Place Marcel Aymé: The Man Who Walked Through Walls

Follow Rue Saint-Vincent a little further from Au Lapin Agile and you'll arrive at Place Marcel Aymé. It looks like there's nothing here and you could easily walk right past, but look closely and you'll spot a very unusual sculpture: a man emerging from a wall.

The Man Who Walked Through Walls is a well-known story that has also been adapted for the stage. It tells of a man who suddenly gains the ability to pass through walls and plays pranks with it. For an imaginative story it has plenty of humor, but on reflection it is a rather sad one. As the name of the square suggests, its author is Marcel Aymé, a novelist and playwright often called a master of the short story and one of the defining writers of the 20th century.

The statue stands here because this is where Marcel Aymé lived. He lived in a house here until his death, and the actor Jean Marais is said to have made the sculpture to remember him. Is the figure vanishing, stuck in the wall as in the story's ending, or just emerging on the other side? The statue invites you to imagine. Take a souvenir photo in front of it.