell" room by "Goofy" Godfrey, an American
poet and painter. The Straw hats came from a flea market which, with Government surplus and the Salvation Army, was a main source of clothing for the Beats.
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0063883
Diane Barker in her room.
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0063882
Bob Grosvenor from Newport, Rhode Island, USA.
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0063881
Bob Grosvenor and Verta Kali Smart in their room, surrounded by objects from flea markets, which Bob later exhibited in a New York gallery, and sold as "objets trouves".January 1958
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0063880
January 1958. Verta Kali Smart, working on her article, "Inside the Beat Hotel", for "Left Bank This Month", which was sold to tourists at 300 francs a copy, in the streets of the
Latin Quarter.
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0063879
Verta Kali Smart from Philadelphia and Bob Grosvenor in Room 9. January 1958.
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0063878
"Cyclops" Lester with Bob Grosvenor's easel and paintings behind him, and Herb Kohl, at the "Fete des Rois". January 1958
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0063875
December 13th, at 7.00am,in Room 38.Having lit candles, made crowns of tinsel and wrapped themselves in sheets, Annika, Eyla and Liza were about to sing, knock on people's doors and offer them coffee and biscuits. It was the Nordic
festival of Santa Lucia, the patron saint ofopticians and photographers.
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0063874
Jean Swanson with experimental hairstyle.
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0063873
Jean Swanson in her"au pair" outfit. She looked after children on the Ile de la Cite.
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0063872
Jean Swanson and Mirtaud.
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0063871
Jean Swanson cutting hair in number 4, a "cell" roomon the first floor. At 400 francs a night, the "cells" were the cheapest rooms, with windows which opened on to the stairs and with no direct daylight. They contained a was basin with a cold tap, an iron bed, a chair, a small radiator, and a naked 25 watt bulb. There was one "cell" on each landing.
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0063870
The stair well. Owingto the less stringent laws in force at the time, the smoking of hashish and marijuana was, among some of the residents, a social activity like any other in the hotel. The distinctive smell would, day or night, drift from some of the ill-fitting doors on to the stairs..
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0063869
Madame Madeleine, a concierge from Place St-Michel, with Biquette.
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0063868
Left to right: Robin Page, Canadian painter; Peter Bishop, English journalist; Larry Yampolsky,news-reel cameraman;
Madame Rachou; Thomas Neurath; Peter Golding, London fashion designer; John Hammer. June 1960
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0063867
Diane Barker, an American model.
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0063866
Madame Rachou counting out 40 centimes, the price of a cup of coffee, for which Keith forgot to pay.
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0063865
Bob Grosvenor with tuba, "Pug" with guitar, and Verta Kali
Smart in headscarf. 1958.
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0063864
Madame Rachou, described by Dixie Nimmo as "pugnacious" and "kindly".
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0063863
Public telephones were not in telephone boxes, but in cafes.
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0063862
The main entrance of the hotel. The door, which was never locked, made a penetrating screech as it crashed shut, the sound of which could be heard on the top floor. Attempts to shut the door quietly would bring Madame Rachou out of her room to investigate, and, in the words of Harold Norse, she would, at night, "suddenly materialize, whitegowned and
stonefaced".
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0063861
The cafe door.
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0063860
The Beat Hotel; a thirteenth-class establishment; looking towards the Quai des Grands Augustins.
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0063859
Rue Git-le-Coeur.
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0063858
Thelma Shumsky from New York, on the corner of Rue de
l'Hirondelle and Rue Git-le-Coeur. She had just completed a cancer research project, collecting earth samples from all over the Middle East.
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0063857
William Guthrie in Rue Git-le-Coeur, winter 1956. In "Left Bank This Month", Verta Kali Smart wrote that the Beat Hotel was "impossible to get into unless you know the key people, say the right things, carry a canvas under your arm".
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0063856
American action painter William Morris, outside the Beat Hotel, 9, Rue Git-le-Coeur. He produced all the paiintings for an exhibition in one afternoon on the Quai des Orfevres.
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0063855
Rue Git-le-Coeur, which means "where lies the heart". Henry 1V, passing the street in his carriage on the Quai des Grands
Augustins, remarked to his companion: "Icy gist mon coeur", For he had a mistress living there.
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0063854
My Austin 7, which I would park on the Quai des Grands
Augustins at the end of Rue Git-le-Coeur. The car attracted large crowds, and people pushed messages and coins through gaps in the windows. Realising the car could be used as a source of income, I hung a billycan on the radiator
and stuck the best messages, which included poems and drawings, on the inside of the windows. People filled the billycan with food, small coins and cigarettes, until one day, the "day's takings" were stolen. I then founs an art student to mind the car for me, and we split fifty-fifty.
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0063853
Rue Git-le-Coeur, on the corner of the Quai des Grands
Augustins. Left to right Tove, Eunice Richards, Stella Tohl,
Keith, Ken Tindall, "Cyclops" Lester. The folding handcart was borrowed from the local "charbonnier" to collect Tindall's trunk from the Mistral.
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0063852
Outside the Mistral bookstore, in Rue de la Bucherie. Left to right: Ken Tindall, "Cyclops" Lester, Stella Tohl, George Whitman, Eunice Richards, and George's dog in the arms of Tove.
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0063851
Gregory Corso in the Mistral bookshop Spring 1957
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0063850
Eunice Richards and Volkmar von Alten in the reading room of the Mistral bookstore, summer 1959. Much frequented by Beats and intellectuals from abroad, the shop was, in the words of the American owner, George Whitman, a "Guest House" where newcomers to Paris could stay, and a "Free University", where seminars and poetry readings were held.
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0063849
On the road. A band of hitch-hikers resting in a popular meeting-place on the corner of Rue de la Huchette, opposite the bar Chez Popov.
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0063846
Nick Smart, from the USA, in Place St-Andre-des-Arts. He organised the selling of "Left Bank This Month", a one-shot magazine of poetry, prose and local information, produced in the Beat Hotel.
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0063845
Daytime at the Tabac St-Michel; one of the waiters whom at
night I would try to avoid. A loudly dressed conjurer changed my life: after a quick demonstration, I learned how to speedily take pictures of people before they became aware of the camera. This way, I earned a living at night as a Polaroid photographer, creeping round local cafes, dodging the waiters. An assistant would accompany me, talk to customers, smear each picture with a fixative, and collect the cash. During the day, I was free to wander the streets of Paris, photographing everyday life.
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0063844
"Cyclops" Lester outside the Tabac St-Michel. He was working in the Circulation Department of the New York
Herald Tribune.
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0063843
Thomas Neurath in a fashionable trench coat, with Diane Wells, an English schoolteacher. Pont St Michel, on which they are standing, joins the Ile de la Cite with the Latin Quarter.
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0063842
Ian Sommerville in Montparnasse.
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0063841
Francois Massal, photographing me after I had photographed a group of diners in the Restaurant Chez Jean. The Pentax, which he is using, was a reasonavly priced good camera, much sought after by serious but impecunious photographers. Francois was a keen documentary photographer of Paris Bohemian life.
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0063840
Peter Orlovsky, the American poet, outside the Restaurant Chez Jean, BoulevardSt-Germain. December 1956
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0063839
Peter Orlovsky and Allen Ginsberg in Rue St. Andre-des-Arts, December 1956. At that time, they were living in Room 25 of the Beat Hotel.
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0063838
Allen Ginsberg with Lee Forest in her room at the Hotel de Londres. December 1956
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0063837
Left to right: Peter Orlovsky, Allen Ginsberg, on a double-sided bench, Place St. Germain-des-Pres. December 1956
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0063836
Lee Forest, an American fashion model,winter 1956. Behind her is the 11th century pre-Gothic church of St.Germain-des-Pres, the oldest church in Paris.
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0063835
"the flea-bag shrine will be documented by art historians"...
(Harold Norse, in his article, "The Death of 9, Rue Git-le-Coeur", City Lights Journal, San Francisco 1963).
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0063833
Lunchtime in the cafe. Workmen could have their lunches
re-heated on Madame Rachou's gas stove. Peter Golding on the harmonica, Robin Page playing the guitar. June 1960
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0063834
Ian Sommerville in the Beat Hotel, Paris. 1960s.
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