Les Deux Magots

**Texts:** *A Moveable Feast* by Ernest Hemingway and *Lolita* by Vladimir Nabokov. Les Deux Magots functions in literature as instant Saint-Germain shorthand: conversation, reputation, style, and the performed life of the mind. In Hemingway it belongs to the map of poor-writer Paris, where cafés are offices, shelters, and theaters of observation. In Nabokov, the name carries a flash of chic, cosmopolitan Paris. Writers choose it because the café does double duty. It is both concrete address and cultural emblem, equally useful for locating a character geographically and socially. A mention of Les Deux Magots tells the reader not just where someone is, but what kind of world they are entering.

6 Place Saint-Germain-des-Prés, 75006 Paris, France