Perhaps it's the peaceful atmosphere, but when the weather is nice some Parisians come here for a stroll or spend a whole afternoon reading on one of its park benches.
It was a pleasantly balmy spring day when I finally convinced H to come with me to the cemetery. A gentle breeze made the leaves quiver in the trees and my goth self shiver with excitement.
Anyone can come inside and detailed maps are downloadable from the web. We got one at the entrance (because I forgot mine at home!) for about 2 euros. It's highly advised that you either have a good sense of direction or a map because the place is HUGE (43 hectares to be exact), and you can lose time just trying to figure out where you are.
It is so wide and so old that there are sections where you can forget you are in Paris.
In fact, if you're not paying attention, you could become lost. It's one of those places I could see myself spending hours just exploring, going up and down hills, reading epitaphs and staring at the lovely monuments to the dead.
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| Going up. |
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| Going down... |
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| Going up. |
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| Going down. |
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| Going nowhere. |
The cemetery boasts of beautiful architecture from bourgeois families trying to outdo each other since the early 1800s, when Napoleon-I turned the former Jesuit hospice into a cemetery (then called the Cimetière de l'Est).
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| Bourgeois fer realsies. |
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| Chilling effigies of Grief. |
But the biggest attraction are the famous artists, celebrities and political figures buried here.
The most crowded areas were the tombs of La Môme...
And the larger-than-life frontman of The Doors.
(Whose death anniversary was, incidentally, just this week.)
In fact, some come to Paris just to pay him homage. To control the crowd, metal fences were installed... not that they help much. Some fans took to vandalizing the tree just across his tomb to scribble messages of undying love.
But there is no bigger monument of worship here as the sculpture of Sir Jacob Epstein for the final resting place of author, iconoclast, outcast Oscar Wilde...
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| The sphinx used to have a penis, but someone took it. |
Whose tomb is covered in kisses.
From a new generation of outcasts from around the world.
Which is perhaps fitting for the man who wrote the verses:
And alien tears will fill for him
Pity's long-broken urn,
For his mourners will be outcast men,
And outcasts always mourn.
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| The crematorium. |
But more than a place of pilgrimage for fans of the long departed, it is a place that affords one the opportunity to reflect on life.
To see the forest for the trees.
And think about who you want beside you until the very end.
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| "You and Me" |
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