Marcel Aymé in Montmartre, 18th arrondissement, Paris, France: Literary Île-de-France #14

'"Histoire de Paris

Le Passe-Muraille

Il y avait à Montmartre[, au troisième étage du 75 bis de la rue d'Orchampt,] un excellent homme nommé Dutilleul qui possédait le don singulier de passer à travers les murs sans en être incommodé." Modeste employé de troisième classe dans un ministère, il se découvre fortuitement cet étrange pouvoir, et l'utilise d'abord pour rendre fou un sous-chef de service qui l'abreuvait d'humiliations. Vient alors, après quelques fruitueuses cambriolages signés "Garou—Garou", le tour du directeur de la Santé, impuissant à garder un prisonnier qui sort déjeuner dans le quartier et l'appelle innocemment pour régler la note... L'amour perd cependant notre héros, figé à l'intérieur de la muraille au sortir d'une nuit passionée. Depuis, "certaines nuits d'hiver, dans la sollitude sonore de la rue Norvins", seuls les accords de guitare joués par le peintre Gen Paul "pénétrent au coeur de la pierre comme des gouttes de lune"... L'âpre lucidité de Marcel Aymé s'en donne à coeur joie dans ce receuil de nouvelles paru en 1943, qui dénonce d'un coup discret de baguette magique, narquoise irruption du fantastique dans un quotidien trop bien réglé, la médiocrité du monde moderne.

'The Man Who Could Walk through Walls

In Montmartre, there was [on the third floor of 75b Orchampt Street], a splendid man called Dutilleul who had the strange gift of being able to go through walls with no difficulty whatsoever. A modest clerical assistant in a government department, he discovered this odd gift quite by chance, and as his immediate boss had deeply humiliated him, he first used it to drive him mad. After several fruitful burglaries signed "Will-O'-the-Wisp", the turn came for the director of the mental hospital, who was powerless in retaining an inmate who went for lunch in the neighborhood and innocently called him to pay the bill... However, our hero was lost to love, and he's now trapped inside the exit wall after a night of passion. Since then, "on certain winter nights, in the dead quiet of Norvins Street", only the chords of a guitar played by the painter Gen Paul "penetrate the heart of the stone like moon drops"... Marcel Aymé's bitter lucidity lends joy to the heart in this collection of short stories published in 1943, which, with one wave of a magic wand, brought a subtle eruption of the fantastic into the all too regulated, mediocre daily routine of the modern world.'

'ICI VÉCUT

L'ÉCRIVAIN

MARCEL AYMÉ

1902 — 1967'

'HERE LIVED

THE WRITER

MARCEL AYMÉ

1902 —1967'

This is now named after the writer.

 But the center of attention is the sculpture in the square, representing the end of the short story, when Tutilleul's powers desert him. (The face is that of Aymé himself.)

This was sculpted by Jean Marais in 1989.

 Marcel Aymé was buried in Cimetière Saint-Vincent, or Saint-Vincent Cemetery, in Montmartre.

 'Ses amis de Montmartre' | 'À Marie Antoinette'.

'Nous ne Vous Oublierons Jamais'

['We shall Never Forget You']

Addendum: My thanks to Dr Jean-Pierre Belleville for drawing my attention to this website linked below, which he runs:

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SAMA Société des Amis de Marcel Aymé